Ohio History Journal

A VISIT IN 1929

TO THE SITES, IN WESTERN OHIO, OF FORTS BUILT BY

GENERALS ARTHUR ST. CLAIR, ANTHONY WAYNE

AND WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON

BY JAMES A. GREEN

CHAPTER I

On the Fourth of July, 1929, I made a patriotic pil-

grimage, visiting the sites of some of the forts erected

in western Ohio in St. Clair's and Wayne's Indian Cam-

paigns and by Harrison in the War of 1812. As showing

the immeasurable difference between the slow and labor-

ious progress of our early armies and the speed of the

modern automobile, I left my house in Avondale - Cin-

cinnati- at 11:00 A. M. on the Fourth, slept at Del-

phos; from there went to Fort Jennings and Fort Brown

and returned by way of Paulding and Van Wert, reach-

ing home at 4:30 P. M. on the fifth. The distance cov-

ered was 378 miles. Every foot of the way we were on

a good road and for the most part we were on cement

and brick highways, smooth and level as a floor. A speed

of from 40 to 55 miles an hour was quite safe, and with

the exception of the heavy trucks most of the cars on the

road were going at about that rate.

The automobile has not yet ceased to be a marvel.

We still wonder at the way in which it annihilates dis-

tances. The young people who are not yet over thirty

take it for granted; they have been accustomed to it all

their lives, but to men like myself - who were born in

(601)

602     Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

the age of the horse and who remember that if one went

anywhere off the direct line of the railroad a horse and

buggy represented the fastest thing there was in the way

of transportation - to such men the automobile is still

a miracle.

When you travel by rail you must go to the station

and when you reach your destination you are landed at a

station, probably some distance from where you wish to

go. But with the automobile you leave your own house

and it carries you to the exact spot which you desire, to

the door of the hotel, or to the house of your friend or

wherever it may be that you are going. True, the horse

did the same, but by comparison the horse was so slow

and the horse needed so much attention-it was neces-

sary to feed and stable it. As for the automobile, keep

its gas-tank full and give it oil and water now and then,

barring accidents, it goes on mile after mile. Like the

Iron Horse it does not grow weary, uphill or downhill is

the same to its tireless engine. How many times in the

years gone by I have sat behind a horse toiling up a long

hill and have suffered to see it suffer from too much ef-

fort, but the automobile, of course, does not make any

claim upon your sympathies.

Then, too, the automobile is to be thanked for the

good roads one finds everywhere and it seems to me that

it has had an immense effect in making the country towns

better places in which to live-their isolation has been

removed. It is noticeable that the hotels are no longer

"countrified." For example, at Lima where we stopped

for dinner we were given a table d'hote meal served in

courses, admirably cooked and quite as good in every

way as a dinner in New York. And at Delphos, where

604      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

one might have expected that the waiter at breakfast

would have asked the one question of the old days, "How

will you have your eggs?"-then breakfast at a country

hotel consisted of ham and eggs, or eggs in some style,

a small steak, fried potatoes, hot cakes and syrup and

coffee-at Delphos, they gave us melon, breakfast food,

buttered toast and coffee.

In the early days travelers dwelt with some particu-

larity upon the meals they were served, with unction if

they were good meals and with a display of ill-humor if

they were poor meals.

I remember well the account John Melish gives of

passing through West Union in old Adams County in

1811. He was with an American friend and it was the

fall of the year. They came to a peach orchard which

invited Mr. Melish to stop. But his friend bade him

keep on. Presently they came to another peach orchard

and here they stopped, for this orchard had a distillery

attached. So the travelers were able to purchase peach

brandy and they "found the quality excellent." A little

later coming to a lovely valley with a clear stream they

lunched on "a piece of bacon, some bread, cheese and bis-

cuit," not to mention the peach brandy. No wonder Mr.

Melish wrote they "made a very pleasant repast." And

with this precedent I justify myself for detailing what

we had at Delphos for breakfast.

