Ohio History Journal

EDITORIALANA.

VOI. XXVI.       No. 1.

JANUARY, 1917

TARHE AND THE ZANES. The Editor of the QUARTERLY has seen occasional references to the tradition or fact, if it be the latter, that Isaac Zane married a daughter of Tarhe, the Crane. Learning that General Robert P. Kennedy was familiar with and an authority on this matter, having gotten his in- formation at first hand from members of the Zane family, we wrote the General concerning the same and received the following reply, which we regard worthy of permanent preservation. BELLEFONTAINE, OHIO. MY DEAR MR. RANDALL:- In answer to your inquiry concerning Isaac Zane and Tarhe, the Crane, my information comes from different sources. Of course the capture of Isaac Zane and his long and continued residence with the Indians has passed into undisputed history. There is one statement in my article--one published some time ago in a local paper-that I think I should correct, and it relates to his release and return to Virginia, and his election to the Virginia House of Burgesses, and his subsequent return to Ohio. Information since writing that article persuades me that that is an error, and that Isaac Zane (our Isaac) did not return to Virginia, but that he remained with the Wyandots, and that the Isaac Zane who was elected to the House of Burgesses was another Isaac Zane,-a member of the same family which remained in Virginia, -and of course a rela- tive of the Zanes of Wheeling and Ohio. Now as to Isaac Zane and his marriage. Of course we understand that in the absence of positive his- tory, made fully of record -there is much tradition in the history of the Indian tribes. It has long been the family history of all the Zanes that Isaac who was captured in his youth and brought up and remained with the Wy- andots was adopted by the Chief and made a member of the Chief's family - and it was a part of that well understood history that he mar- ried what they were pleased to call an Indian princess, the daughter of the Chief. That he was in the family of Chief Tarhe is almost unquestioned for Tarhe was the Wyandot Chief in this section of Ohio for many (146)

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years,-his home town being Solomonstown, near to and just south of

Richland in this county - and somewhat known by all persons trading

and trafficking with the Indians.

Isaac Zane was captured and carried away from Virginia in the

year 1762, being at the time nine years of age and being the youngest

of five brothers. He was carried to Buffalo, thence to Detroit, thence to

Sandusky, and to what is now Logan County. His brother Jonathan,

who was captured with him, was ransomed and released and returned to

Virginia.

Isaac was adopted into the family of the Chief of this particular

tribe and like hundreds of other captives became enamored of Indian

life,--and sometime in 1796 or 1797 must have married for in 1786

when General Logan came from Kentucky to destroy the Indian towns

in the Mad River Valley, Zane was living in what is now Zanesfield,

and what was then his home protected by a fort, or blockhouse, and had

some four or five children. He was not disturbed, it being understood

that he was friendly to the whites. His eldest daughter married William

McCulloch, the eldest of the three McCulloch brothers, William, Solomon

and Samuel, all of whom were brothers of Ebenezer Zane's wife of

Wheeling.

Before the time of his (McCulloch's) marriage, Tarhe, the Crane,

had removed his village from Solomontown to the crossing of the Hock

Hocking, at Lancaster, and it is family tradition that William McCulloch,

who with his brother Jonathan was assisting Ebenezer Zane in cutting

the road from Wheeling to the Limestone, there met the daughter of

Isaac Zane, Nancy, who had gone to the home of Tarhe, her grandfather,

on a visit and they were married in the year 1797,-and afterward

lived for a time at Zanesville where Noah Zane McCulloch, their son,

was born in 1798, being the first white child born in that county.

William McCulloch and his two brothers afterward moved to Logan

County, and settled near Zanesfield where Isaac Zane then lived.

After the treaty of Greenville Isaac Zane was granted land by the

Government for his services and located the land he was then occupy-

ing at Zanesfield, -of which he was practically cheated by trickery, but

finally obtained the most of it. It is well known by the family that

Isaac Zane's wife while an Indian was very fair and white and a very

handsome woman and all of her children, especially her daughters, were

very handsome women, and all married distinguished men.

It has always been understood by the family that the mother of

Tarhe's wife was a white woman captured by the Indians with her

young daughter, and that she was the wife of the Chevalier Durante,

a French Canadian.

