AN APPENDIX RELATIVE TO THE MURDER OF

LOGAN'S FAMILY.'

The "Notes on Virginia" were written, in Virginia, in the years 1781 and 1782, in answer to certain queries proposed to me by Monsieur de Marbois, then secretary of the French legation in the United States; and a manuscript copy was delivered to him. A few copies, with some additions, were afterwards, in 1784, printed in Paris, and given to particular friends. In speaking of the animals of America, the theory of M. de Buffon, the Abbé Raynal, and others presented itself to consideration. They have supposed there is something in the soil, climate, and other circumstances of America, which occasions animal nature to degenerate, not excepting even the man, native or adoptive, physical or moral. This theory, so unfounded and degrading to one-third of the globe, was called to the bar of fact and reason. Among other proofs adduced in contradiction of this hypothesis, the speech of Logan, an Indian chief, delivered to Lord Dunmore in 1774, was produced, as a specimen of the talents of the aboriginals of this country, and particularly of their eloquence; and it was believed that Europe had never produced anything superior to this morsel of eloquence. In order to make it intelligible to the reader, the transaction, on which it was founded, was stated, as it

1 In connection with this appendix see letter to Governor Henry, printed as Note in p. 89.

had been generally related in America at the time, and as I had heard it myself, in the circle of Lord Dunmore, and the officers who accompanied him; and the speech itself was given as it had, ten years before the printing of that book, circulated in the newspapers through all the then colonies, through the magazines of Great Britain, and periodical publications of Europe. For three and twenty years it passed uncontradicted; nor was it ever suspected that it even admitted contradiction. In 1797, however, for the first time, not only the whole transaction respecting Logan was affirmed in the public papers to be false, but the speech itself suggested to be a forgery, and even a forgery of mine, to aid me in proving that the man of America was equal in body and in mind, to the man of Europe. But wherefore the forgery; whether Logan's or mine, it would still have been American. I should indeed consult my own fame if the sugges tion, that this speech is mine, were suffered to be believed. He would have just right to be proud who could with truth claim that composition. But it is none of mine; and I yield it to whom it is due.

On seeing then that this transaction was brought into question, I thought it my duty to make particular inquiry into its foundation. It was the more my duty, as it was alleged that, by ascribing to an individual therein named, a participation in the murder of Logan's family, I had done an injury to his char

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acter, which it had not deserved. I had no knowledge personally of that individual. I had no reason to aim an injury at him. I only repeated what I had heard from others, and what thousands had heard and believed as well as myself; and which no one indeed, till then, had been known to question. Twenty-three years had now elapsed, since the transaction took place. Many of those acquainted with it were dead, and the living dispersed to very distant parts of the earth. Few of them were even known to me. To those however of whom I knew, I made application by letter; and some others, moved by a regard for truth and justice, were kind enough to come forward, of themselves, with their testimony. These fragments of evidence, the small remains of a mighty mass which time has consumed, are here presented to the public, in the form of letters, certificates, or affidavits, as they came to me. I have rejected none of these forms, nor required other solemnities from those whose motives and characters were pledges of their truth. Historical transactions are deemed to be well vouched by the simple declarations of those who have borne a part in them; and especially of persons having no interest to falsify or disfigure them. The world will now see whether they, or I, have injured Cresap, by believing Logan's charge against him; and they will decide between Logan and Cresap, whether Cresap was innocent, and Logan a calumniator?

In order that the reader may have a clear concep

2. Of

tion of the transactions, to which the different parts of the following declarations refer, he must take notice that they establish four different murders. I. Of two Indians, a little above Wheeling. others at Grave Creek, among whom were some of Logan's relations. 3. The massacre at Baker's bottom, on the Ohio, opposite the mouth of Yellow Creek, where were other relations of Logan. 4. Of those killed at the same place, coming in canoes to the relief of their friends. I place the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, against certain paragraphs of the evidence, to indicate the particular murder to which the paragraph relates, and present also a small sketch or map of the principal scenes of these butcheries, for their more ready comprehension.

Extract of a letter from the Honorable Judge Innes, of Frankfort in Kentucky, to Thomas Jefferson, dated Kentucky, near Frankfort, March 2d, 1799.

I recollect to have seen Logan's speech in 1775, in one of the public prints. That Logan conceived Cresap to be the author of the murder at Yellow Creek, it is in my power to give, perhaps, a more particular information, than any other person you can apply to.

In 1774 I lived in Fincastle county, now divided into Washington, Montgomery and part of Wythe. Being intimate in Col. Preston's family, I happened in July to be at his house, when an express was sent to him as County Lieut. requesting a guard of the militia to be ordered out for the protection of the inhabitants residing low down on the north fork of Holston river. The express brought with him a War Club, and a note which was left tied to it at the house of one Robertson, whose family were cut off by the Indians, and gave rise for the application to Col. Preston, of which the following is a copy, then taken by me in my memorandum book.

"Captain Cresap,-What did you kill my people on Yellow Creek for? The white people killed my kin at Conestoga, a great while ago; and I thought nothing of that. But you killed my kin again, on Yellow Creek, and took my Cousin Prisoner. Then I thought I must kill too; and I have been three times to war since; but the Indians are not angry; only myself.

"July 21st, 1774.

CAPTAIN JOHN LOGAN." With great respect, I am, Dear Sir, your most obedient servant, HARRY INNES

Before me, the subscriber, a justice of the peace in and for said county, personally appeared John Gibson, Esquire, an associate Judge of same county, who being duly sworn, deposeth and saith that he traded with the Shawanese and other tribes of Indians then settled on the Siota in the year 1773, and in the beginning of the year 1774, and that in the month of April of the same year, he left the same Indian towns, and came to this place, in order to procure some goods and provisions, that he remained here only a few days, and then set out in company with a certain Alexander Blaine and M. Elliot by water to return to the towns on the Siota, and that one evening as they were drifting in their canoes near the Long Reach on the Ohio, they were hailed by a number of white men on the South West shore, who requested them to put ashore, as they had disagreeable news to inform them of; that we then landed on shore; and found amongst the party, a Major Angus M'Donald from West Chester, a Doctor Woods from same place, and a party as they said of one hundred and fifty men. We then asked the news. They informed us that some of the party who had been taken up, and improving lands near the Big Kanhawa river, had seen another party of white men, who informed them that they and some others had fell in with a party of Shawanese, who had been hunting on the South West side of the Ohio, that they had killed the whole of the Indian party, and that the others had gone across the country to Cheat river with the horses and plunder, the consequence of which they apprehended would be an Indian war, and that they were flying away. On making inquiry of them when this murder should have happened, we found that it must have been some considerable time before we left the Indian towns, and that there was not