The World certainly moves, but the automobile

makes it move more rapidly, and surely without it one

could not have visited Fort St. Clair, Fort Jefferson,

Greenville, St. Marys, Fort Jennings and Fort Brown in

the course of 24 hours. And as we rode so swiftly over

the splendid highways we thought of those armies under

A Visit in 1929             605

St. Clair, Wayne and Harrison that toiled laboriously

and slowly through the primeval forests. We were able

to go in a quarter of an hour a greater distance than they

could accomplish in a day!

All this boasting of the speed and comfort of travel

today reminds me of the way in which our forefathers

boasted at the time when railroads were first built. As

compared to stage-coaches and water travel they worked

wonders. When President Jackson visited New England

in the summer of 1833, Niles' Weekly Register recorded,

"He left Concord, New Hampshire, on Monday the 1st

and arrived in Washington at 9:00 or 10:00 o'clock on

Thursday, the Fourth of July, making a journey of 474

miles in three days, (three days printed in italics) very

considerably recruited. Such are the present accommo-

dations for traveling." Now in another hundred years

will the speed of travel be so much greater that we shall

appear as laggards ?

CHAPTER II

FORT ST. CLAIR

Fort St. Clair was built half a mile westward from

the present Eaton. It was the third fortified place on the

Military Road that ran northward from   Cincinnati.

First on the banks of the Ohio was Fort Washington;

then came Fort Hamilton on the banks of the Big Miami.

Its site is now in the very center of the busy industrial

city of Hamilton. It is marked by a blockhouse of stone.

Fort St. Clair was the scene of General Harrison's first

real military duty for he was sent in the winter of 1791-

1792 with a detachment to build a blockhouse there and

A Visit in 1929             607

on the soil of Ohio, yet from it there comes no whisper

of all that it has seen. It was a witness of great events,

but a witness that is forever silent. So the name of

"Whispering Oak" is pardoned only by poetic license.

The afternoon of the Fourth was lovely and never did

a place present a better picture of peace and contentment

than did Fort St. Clair. There were scores of people

who had come there with their picnic dinners; they were

sitting in the shade of the old trees on the bank of the

little stream on the side of the monument opposite us. I

hope some of them thought of the brave soldiers who

were there so long ago; of the soldiers under St. Clair

doomed to disaster; of the soldiers of the Legion of the

United States, superbly drilled and disciplined, who fol-

lowed Wayne to victory, and, finally, of the men under

Harrison who at the Thames redeemed Detroit and

ended forever the menace of the Indians on this side of

the Mississippi-soldiers, all of them, who won Ohio for

us and who made possible the advance of civilization.

CHAPTER III

FORT JEFFERSON

From Eaton-why did they drop such a fine name as

Fort St. Clair ?-our way led to Fort Jefferson. It was a

drive of less than an hour. On either side of the road

were the wheat-fields, yellow for the harvest, and the air

was sweet with the fragrance of the freshly mown hay

and clover. It is no longer possible to identify the old

Military Road.  Its general direction, of course, is

known, but the present highway does not follow it.

At Fort Jefferson an obelisk made of hewn boulders

A Visit in 1929             609

propriated $5000.00, to be spent in extending the limits

of the State Park at Fort Jefferson and in marking the

place more adequately. It was here that the survivors

of St. Clair's Defeat found refuge. Those poor fel-

lows, fleeing from that appalling massacre, must have

looked upon the wooden walls of Fort Jefferson as a

veritable City of Refuge.

Six miles north of Fort Jefferson is the City of Green-

ville, where Wayne built a permanent encampment -- a

city of log huts surrounded by a palisade. Not a trace

of it remains and only a bronze marker tells the story.

But there is at Greenville a museum where are exhibited

many relics of the past, Indian weapons, and the things

that the American soldiers either lost or threw away.

General Harrison practically rebuilt Fort Greenville,

but the tradition is that after Wayne's departure the set-

tlers near Dayton destroyed the buildings by carrying off

the iron spikes, nails and hinges. Iron in the pioneer

days was especially valuable and this treasure-trove to

the pioneers was worth a long journey. It is a thousand

pities that the site of the Fort was not in the year 1815

set aside as a park. But in those days there were no

historical societies to demand such things. So posterity

laments in vain. Even the old military graveyard is for-

gotten and unmarked. Nevertheless, Mr. Frazer E. Wil-

son's two books, Historic Greenville and The Peace of

Mad Anthony are monuments in themselves. They tell

the story of Greenville's heroic past and are as good as a

dozen tall shafts of granite. Local history of the kind

Mr. Wilson writes is not only admirable, but patriotic.