The wife was released but the daughter was held and afterwards

married the young chief Tarhe-and from this union there descended a

most distinguished family of children-the only child and daughter of

Tarhe and his white wife becoming the wife of Isaac Zane.

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Some writer a short time since told a story of Tarhe and his resi-

dence at Upper Sandusky-of his drunkenness and his marriage to

someone there and his leaving a half-witted son.

This I don't think has a single particle of truth in it as Tarhe's

character was too well known to justify any such statements.

Now I have given you family tradition and I am going to give you

family history.

Judge Noah Zane McCulloch was for many years one of the most

distinguished citizens of our county, the eldest born son of William

McCulloch who married the eldest daughter of Isaac Zane. He was a

man of wonderful mind and memory, and he has repeatedly told me of

the Zane family and especially of his grandfather Isaac Zane who died

in 1813, when Judge McCulloch was fifteen years old.

He gave the history of Isaac Zane's marriage which I have given

you here,-as being with the daughter of Chief Tarhe, of course he

remembered the death of his father which took place at the battle of

Brownsville (Detroit) where Capt. Wm. McCulloch commanded a com-

pany of Scouts, and was killed in the battle.

Mrs. Catherine Dawson was the daughter of Robert Armstrong who

married another daughter of Isaac Zane, and Mrs. Dawson always said

that she was born at Solomontown which had been the village of her

grandfather, Chief Tarhe.

In the year 1876 Dr. James Robitaille, formerly Treas.-Genl. of

Canada, came to visit his half sister, Mrs. Genl. Isaac S. Gardiner-my

wife being a daughter of General Gardiner I paid him a good deal of

attention and took much pains to show him around, driving him to

various points.

His brother Robert Bobitaille was a Canadian of considerable wealth,

who came to this country as a trader in furs, etc. He became enamored

with Elizabeth Zane, the youngest daughter of Isaac Zane, and married

her, and opened the first store ever established in this section of Ohio,

about the year 1795. His store was at what is now Zanesfield. To this

union two sons were born, Robert in 1796, and Dr. James in 1798. In

the year 1802 Robitaille died leaving a widow and two sons.

These sons were cared for by their grandfather Isaac Zane until

their mother Elizabeth married James Manning Reed, the son of Seth

Reed the founder of Erie, Penn., who had come out here to occupy

the lands granted for service in the Revolution.

In 1817 or 1818, the uncle of the two Robitaille boys came out from

Montreal, Canada, and persuaded the boys to return with him, which

they did.

Dr. James was at the time of his visit 78 or 79 years old and ex-

ceptionally bright with a wonderful memory for locations, etc., and it

was a pleasure for me to accompany him for he was an encyclopedia of

information as to dates and locations of our early history.

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Editorialana.                       149

 

His grandfather Isaac Zane had been buried in 1813 - and of course

he attended the funeral.

He gave me the family history of Isaac Zane and his wife - whom

of course he distinctly remembered and told me of the marriage of

Isaac Zane to the daughter of Tarhe, who he said was his great-grand-

father. At the time he left for Canada they were just cutting the brush

out of the main street of Bellefontaine the new village.

There died here lately Mrs. Garwood, a grand-daughter of Wm.

McCulloch, the son-in-law of Isaac Zane, and she and her brothers who

visited her some time since, were full of the family tradition as I have

given it to you, both of them being between 80 and 90 years old.

P. Zane Grey, of Columbus, uses the story of Zane's marriage to

the Chief's daughter, but I think he does not give the name of the father

of Isaac's wife. (His book is "Betty Zane").

Grey gives an account of the attempted escape of Isaac and his

recapture by the Chief's daughter,--all of which I think fiction for

Isaac did not care to escape, and never attempted to do so.

If I have given you any information of value I shall be glad of

it. It is written quite hurriedly, and quite disconnected possibly-but

I have not had time to hunt up any histories and I presume that you

wanted something not found in histories as we understand it.

ROBT. P. KENNEDY.

