The Chicago Massacre of 1812: With Illustrations and Historical DocumentsKirkland, Joseph
History
The Chicago Massacre of 1812: With Illustrations and Historical Documents
Kirkland, Joseph
Chicago (Ill.) -- History; Fort Dearborn Massacre, Chicago, Ill., 1812
Chicago.--Among the persons who have recently arrived at this place,
says the Plattsburg [N. Y.] paper of the 21st ultimo, from Quebec,
are: James Van Horn, Dyson Dyer, Joseph Knowles, Joseph Bowen, Paul
Grummond, Nathan Edson, Elias Mills, James Corbin, Phelim Corbin,
of the First Regiment of U. S. Infantry, who survived the massacre
at Fort Dearborn, or Chicago, on the 15th August, 1812. It will be
recollected that the commandant at Fort Chicago, Captain Heald, was
ordered by General Hull to evacuate the fort and proceed with his
command to Detroit; that having proceeded about a mile and a half,
the troops were attacked by a body of Indians, to whom they were
compelled to capitulate.
Captain Heald, in his report of this affair, dated October 23d, 1812,
says: "Our strength was fifty-four regulars and twelve militia, out
of which twenty-six regulars and all the militia, with two women and
twelve children, were killed in the action.
"Lieut. Linai T. Helm, with twenty-five non-commissioned officers
and privates, and eleven women and children, were prisoners when
we separated." Lieut. Helm was ransomed. Of the twenty-five
non-commissioned officers and privates, and the eleven women and
children, the nine persons above mentioned are believed to be the
only survivors. They state that the prisoners who were not put
to death on the march were taken to the Fox River, in the Indian
territory, where they were distributed among the Indians as servants.
Those who survived remained in this situation about nine months,
during which time they were allowed scarcely a sufficiency of
sustenance to support nature, and were then brought to Fort Chicago,
where they were purchased by a French trader, agreeable to the
directions of General Proctor, and sent to Amherstburg, and from
thence to Quebec, where they arrived November 8th, 1813.
John Neads, who was one of the prisoners, formerly of Virginia, died
among the Indians between the 15th and 20th of January, 1813.
Hugh Logan, an Irishman, was tomahawked and put to death, be not
being able to walk from excessive fatigue.
August Mott, a German, was killed in the same manner for the like
reason.
A man by the name of Nelson was frozen to death while a captive with
the Indians. He was formerly from Maryland.
A child of Mrs. Neads, the wife of John Neads, was tied to a tree to
prevent its following and crying after its mother for victuals. Mrs..
Neads perished from hunger and cold.
The officers who were killed on the 15th of August had their heads
cut off and their hearts taken out and boiled in the presence of the
prisoners. Eleven children were massacred and scalped in one wagon.
Mrs. Corbin, wife of Phelim Corbin, in an advanced stage of
pregnancy, was tomahawked, scalped, cut open, and had the child taken
out and its head cut off.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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