Books of that kind should be read in the schools of Ohio.

Vol. XXXVIII--39.

610      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

CHAPTER IV

FORT RECOVERY

Eighteen miles northwest of Greenville is Fort Re-

covery. Beneath the imposing obelisk which stands as a

memorial to the men who fought and died on that

stricken field, are the bones of the fallen. When Wayne

sent the expedition from Greenville, Lieutenant William

Henry Harrison was in the party, to assist in burying

the weather-worn remains of the dead. General Wayne

directed that a fort be built which was to be called Fort

Restitution. Then in his official orders, which are to be

seen in the Wayne Papers at the Philadelphia Historical

Society, he had a better idea, for he crossed out the word

Restitution and in its place wrote Recovery. That fort

was built on the very ground where the Indians had won

their victory; the very spot where the squaws, like car-

rion-crows, following the warriors, complained that their

arms ached from wielding the tomahawk in killing the

wounded and in mutilating the slain. It was to serve the

savages as a visible sign that their triumph was of no

avail -- that the army of the United States did not ac-

cept defeat. The Fort was built in the winter of 1793-

1794 and placed under command of Captain Alexander

Gibson. Later it was garrisoned by one hundred and

fifty men under Major William McMahon. In June,

1794, it was assailed by a large force of Indians and hotly

besieged two days and one night. Twenty-two of the

garrison were killed and thirty wounded. The Indians

retreated with heavy losses.

When Wayne made his treaty at Greenville it was

from Fort Recovery, and not from Greenville, that the

612      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

The place is now a quiet little village and its tall mon-

ument strikes the visitor with surprise. If one without a

knowledge of history came suddenly into the quiet town

and saw the grassy park with the great guns flanking

the obelisk, he would be startled to find such a thing in a

neighborhood so dedicated to farms and peaceful people.

They still find relics of the Battle. Old Mr. Reup showed

me a flint-lock that he had this very year dug up in his

potato patch. His father had bushel baskets filled with

Indian axes, flint-locks, soldier buttons, etc., to which

all comers were welcome to help themselves. He told us

that when he was a boy a farmer in the neighborhood

had a pig-pen made entirely of musket barrels. These

were guns that he had picked up and utilized by making

a fence of them. The Bank at Fort Recovery has a most

interesting exhibit of these relics.

In our history there is no defeat suffered by the Army

of the United States more complete and terrible than

that of St. Clair on the site of what afterward became

Fort Recovery. It was worse than the Custer Massacre.

Had the Indians been as well-disciplined as they were

blood-thirsty and ferocious, not a single American sol-

dier would have been left alive. But they stopped to

gather loot from the abandoned camp and to rob the

dead, and so the fugitives escaped. And it is well that

Wayne built a fort there from which floated the Stars

and Stripes. On this Fourth of July, 1929, the flag was

flying everywhere, just as it has flown every day since

Wayne recovered the lost field and made it a symbol of

our ultimate victory. And no one can complain of what

has been done to mark the place. The Park is beautiful

and the Monument striking and impressive.

A Visit in 1929             613

CHAPTER V

FORT SENECA

General Harrison had two main lines of supply -

one was by way of Columbus overland to Lower San-

dusky - Fremont - with his main depot on this line at

Fort Seneca; the other line ran from Cincinnati to the

north in a fairly straight line. There were settlements

in 1812 as far north as Piqua; beyond that was the un-

broken forest. But the country from Dayton to Cincin-

nati was fairly well settled and was an important source

of supplies. General Harrison had blockhouses at St.