P. S.--I should have said that Robert Armstrong, Mrs. Dawson's

father, went from Solomontown to Wyandot County and became head

chief or chief man of the Wyandots, and remained with them until his

death. If I am not mistaken he went with them to Kansas in 1844.

 

A LOGAN MONUMENT.

The unveiling of the Cresap Tablet, and the erection of a log cabin

at Logan Elm Park has revived the interest, of the people residing in

the vicinity of the Elm, in the memory and speech of the Mingo chief.

This interest has found expression in some of the newspapers of Picka-

way county, and the suggestion is freely expressed that a monument

or tablet should be erected near the Elm that bears the name of Logan.

Curiously enough this idea of a monument to Logan was proposed by a

correspondent in the year 1843--nearly three-quarters of a century

ago--in the "American Pioneer," a monthly periodical, as the title

page announces, "devoted to the objects of the Logan Historical Society,"

and published in Cincinnati. The communication is in the form of the

following poem, written by Joseph D. Canning:

 

EPITAPH FOR THE LOGAN MONUMENT.

Logan! to thy memory here,

White men do this tablet rear;

On its front we grave thy name -

In our hearts shall live thy fame.

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While Niagara's thunders roar,

Or Erie's surges lash the shore:

While onward broad Ohio glides,

And seaward roll her Indian tides,

So long their memory, who did give

These floods their sounding names, shall live.

 

While time, in mindness, buries low

The gory axe and warrior's bow,

0, Justice! faithful to thy trust,

Record the virtues of the just!

 

Mr. Canning's poem is followed in the volume (1843) by the fol-

lowing "Quere.--When will the Logan monument be built, if our

citizens relapse into their late habits of speculation and extravagance,

as means of doing so increase? Will they not always feel too poor for

any enterprise of the kind?"

 

 

 

 

THREE INDIAN LOGANS.

In previous pages of this QUARTERLY is an account of the unveiling

of the "Cresap Tablet" at Logan Elm Park. In connection therewith

is a brief article by Miss Arista Arledge in which reference is made

to the Logan speech and episode. A volume recently issued, entitled

"The First Century of Piqua, Ohio," compiled by John A. Rayner,

calls attention to the infrequently known fact that there was another

Indian chief Logan, often spoken of by Colonel John Johnston, many

years government commissioner for the Ohio Indians.    This Indian

Logan, no relative to the Mingo orator, was a Shawnee chief, and son

of the sister of Tecumseh. He was called James Logan after Colonel

Benjamin Logan of Kentucky. He must be distinguished also from an-

other James Logan, Indian name Say-ugh-towa, a brother of John Logan,

Indian name Tah-gah-jute, the well known orator. These two Logans,

John the orator and James, his brother, were given the name Logan by

their father in honor of James Logan, one time secretary to Wm.

Penn and later president of the council of Pennsylvania.

Logan, the Shawnee, Indian name Spemica Lawba, meaning High

Horse, had a noble and brave character and figured conspicuously in

early Ohio history. He was captured at the destruction of the Mac-o-

chec towns by Colonel Benj. Logan in 1786. The Indian boy was then

sixteen. His father, the head chief, Moluntha, was brutally mur-

dered after he had surrendered. Colonel Logan took a fancy to the

young son, carried him to Kentucky and adopted him into his family,

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Editorialana.                       151

 

giving him the name Logan. After returning to his people James

Logan settled at Wapakoneta, but during the period of the war of 1812

he resided at Upper Piqua. He was a warm and true friend of the

Americans, the White pioneers, whom he led in several hazardous ex-

peditious (against the British and Indians). In November (1812) after

returning from a scouting expedition Logan was wrongfully accused of

treachery to the American cause, by an officer of the Kentucky troops.

Logan resented this implication upon his allegiance and to prove the

falsity of the charge set forth to capture and "bring in" some hostile

Indians. In this effort he was himself captured and in his attempt to

escape was mortally wounded, but was rescued and brought into the

American camp by his companions. He died after several days illness,

and was buried with military honors at Camp Winchester. His dying

request was that his two sons, named respectively, Henry Clay and Mar-

tin Hardin, should be sent to Kentucky to be brought up and educated

by Major Hardin. This request could not be fulfilled, so Colonel Johns-

ton brought the boys to Piqua and placed them in school. They soon,

however, returned to their tribe and after the removal of their people

to the western reservation Henry Clay became a chief. In later years

both brothers became dissipated and ignoble, as runs the narrative,

and died without honor.

