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Updated: June 19, 2025
To the Senate of the United States: In compliance with a resolution of the Senate of the 22d of February last, "requesting the President of the United States to cause to be collected and communicated to the Senate at the commencement of the next session of Congress the best information which he may be able to obtain relative to certain Christian Indians and the lands intended for their benefit on the Muskingum, in the State of Ohio, granted under an act of Congress of June 1, 1796, to the Society of the United Brethren for Propagating the Gospel among the Heathen, showing as correctly as possible the advance or decline of said Indians in numbers, morals, and intellectual endowments; whether the lands have inured to their sole benefit, and, if not, to whom, in whole or in part, have such benefits accrued," I transmit a report from the Secretary of War with the accompanying documents.
Byle, who, finding his words unheeded, gave no sign of discomfiture, and went on talking to himself in the friendliest manner. "Here we are, five miles above the mouth of Muskingum, making batteaux to go five million miles south of the jumping-off place of creation! Will I go with you, friends and fellow-citizens? No, not by a jugful. Do you think Byle is a plumb fool?
He watched till the feathered tuft of an Indiana head appeared from the cave. The call of the wild turkey sounded, and at the same time the sharp crack of Wetzel's rifle noted the Indian's death. It was Wetzel's habit in the autumn to go on a long hunt into the Ohio country. Once he went as far as the Muskingum, some ninety miles from Wheeling, when he came on a camp of four Indians.
After listening to a short speech from him, they fired a salute, and set off, as the lettering on their leading wagon made known, "For the Ohio Country." It was eight weeks before they reached the headwaters of the Beautiful River, and began to build boats to float down its current to the mouth of the Muskingum.
They were parties with the Wyandots and Delawares and other tribes to the treaty of Fort Harmar, Ohio, at the mouth of Muskingum, in 1789, whereby the Wyandots ceded large tracts of land in the southern part of that state to the United States government, and were granted in turn the possession and occupancy of certain lands to the south of Lake Erie.
When the Moravians removed beyond the Ohio, they settled on the banks of the Muskingum, made clearings in the forest, and built themselves little towns, which they christened by such quaint names as Salem and Gnadenhutten; names that were pathetic symbols of the peace which the harmless and sadly submissive wanderers so vainly sought.
This murder spread great alarm through the sparse settlements and revenge was not only resolved upon, but a handsome reward was offered for scalps. Major McMahan, who often led the borderers in their hardy expeditions, soon raised a company of twenty men, among whom was Lewis Whetzel. They crossed the Ohio and pursued the Indian trail until they came to the Muskingum river.
Washington, out of a full heart, for he dearly loved the West, said of them: "No colony in America was ever settled under such favorable auspices as that which has just commenced at the Muskingum. Information, property, and strength will be its characteristics. I know many of the settlers personally, and there never were men better calculated to promote the welfare of such a community."
By 1780 they began to plant camps and cabins on the rich bottom-lands of the Miamis, the Scioto, and the Muskingum; and when they heard that the British claims in the West had been formally yielded, they assumed that whatever they could take was theirs. With the technicalities of Indian claims they had not much patience.
"Well, to make a long story short, several of these boys are desirous of going West next summer and spending their vacations instead of East, and he called to ask me about the Muskingum Camp. He is going there, Kate, and he'll be near us. I made him write to Mr. Adams your father's man who did everything for us, and ask him to reserve a place for the Scouts. I'm just wild for summer to come.
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