Marys and Wapakoneta - Fort Logan - and a series

of them on the Auglaize. The latter does not seem

much of a river nowadays, but it was large enough to

float barges loaded with troops and provisions down to

Fort Defiance where it falls into the Maumee and thence

to the Rapids just south of Fort Meigs. On the Aug-

laize he constructed Forts Amanda, Jennings and Brown

to protect his supplies and to furnish convenient stop-

ping-places for the troops that were moving north and

south. Fort Amanda was particularly important as

there it was the boats were built and started on their

journey to the North; it was also the terminus of the

roads from the South. The site of Fort Amanda has

been beautifully marked by a great obelisk standing in a

State park of considerable extent. The graves of the

soldiers of 1812 are in the adjoining township cemetery.

They are well marked and well tended. The American

Legion, with fine feeling, had placed on the morning of

the Fourth, a tiny flag over each of these graves as well

as over the graves of the soldiers of the Civil War.

614      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

Initial steps have been taken to preserve and properly

mark the site of Fort Defiance, so that one need not blush

for it, but at St. Marys, Fort Jennings and Fort Brown

nothing has been done that can be pointed to with pride.

At St. Marys there is no marker whatever. The fort

that General Wayne erected here has left no trace. Its

site is now an abandoned graveyard, a place much over-

grown and neglected. General Harrison's Fort stood in

what is now the business center of the town, but no

marble shaft or monument in bronze marks the place.

Local tradition has preserved its memory and that is all.

CHAPTER VI

FORT JENNINGS

Fort Jennings is a little town - population 275 - on

the Auglaize, six miles north of Delphos. The Fort stood

directly on the river bank and its site is now occupied by

a cottage and its attendant garden and chicken-yard,

together with outbuildings. The soldiers who died at the

post - so we were told - were buried directly back of

the Fort on a spot where now stands a particularly un-

sightly barn and a distressingly offensive pig-pen. That

the graves of American soldiers should be so desecrated

needs no comment -Ohio cannot be proud of such a

state of affairs, yet the town has a handsome memorial

in the shape of a fine building which is used for public

meetings of one kind or another. Naturally, in such a

rural community the building is used only occasionally.

In size it is out of all proportion to any ordinary need of

the village, but, of course, such a building is an inspira-

tion and the future may justify it. It stands at least 1500

feet from the site of the old fort. One of the inhabitants

618      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

to answer this appeal. Fortunately there are no build-

ing on the site of the Fort so that the way is open with-

out great expense to redeem the place.

This fort, like the others on the Auglaize, was built

on a bluff. It stands at the point where the Little Aug-

laize joins the larger river. Below the bluff was a wide

expanse of level grass-grown bottom land, an ideal spot

for the landing of boats and the camping of troops. It is

a quiet place with the farmhouses few and far between.

But during the War of 1812 it saw stirring scenes. Here

passed the bold Kentuckians who were pressing forward

to the relief of Fort Meigs - those brave but foolhardy

men who fell with Colonel Dudley because they disobeyed

General Harrison's orders. They took the British guns

in their gallant sortie, but alas! their impetuous and un-

restrained courage carried them in the flush of victory

to destruction.

There may be a few pleasure-boats now on the Aug-

laize - that is all. That it was utilized by General Har-

rison in a large way for the transportation of supplies

seems incredible. But such is the fact. From Fort

Amanda to the Rapids of the Maumee the rude flatboats

carried flour and meat to the front. On some one of

the monuments which future patriots will erect, I hope

that there may be a bas-relief on a bronze plate picturing

a flotilla of these boats. They went, of course, under

heavy guard, and navigation was not easy, for there are

records of many mishaps, boats wrecked or stranded.

How they ever did it is a marvel. The spring and early

summer of this year, 1929, have been marked by almost

continuous rains. In all northern Ohio the water stood

in the furrows between the rows of corn - the country

A Visit in 1929             619

had reverted almost to the days of the Great Black

Swamp. We passed along on roads which are the work

of a century, roads ditched and lifted above the general

level, but how the armies of the early days moved

through that country in wet weather is beyond imagina-

tion. The more familiar one is with the difficulties of-

fered by the very nature of the ground over which

Wayne and Harrison were obliged to move, the more one

realizes their indomitable wills that rose superior to ob-

stacles that would have paralyzed the efforts of lesser

men.

