University of Virginia Library

Rowe's Tam.

“Your last, my son, is now before me, and
every sentence yields me pleasure, except that in
which you mention Amelia's fears on my account.
Assure her from me, that the moment any real
cause of alarm presents itself, I shall not be backward
in providing for the safety of myself and
those under my protection. It grieves me that
she should make herself unhappy in anticipating
evils that may never arrive. Let me intreat her,
through you, to banish every fear for the safety
of her father, and repose her trust in that merciful
Being who, in the operations of his providence,
never permits an evil to take place but for
the ultimate good of his creatures; and it is our
duty to submit without a murmur. I do not wish
it to be understood that the ordinary human
means of shunning an impending danger are to
be neglected: so far from it, I should conceive
that I was tempting the Almighty, to remain in a
place of danger, when I could retreat consistently
with duty. I repeat, that I will remove from
Mulberry-Grove the moment I apprehend any

danger from staying. Were it a tenable fortress,
the case would be different. Let this assurance
restore peace to the bosom of my child.

“I have just received an account of the unprofitable
contest at Queenston, and I lament to
add, that your brother George is again a prisoner
of war. A letter from Lewiston assures me that
my noble boy behaved in a very gallant manner
throughout the whole affair, and this in some measure
reconciles me to his renewed captivity. I
received a letter from him while at Buffalo, giving
an account of the fortunate enterprize which
restored him to liberty, with above thirty others,
only five days before the Queenston affair; but
as you must already be in possession of the particulars,
perhaps from his own pen, I shall pass
them over unnoticed.

“You wish me to “continue a regular detail
of war events on the western frontier.” Indeed,
you enjoin on me a hard task; for the situation of
Mulberry-Grove is not the most eligible for a political
observatory. I am sometimes indebted to
a Boston newspaper for accounts of events passing
in this state. But I will comply with your request
as far as practicable, and give you a brief
account of every interesting occurrence in the
order I receive them.

“On the nineteenth of September, general
Harrison, pursuant to orders from the war department,
relinquished the command of the Northwestern
army to brigadier-general Winchester, a
gentleman of great respectability and merit, but
who does not appear to possess the confidence of
the Kentuckians like Harrison. Great discontent
and murmuring were produced among the troops
when they were informed of the change; but on

being addressed by Harrison, they appeared better
satisfied. An express from the seat of government,
however, has since reached him, with
dispatches from the same department, appointing
him to the command of all the troops which have
been called into service from the western states.
He has, therefore, again taken the command of
the Northwestern army, and, it is expected, will
immediately adopt the most efficient measures to
regain Detroit and proceed into Upper Canada.

“Among the volunteers from Kentucky, now
under Harrison, are the following members of
congress: Samuel Hopkins, major-general; Richard
M. Johnson, commanding a battalion of
mounted rangers; John Simpson, captain; William
P. Duval, captain; Samuel M`Kee, private;
Thomas Montgomery, private. To the honor of
that patriotic state, I can also add, that numbers
of the most wealthy and respectable private citizens
are in the ranks, who endure all the privations
necessarily attendant on a military life, with
a degree of subordination never exceeded by regular
troops.

“During the attack on Fort Wayne by the Indians,
mentioned in my last, it is said that the
commander, captain Rhea, proposed to surrender;
but his subalterns threatened to put him to
instant death if he made the proposition again.
It was supposed he intended to surrender the fort
and make his escape to Detroit. The moment
general Harrison arrived, captain Rhea was arrested,
and given liberty to resign, or to stand his
trial. He chose the former. The firmness of
these officers, no doubt, saved the garrison from
indiscriminate massacre.

“Some particulars respecting another expedition
against that post, have just come to my knowledge.
About the middle of September, two Indians
arrived at Detroit with a letter, which they
found on an express whom they had intercepted
and killed, and which had been sent by the commander
of Fort Wayne to general Harrison, requesting
succors, and stating that his situation
was critical. The British commander, on the receipt
of the letter, immediately sent about one
thousand Indians, who had arrived at Detroit
since its surrender, with a few regulars, to attack
the fort; who proceeded until they came within
sixteen miles of an American army, which they
learned, from a prisoner their spies took, to be
Harrison's. They then precipitately retreated,
leaving much of their ammunition, &c. on the
ground.

“Harrison, I understand, is now employing
himself with the greatest zeal, in arranging depots
of provisions, clothing, and ammunition;
opening roads, building boats, erecting block-houses,
&c. preparatory to his march to the borders,
whither he shortly proposes to proceed.
Several of the Miami and other Indians have
come in to him, and thrown themselves on the
mercy of the government, agreeing to abide by
the decision of the president in relation to them,
whatever that may be.

