Wau-nan-gee; Or, the Massacre at Chicago: A Romance of the American RevolutionRichardson, Major (John)
General
Wau-nan-gee; Or, the Massacre at Chicago: A Romance of the American Revolution
Richardson, Major (John)
Chicago (Ill.) -- Fiction; Fort Dearborn Massacre, Chicago, Ill., 1812 -- Fiction; Massacres -- Fiction
the torture he was too much distracted by pain to think of removing
by the instant death of his enemy, the Chippewa sprang suddenly
upwards, but this movement only tended to increase the torments
under which he writhed, for, as the Virginian held the handle firmly
in his grasp, the bayonet was half withdrawn, and the sharp point
forced, by the down-hanging weight of the socket, into a new
direction. Wild with revenge and pain, he was at length in the
act of raising his tomahawk to dispatch the Virginian, who had
abandoned his hold of the bayonet, when a shot came from the front
of the square, and Pee-to-tum fell dead across the bodies of both
his immediate victims. Singular to say, the ball, aimed by Captain
Headley himself at the upper part of his person, and during the
only period when the Indians could be reached without danger to
some one or other of the men, entered his brain over his injured
eye, and forced out the other.
The fall of the detested Chippewa--the head and stay of their
battle--seemed greatly to dispirit the Pottowatomies, a band of
about fifty of whom had followed them in this fierce onset. Of that
number, some fifteen had perished, both in the hand-to-hand encounter
with the immediate followers of Ronayne and several shots from the
square. On the other hand, but four of the volunteers
remained--Corporal Collins, Phillips, Weston, and Degarmo--the latter
severely wounded. All the others had fallen, and, with the exception
of Serjeant Nixon, been scalped.
A cessation of the contest now ensued, and the Indians, holding up
what was intended to be a flag of truce, asked permission to carry
off the body of the Chippewa. Sensible how impolitic it would be
to exasperate them without necessity, Captain Headley granted their
request, adding that now the bad man who counselled them had been
stricken down by the anger of the Great Spirit, he hoped they would
come to their senses and obey their legitimate chiefs.
A low murmuring among themselves was the only reply, as they placed
the body in a blanket, drew the bayonet from the wound, from which
followed a copious dark stream, and leisurely proceeded with their
burden and the scalps they had secured to rejoin another body of
their tribe who had been watching them in the distance, and who
now rapidly advanced to meet them, evidently anxious to know
why they returned unmolested, and what tidings they brought.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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