CHAPTER VIII

NORTHWESTERN OHIO OCCUPIED BY PEOPLE OF GERMAN DESCENT

In passing it might be noted that nearly all of the

northwestern part of the state is occupied by people of

German descent. Their ancestors were late comers to

the state and when they arrived the only cheap lands left

were those of the great flat, swampy regions which

others had passed by with disdain. In some ways these

Germans got the pick of the pack, for the land is exceed-

ingly rich. They have done wonders in draining it and

their big barns bear testimony to the abundant harvests.

I have often speculated on what would have happened

if the Government had closed those lands to settlement

except to the Dutch and then had brought over ten or

twenty thousand Hollanders and told them "to go to it."

They would have found a country flat as their own with

a much richer soil. Of course they would have criss-

crossed it with canals and perhaps would have put up a

few windmills. Of a truth if there ever was a land out-

side of Holland that would have pleased the Dutch it is

this.

620      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

The first generation of Germans were not bothered

by any Americanization experts. There were so many

of them that they got along very well by themselves and

many made no effort to learn English or to change par-

ticularly their ways from those of their dear "Vater-

land."

One of the old residents at Fort Jennings told me

that when he was a boy the school was conducted in Ger-

man and he was almost a man grown before he ventured

to express himself in English. The boys and girls all

spoke German to each other and, as he put it, were

ashamed "to try the English." By that he probably

meant they were timid about it. But the World War

ended all conscious or unconscious effort to retain Ger-

man as the familiar speech. The old man to whom I re-

ferred said that for ten years and more, he had heard

scarcely a word of German and that he had almost for-

gotten it. The schools are conducted in English and the

children know no other language. They are a thrifty,

hard working people with all the solid German virtues to

which have been added the American spirit of enterprise.

The War did them good as it swept away the lingering

feeling that they were strangers in a strange country

with a mission to cherish an alien culture and an alien

speech. It made them part and parcel of the rest of the

country.

This great Black Swamp has been redeemed. For

years on the early maps it was marked as the Indian

Territory and doubtless General Harrison's soldiers who

had struggled through its muck and mire would have

been prepared to swear that it was a hopeless region

much of it so low that it never could be drained and made

A Visit in 1929             621

fit for agriculture. But big drainage ditches solved that

problem and now the old Black Swamp blossoms like

the Rose of Sharon.

CHAPTER XIX

CONTEMPORANEOUS JOURNALS ON FORTS ERECTED IN WESTERN

OHIO IN THE WAR OF 1812

Colonel James Mills, First Regiment, Third Detach-

ment Ohio Militia, kept a Regimental Book, February 6

to August 4, 1812, which has many references to Gen-

eral Harrison's chain of western forts. On March 1,

Colonel Mills was in Command of the garrison at St.

Marys, and that day he wrote to Governor Meigs that

his instructions from the Commander-in-Chief were "to

attend to, fortify and keep safe this place, Amanda,

Woghpochkenata, Winchester (Fort Defiance), Fort

Jennings, Fort Brown and Fort Wayne. In three days

there will not be a man left at any of the above posts ex-

cept a few at Fort Wayne, as I am told." Then followed

an appeal for reinforcements. A few days later Colonel

Mills was able to send men to all the forts, - to Amanda

three companies, to Defiance one company, to Fort Jen-

nings a company and to Fort Brown "a subaltern and

twenty men." One of the noticeable things in Colonel

Mills' Regimental book is the mention of the soldiers

who died at St. Marys and who were buried with the

honors of war. Posterity, in many cases, has forgotten

and neglected the graves of these soldiers.

The maps of 1815 to 1820 show the Frontier Forts,

not only in Ohio, but in Indiana, Illinois and in the

South. General Jackson's campaigns were marked by

the erection of the same stockades and log blockhouses

622      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

as marked the campaigns of the men distinguished in

early Ohio history, St. Clair, Wayne and Harrison.