“The accounts from Detroit are not very
agreeable; almost every day furnishes instances
of dishonorable conduct in British officers, who
openly and shamefully violate the articles of capitulation.
The inhabitants are daily plundered
of their private property, and robbed of every
thing to which their haughty oppressors take a

liking. But the barbarities of the Indians are
shocking beyond belief; even the sanctity of the
tomb is violated, and dead bodies have been unearthed
and stripped of their scalps, which these
unprincipled wretches have then sold to their
more unprincipled employers; thus at once robbing
the dead and cheating the living! The British
have almost disrobed Detroit of every thing
valuable, and carried it within their lines. They
have no expectation of being able to hold the
place, and are therefore removing the cannon and
ammunition. The fort is now garrisoned by one
hundred British regulars.

“I can now positively and safely contradict
the report that I hinted at in my last, of the defeat
and massacre of a detachment from general
Perkins' command at the river Huron. The circumstances,
which I have since learned, and
which may be depended upon, are as follows:
General Perkins had detached captain Cotton,
with a party of ninety men, to the peninsula of
Sandusky, to secure some salt said to be there.
On the arrival of the party, they discovered some
Indians, whom they immediately attacked; the
Indians retired until they were joined by another
party, when a brisk fight took place; and had it
not been for some misunderstanding of the orders,
it is probable the whole of the Indians would
have been killed or taken, as the Americans had
outflanked and nearly surrounded them. It is,
however, satisfactory to add, that the Indians
were beaten; and, though the number killed
could not be correctly ascertained, there is no
doubt but their loss greatly exceeded ours, which
was six killed and ten wounded, none of them
dangerously. Captain Cotton has returned to
camp.

“Captain Elliott is making great exertions to
secure the command of Lake Erie, for the attainment
of which important object a great number
of ship-carpenters are put in requisition. May
Heaven crown their labors with success, and
make them instrumental in restoring a speedy
peace.

“You request some further observations on
the subject of war, and seem not to be entirely
satisfied with my attempts to reconcile it with religion.
Perhaps you do not sufficiently keep in
view the ground on which I found my argument—
viz. the present degenerate state of man. Evil is
in the world; how it gained a footing here, does
not belong to the present subject. It is sufficient
for my purpose to know, that all the operations
of Providence tend to its removal; it was for this
purpose alone that revelation was given, and it is
for this purpose alone that wars, pestilences, famines,
&c. are permitted to ravage the earth.

“There never were but two ways or methods
by which the operations of Providence have been
carried on: the one by extraordinary, the other by
ordinary means; the former may be termed miracles—the
latter, natural occurrences. Miracles
have long since ceased, because they interfere
with the free will of man, forcing an acquiesence
from the understanding, without reforming
his heart. The only possible manner, then, in
which evil can be gradually removed from the
world, (consistently with that freedom of will
which makes us men) is by spiritual instruments;
and, as it would be out of order for good spirits to
be employed in such dirty work, and as evil spirits
always stand ready to do such work, the Almighty
permits them, under proper restraints, to

stir up nation against nation—set the great cauldron
boiling, and take the scum for their trouble.

“But you will ask, if the removal of evil is all
that is intended in the permission of wars, pestilences,
famines, and the rest, how happens it that
the good suffer equally with the bad?

“To this I answer—The good are permitted
to be thus afflicted in order to make them still better,
by increasing their patience, humility, and
dependence on Heaven. And when they are
finally removed from this life by one of these
same instruments, they enter into a state of never-ending
felicity, where these instruments can no
more reach them or afflict them. With the wilfully
wicked the case is different; by permitting
them to be cut off, the hereditary love of evil
which they derived from their parents, (and which,
instead of combatting and subduing, they have
increased by unrestrained indulgence) is thus arrested
and prevented from descending to a numerous
progeny, who might in their turn transmit
the accumulated load to the next generation,
until the world would be again reduced to that
state which once caused its destruction by a deluge.

“But, admitting all this, you may then ask—
How can good men conscientiously assist in this
work of devils, for the performance of which
there are, alas! too many instruments instigated
by passions altogether suitable for the diabolical
employment?

“This brings us to the main point of the subject,
and will lead me to notice a very nice distinction.

