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Battles were fought; forts were stormed; and hideous stories about stakes, scalpings, and death-songs reached Europe, and inflamed that national animosity which the rivalry of ages had produced. The disputes between France and England came to a crisis at the very time when the tempest which had been gathering was about to burst on Prussia.
They put stories in circulation as eloquent as those of the Boones, which told of all the scalpings, captivities, and murders of the Indians, magnified in a tenfold proportion. With them, the savages were like the ogres and bloody giants of nursery stories.
This incident is a source of pride to ourself beyond any thing experienced by any urchin besides. We boast of it frequently, and, being disliked therefor, commit several impromptu scalpings on our own account. Vagabonds unnumbered beg our hospitality, and get it. Some of these it would be difficult to determine, either as to profession or destination.
The claim was made that under the treaty of peace with Great Britain, that no reservation had been made in favor of any of the Indian tribes, or in favor of their claims to any of the lands they occupied; that under the treaty the absolute fee in all the Indian lands within the limits of the United States had passed to the several states such as Virginia, who had a legitimate claim to them, and later by cession of these states to the general government, and that congress "had the right to assign, or retain such portions as they should judge proper;" that the Indian tribes, having aided Great Britain in her attempt to subjugate her former colonies, and having committed innumerable murders, arsons and scalpings on the exposed frontiers, should now be required to pay the penalty for their crimes; that their lands and hunting grounds should stand forfeit to the government, and they be expelled therefrom.
Mr. Doolittle's rueful narrative treats mainly of miscellaneous murders and scalpings, interesting only to the sufferers and their friends; but he also chronicles briefly a formidable inroad that still holds a place in New England history.
While, gorged with food, they lay dozing on piles of branches in their smoky huts, where, through the crevices of the thin birch bark, streamed in a cold capable at times of congealing mercury, their slumbers were beset with nightmare visions of Iroquois forays, scalpings, butcherings, and burnings. As dreams were their oracles, the camp was wild with fright.
But when the earth came from beneath the snow, although it was still cold weather, they began again to range the forest far in every direction, and they found that the Indians, and the Tories also, were becoming active. There were more burnings, more slaughters, and more scalpings.
Kentucky at that time was the scene of repeated Indian raids, ambuscades, burning of homes, scalpings, and other atrocities. The Red Man was determined that his choicest Hunting Ground should not be possessed by the White Man. The Indians were met by such hardy and invincible scouts and frontiersmen as Daniel Boone, Simon Kenton and George Rogers Clark.
But, except for occasional Indian forays and for house-burnings and scalpings in the more remote districts, there were only two serious wars in the seventeenth century that against the Pequots in 1637 and the great War of King Philip in 1675-1676.
He had taught the Indians that he was as one of themselves, had omitted no means of securing their amity; had danced and sung with them and smiled approvingly on their butcherings and scalpings; and he had no right to imagine that they would believe him sincere in his promise to spare the prisoners. It was too late for him to cry "Kill me, but spare them!" after the massacre had commenced.
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