They were not to be compared to Gibraltar. Indeed, the

very early Ohio men at Fort Ancient left the remains of

a fortification that in strength and extent far exceeded

anything our white forefathers built. But these little

frontier forts sheltered and protected the men who

conquered Ohio for us. And they should be neither for-

gotten nor neglected.

In the "Journal of Orders," etc., of Captain Daniel

Hosbrook's Company of Ohio Militia, rendezvoused at

Cincinnati on the 5th day of February, 1813, there are

many references to the Auglaize Forts. This Company

garrisoned Fort Amanda and constantly sent supplies to

Forts Jennings and Brown.

They were occupied day after day in building boats.

General Harrison visited Fort Amanda ten days or so

before the siege of Fort Meigs. His purpose was to

expedite the forwarding of men and food. He held a

council of war there on that occasion, but he stayed only

over night. The entry in the Journal reads: April 8,

1813 - "Weather clear and pleasant. All hands busyly

employ'd preparing Boats, etc. for to transport provi-

sions and troops down the River. 1 P. M. Gen'l Harri-

son and suit arriv'd. At 2 o'clock Capt. Hatfield's Com-

pany of Rifflemen and at 4 o'clock Capt. Nearing with a

Detachment of Regulars, 140, arriv'd." The entry for

the following day records additional arrivals, then there

is this addition: "Note - Capt. Hamilton with his Com-

pany came down by land just as General Harrison was

pushing off and 15 Indians went in company with the

General and other troops."

624      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

all hands paraded and proceeded to throw into the river

a large quantity of dead hogs and skins and entrails

which had been left on the bank above the Fort and

which began to be very offensive because of putrefac-

tion."

The Journals give plain testimony to the fact that

these western forts must have been pretty smelly places.

The meat ration was mostly on the hoof. When meat

was wanted cattle were killed and naturally there were

no such facilities as are found in the abattoirs of today.

Every now and then conditions became so bad that

special parties were detailed to clean up the offal. When

General Harrison came unexpectedly to St. Marys, evi-

dently he was much annoyed, for the next day an order

was issued by his authority to clean up the place, to

gather together the muskets and to cease firing the sun-

set gun. This latter, perhaps because of the shortage of

powder. But, the order to clean up and gather together

the muskets tells its own story of the carelessness of the

militia. They meant well, of course, and that is the best

that can be said.

Colonel William Jennings commanded a regiment of

Kentucky riflemen. September 21, 1812, General Har-

rison, Commander-in-Chief, ordered Colonel Jennings

to establish a post on the Auglaize midway between St.

Marys and Defiance. He was to escort provisions to

General Winchester's Army at Defiance and the Fort

he was to build was to afford protection in case of attack.

Colonel Robert Poague was the Commander of an-

other Kentucky Regiment. He was the builder--in the

Fall of 1812--of Fort Amanda which he named for

his sweetheart.

626      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications

much in evidence, we shall mark the British Fort Miami,

just south of Toledo on the Maumee. That fort was the

last gasp of the English Tories who refused to accept

the Revolution as an accomplished fact. Governor Sim-

coe built it. He expected the States of the American

Union to fall apart--he did not think they could hold

together for ten years, and so he boldly constructed a

fort in Ohio as an advanced post of the British Empire

to be ready for the contingency that he awaited; that is,

when the Union fell apart the English King would have

a fort and soldiers ready to take possession. It was the

great dream of a great empire-builder. But we bear

Simcoe no malice--his Fort Miami was the last place

in Ohio where the English flag floated--it is to be re-

membered Proctor was there in 1812. And certainly old

Fort Miami is worth our commemoration.

Now that we have the automobile there is the more

reason that all the places that were scenes of military

events in our early days should be marked. The auto-

mobile is the great teacher of local geography--"War"

--said Lord Pitt "is the great teacher of geography."

True, but Lord Pitt lived before the automobile made it

possible for the man living in Cincinnati to breakfast in

his own home, take lunch at Fort Amanda and dinner at

Fort Meigs. Our people are more and more on the road;

they are going to visit our historic shrines in ever-

increasing numbers and all these places should be made

worthy. It is not merely local geography that the auto-

mobile will teach--it will reveal the great and glorious

history of Ohio.