“No good man can, conscientiously and voluntarily,
take up arms in an offensive war, unless

he do so to prevent the still greater evil of disobeying
those in authority, (which we are expressly
forbidden by religion to do) and thereby
promote civil dissentions. But in a war altogether
defensive, like the one in which we are now
engaged, every good man, I believe, may safely
take a part, and do so from the purest motives. I
must insist upon it, that in our present low state
of goodness, means correspondingly low must be
resorted to, to defend our just and unalienable
rights. Were we without sin, other means would
doubtless be provided by Providence; as we are
not, we have no right to expect them. It is surely
justifiable self-defence to strike a weapon from
the hand of an assailant; or, if that weapon is
raised against us, to strike off the arm that wields
it. Canada is that arm—the Indian scalping
knife is the weapon it wields. If we cannot repel
the weapon, let us attempt to cut off the arm.

“I have already given you the substance of a
conversation I once had on this subject with general
Brown, before he had entirely discarded
the prejudices of the sect in whose tenets he was
educated. He was then a quaker, and I believe
a most excellent man; nor is he the less so for
being now in the field, ready to chastise the enemies
of freedom. It is possible that some people
might draw from that conversation a mistaken
inference, and imagine that I was combatting
the principle of peace itself, when I was only
contending against the enthusiastic delusions
which men have fallen into by mistaking the genuine
sense and meaning of our religion. If a
Millenium is ever to bless the world, or the Saturnian
age to return, I am confident that it will
not be brought about exclusively by Quakers;

it must be effected by a radical change and reform
in the heads and hearts of mankind. When
such a reform becomes so extensive as to find its
way into our political bodies, its effects will be
exhibited in the sphere of politics. Politicians
will then forget all party distinctions, and the
friends of peace will discard that enthusiasm
which assumes credit for ideal virtues that cannot
be practised. They will be men on a proper
level with the business of the world in which
they live, and, therefore, Christians, truly sane
and efficient.

“The Quakers all profess to be the disciples
of Peace; and, in order not to be mistaken by
the world on this point, have assumed a peculiar
garb, speech, and manners. But is it not highly
probable that many among them may be merely
externally friends; men who indulge their unbridled
passions in the political contests around
them, their bosoms burning like a fiery furnace,
with every malignant and furious passion that is
common to the wicked? If there are such, what
will the external garb of peace avail them, while
they have no peace within? What can avail the
cut of their coat, the nicety of their grammar, or
the peculiarity of their calendar? To such I would
say, “Assume the military uniform of your country;
in that character you may become useful;
let your furious passions, your subtle selfish cunning,
operate against the open enemies of your
country, rather than expend their malignant influence
on your neighbors and fellow-citizens. Ye
are cut-throats internally—you may as well be
so externally: your damnation would not be
more certain.”

“The creed or discipline that gives no latitude
for the exercise of private judgment, is a
wrong one; for the soul that is panting for war,
should no more be restrained by the discipline of
his sect from taking the field, than one of a contrary
disposition should be compelled to go into
it. The man who shoulders his musket conscientiously,
may be a faithful christian. The man
who cheerfully pays others because he thinks
that they are fitter than himself, by nature or education,
for such purpose, may also be a good
christian. The quakers say, he only who resists
not, but trusts to Heaven for protection, is a good
christian.

“Whatever be a man's religious or political
creed, if he be honest and peaceable, uncontroled
by selfish interests, prejudice, and bigotry, an
observer of the golden rule, and a lover of usefulness—every
good christian ought to hail him
as a brother, whether his coat be drab or scarlet—
whether he has conscientiously taken up arms,
or conscientiously refused to take up arms.

“The sect of the quakers tacitly declare to all
others, you must join, or fight for us. Now, it
may happen, and indeed does actually happen,
that very many do not approve of the creed and
discipline of the quakers; the option then seems
to be rather a hard one, and inconsistent with the
general principles of justice; for if, in order to
avoid war, we go into society, we must violate
conscience; if we do not go in, but go out to war,
we are reprobated as anti-christians, even when
fighting their battles, which they unjustly refuse
to do; so that we appear in a dilemma, from
which there are no means of release but in breaking
down the creed itself.

“When we speak of a man trusting in Heaven
for protection, we should always think of a protection
according to the proper and regular order
established by law, not in an imaginary state of
things, taking rise in delusions. On this point
we have an excellent lesson from Scripture, where
Satan, by an affectation of such a trust, desires
the Redeemer to cast himself from the pinnacle
of the temple; the reply to which should be always
present to every christian, for it expressly
forbids us thus to tempt the Almighty, by any improper
or eccentric departure from the established
order even of external or natural things.

“The true state of the case is this: when the
necessity for war shall cease, then war will cease,
and not before; for whilst there are bad men to
commit aggressions, the best of men must defend
themselves, and by carnal weapons too, if necessary.
A contrary doctrine is just as absurd as
for a shepherd to go home with his dog, and trust
to Providence to protect the sheep, when surrounded
by wolves.

“But I shall trespass on your patience, and
therefore adieu for the present.