CHAPTER I.
INDIAN TOWNS ON THE OHIO.
When the whites first penetrated the beautiful valley of
the Upper Ohio, they found it occupied by numerous and
powerful tribes of hostile savages, who held it more as a
common hunting ground than a place of permanent abode.
With the exception of Logstown, eighteen miles below the
forks of the Monongahela and Alleghany; a Mingo village
at the mouth of Beaver; a Shawanee town near the Great
Kanawha, and another near the Scioto, but few native settlements
were to be found on the banks of the "River of
Blood:" the fearfully significant name given by some of the
tribes of Indians to the beautiful stream which sweeps along
our Western border.
Tradition tells of many a bloody battle along the shores of
this grand old river, over whose sylvan banks has so often
rushed the crimson tide of Indian massacre. Many, indeed,
are said to have been the warlike feats here enacted, between
bands of fierce and savage warriors. Here it was that the
stern Iriquois met the equally determined and relentless
Massawomee, and maintained those long and bloody strifes
which ultimately imparted to the whole region the very appropriate
title of "dark and bloody ground."
[1]
The most powerful confederacy of native tribes, found here
by the French and English, was the Massawomees, so called
by the Indians of Eastern Virginia, to whom they were a
constant source of dread and alarm.
The Massawomees occupied, to the exclusion of almost
every other tribe, the entire region stretching from the Blue
Ridge to the Ohio river.[2]
The encroachments of the whites
compelled them gradually to retire, until at last they were
forced over the Alleghanies, leaving the "Valley" unoccupied,
save by occasional predatory bands of Southern tribes.
But the march of the Anglo-Saxon westward was slow in
the extreme. It was not until more than one hundred years
had elapsed from the settlement of Jamestown, that a project
was conceived for crossing the great rocky barrier, whose
frowning heights seemed to shut out all communication between
the primitive settler and the region west.
In 1710, Lieutenant Governor Spottswood, whese military
genius, as displayed in the campaigns of Marlborough, had
won the esteem of his sovereign, and secured him the appointment
of Colonial Governor in Virginia, determined to explore
the trans-montane region. He had heard of the great beauty
and extent of the country lying between the parallel mountains,
but of the region beyond the Alleghany nothing definite
could be ascertained, as the most daring adventurer had
rarely tried to surmount its rugged height, and scan the outspread
landscape which opened its charms to the setting sun.
Equipping a company of horsemen, Gov. Spottswood headed
it in person, and commenced his march from Williamsburg in
great pomp. Nothing occurred to mar the interest of the
occasion, and in due time the expedition reached the Valley.
The governor was enraptured with the view. Bright flowers,
rendered doubly beautiful by the transparent purity of the
atmosphere and the deep serenity of the azure heavens,
covered the ground in almost every direction. Amid forests
of fragrant trees, or deep hid in perfumed alcoves,—spots
more enchantingly beautiful than were ever graced by Calypso
and her nymphs; they found those mysterious Hygeian
fountains whose health-preserving properties now enjoy a
world-wide fame. Pushing on, the expedition at length reached
the base of the Alleghanies, and struggling upward through
rugged defile, and over frowning precipice, the intrepid governor,
with his little party, at length gained the summit of
that great mountain barrier. Never, perhaps, before had the
voice of civilized man broken the solitude which regined
around. The point attained, commanded a magnificent view
of the outspread country beyond. It was one of the highest
peaks of the great Appalachian range; and gazing down into
the illimitable wilderness, they there resolved that the whole
extent should be peopled, and the forest be made to blossom
as the rose. How well the spirit which prompted that resolution
has been carried out by the descendants of the Virginia
colonists, let the eight or ten millions of happy and
prosperous people who now throng the great Valley of the
West answer.
After the return of Governor Spottswood and his party,
he established the "Transmontane Order, or Knights of the
Golden Horse-Shoe," giving to each of those who accompanied
him a miniature golden horse-shoe, bearing the inscription,
"Sic jurat transcendere Montes."[3]
