Ohio History Journal
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EDITORIALANA. |
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VOI. XXVI. No. 1. |
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JANUARY, 1917 |
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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) |
Editorialana. 147
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.
148 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
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.
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.