 

 

"STORY OF MY LIFE AND WORK."

A volume, modest in size, with the above title has recently been

issued by the Bibliotheca Sacra Company, Oberlin, Ohio. The author

is G. Frederick Wright, present president of the Ohio State Archaeo-

logical and Historical Society. It is an interesting relation of an eventful

life. As the writer himself says, in the preface, his active life of sixty

years, (he was born January 22, 1838) covers a period of unexampled

intellectual as well as of material readjustments. And in this readjust-

ment Dr. Wright played no insignificant part. He has been in the fore-

front of the moral, polemical, educational and political movements in his

day and age. Born of sterling New England, revolutionary stock, his

start in mind and character was greatly in his favor and through life

he employed that initial capital to produce the best influential and intel-

lectual results.  His childhood was the happy and fortunate one of

the New England home, not especially thrilling or unusual but peace-

ful, thoughtful and serious. His recital of his boyhood is most readable

because not only happily told but is typical of the time, place and cir-

cumstances of his environment. He taught school and then entered

Oberlin College, to the establishment (1833) of which his father and

uncle contributed. His family were in sympathy with that institution

because of its independent and progressive features; its broad policy

in religious belief and in humanity, as evidenced by its admission of

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152        Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

 

students without restrictions as to sex and color. The political and

religious features of his alma mater had much to do with the develop-

ment of this student, who later and for many years was a distinguished

and honored professor in the theological department of the college.

This latter period was preceded by ten years of pastorate of the Free

Church, in Andover, Massachusetts. Here Dr. Wright lived for the

decade in the intellectual and theological atmosphere of New England.

It was during this period also that Dr. Wright became interested in and

a student of archaeology, geology and more or less in kindred sciences.

He was early recognized as one of the leading authorities in these

subjects. He visited various parts of the North American continent

to make observations and secure data at first hand, which afforded him

material for many books on the topics of his investigations. Later he

extended his scientific studies to Europe and the Orient, making four

different journeys to the foreign countries, one of which entitled

"Across Asia" he narrates at some length, taking up nearly a third of

his volume. It deserves the space occupied and makes "good reading"

for the layman. Indeed, the whole contents of the volume is presented

in a simple, attractive style for the "common" reader and not the

critical student demanding profundity and prolixity.  For many years

Dr. Wright at Oberlin held the chair, at first, of New Testament Lan-

guage and Literature, then of the Harmony of Science and Religion

or perhaps more specifically of the natural and logical evidences of the

Biblical writings; one of his published volumes on this subject is

"Scientific Confirmation of Old Testament History." Dr. Wright has led

a most industrious life, having written half a score of books on scien-

tific or theological themes. He drives a facile pen; is always courteous

and fair in his argument and manner; tenacious of his own views but

tolerant of the views of others. While at Andover he became associated

with the Bibliotheca Sacra, then published at that place; in 1883 this

scholarly publication, one of the foremost magazines in the field of

theological literature, was transferred to Oberlin and Prof. Wright be-

came the head of the editorial board and its chief guide and inspiration.

In its volumes many of the leading theological scholars of the world

have found avenue for the expression of their views. The last chapter

of the book is devoted to "My Creed," in which the author makes state-

ment of his beliefs, both religious and scientific and the reasons therefor.

This "creed" bespeaks the man of Christian faith and broad humanity

qualities that have ever actuated its acceptor. In 1897 Dr. Wright suc-

ceeded General Roeliff Brinkerhoff as president of the Ohio State

Archaeological and Historical Society. That position the occupant has

filled, and is still filling, with interested faithfulness.  During the in-

cumbency of Dr. Wright the Society has grown in magnitude and effec-

tive work until it ranks among the foremost organizations of its purpose

in the country. Not only his personal friends, but innumerable readers

at large will find this little autobiography interesting and stimulating.

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