FORT WAYNE, OLD FORT MIAMI, AND THE ROUTE FROM THE MAUMEE TO THE WABASH.

BY R. S. ROBERTSON.

The early history of the country is a subject attracting the attention of many intelligent minds, and now that many county histories are being prepared, it is but right that any whose investigations have enabled them to throw any light upon the early history of any locality should furnish it, that the work undertaken may be as complete as it is possible to make it. It is with this view, and with the hope that it may induce others to contribute to the work, that I contribute my mite, in the following hasty sketch from notes made at different times for my

own use.

The importance of maps in deciding important questions in history is often overlooked, but they are frequently the only records of early explorations. It is from an early map that we can prove that the site of Fort Wayne was known at an earlier date than any recorded history has given.

In 1657 Sanson, who was Royal Geographer to the king of France, prepared a map of "Le Canada, ou Nouvelle France," on which Lake Erie is displayed, with a river flowing into it from a distance, clearly representing the present course of the the Maumee from the site of Fort Wayne to the lake. The St. Marys and St. Joseph are not delineated, showing that their courses had not not yet been explored. Thus we have quite conclusive evidence, that the Maumee had been explored to the vicinity of this point prior to 1657, by the indefatigable French explorers.

The map is in the possession of C. C. Baldwin, Esq., of Cleveland, and a reduced copy is given in the AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN, vol. 1, p. 233.

Again, in 1680 the route to the Mississippi by way of the Maumee and Wabash is clearly alluded to by Pere Allouez, who says: "There is, at the end of Lake Erie, ten leagues below the strait, a river, by which we can traverse much of the road to the Illinois, being navigable to canoes, about two leagues nearer to that by which they usually go there (by the St. Joseph of the lake and Kankakee?)-Letter of Pere Allouez, on the 9th of November, 1680, translated frow Margry, 3, p. 98.

In 1681 the great La Salle, before starting on his second expedition towards the Mississippi, made his will, in which is the following devise: "Do give, cede and transfer to the said Sieur

* *

Pliet, in case of death. my * As well as all my rights over the country of the Miamis, Illinois, and others to the southward, with the settlements among the Miamis, in the state it may be at the time of my death."- Will of La Salle, Aug. 11, 1681. Translated from Margry's French Discoveries.

We find another mention in 1682, from the pen of La Salle, in a letter, which says: "The 15th of January we struck the trail of those of our people whom M. de Tonty had sent on a hunting expedition. They were searched for and one was found. The two others were gone to make enquiries after me to the river of the Miamis."-Translated from Margry, in Magazine of American History, 2, 544.

In Western Annals, p. 81, it is stated that in a report of La Salle to Frontenac, made in 1682, he mentions the route by the Maumee and Wabash to the Mississippi as the most direct. Notwithstanding it was the shortest route, the explorers long continued to go around by the lakes, sometimes descending by Green Bay and the Fox and Illinois rivers, or by the head of Lake Michigan up the St. Joseph of the Lake to the present site of South Bend, thence by Portage to the Kankakee and down that river. Why they should so long travel this roundabout way has been a mystery until lately, when another unpublished letter of La Salle threw a flood of light upon it. It is well known that about the time of the advent of the whites, the Iroquois confederacy was carrying on a war of extermination against the Algonquin tribes, of which the Miamis were a part. La Salle says: "Because I can no longer go to the Illinois but by the lakes Huron and Illinois, the other ways which I have discovered by the head of Lake Erie, and by the western coast of the same, becoming too dangerous by frequent encounters with the Iroquois.-Letter of LaSalle, October, 1682. Translated from Margry, 2, 296.

This letter is important also, because it shows that LaSalle actually discovered the route, and that he has stood where now a populous city stands, when there was nothing to meet his view but the unbroken forest and the small cluster of Indian wigwams. We may consider this disputed question proven, for La Salle was noted for stating nothing but exact facts, and when he says "I have discovered the route," it may be taken as a fact.

From 1682 to 1716, a period of 34 years, my researches have led me to no direct mention of this route, but it is stated that a route was established about 1716 from the head of Lake Erie up the Maumee to the site of Fort Wayne; thence by a portage to the Wabash; thence by way of that river to the Ohio and Mississippi-but the authority for the statement is unfortunately not given.- Western Annals, p. 80.

Little more is known of events here until near the middle of the eighteenth century. There is a map in Colden's History of the Five Nations, showing a portage from the St. Marys to the "Oubache"-one from our St. Joseph to the "Huakiki," (Kankakee), and one from the Kankakee to the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan.-Colden's Hist. of the Five Nations, ed. 1847. Parkman says: "At the middle of the eighteenth century, her great object," speaking of France, "was fast advancing towards completion. Two posts on the Wabash and one on the Maumee made France the mistress of the great trading highway from Lake Erie to the Ohio."-Consp. of Pontiac, 1. 62.

History and tradition inform us that a French fort was destroyed here in 1747. If this be true, it must have been soon re-established, for in 1749 Capt. Bienville de Celeron, a chevalier of the order of St. Louis, was sent by the Governor of Canada, the Marquis de Galissoniere, with orders to descend the Ohio and take possession of the country in the name of the king. He descended the Ohio to the mouth of the Great Miami, burying leaden inscribed plates at various points in his route; thence up the Miami to about Fort Laramie; thence across the portage to the head of the Maumee. "They completed the portage on the 22nd of September and arrived at Kiskakon. This appears to be the Indian name for the site of Fort Wayne. Celeron found it a French post, under the command of M. de Raymond. It undoubtedly took the name of Kiskakon from a tribe of Ottawas that removed to this place from Missillimackinac, where they had resided as late as 1681. It was here that Celeron provided pirogues and provisions for the descent of the Maumee to Lake Erie. The Miami chief Pied Froid, or Cold Foot, resided in the village. He appears not to have been very constant in his allegiance, either to the French or the English. Leaving Kiskakon on the 27th of September, part of the expedition went overland to Detroit, and the remainder descended the river by canoe."-Mag. of Am. History, 2, 130-147.

A map of his route, prepared by Father Bonnecamp, who accompanied the expedition, shows with considerable exactness the course of the St. Marys and Maumee, and the "Fort" is located in the bend of the St. Marys south and east of the river. If the Map is correct and we have no reason to doubt it, the fort stood somewhere not far from the residence of Hon. Hugh McCulloch, which agrees with existing traditions. Vaudreuil mentions Fort Miami on the Maumee in 1751. This must have been our Fort Miami, for although there were four forts of that name in the west, the other Fort Miami on the Maumee was not built until early in 1794, and then by the British. One of the four was at the junction of the St. Joseph and St. Marys, the

second at the mouth of the St. Joseph of Lake Michigan, the third on the Illinois river, and the fourth at the foot of the Maumee rapids.— Western Annals, 82 and note.

It may be interesting to note that in 1753, Maj. Geo. Washington accompanied his report to Gov. Dinwiddie of his mission to the French at Fort Duquesne, with a map of the western country, which indicates that if he could not himself "tell a lie" he could prepare maps that were a good ways from the truth. On it a mountain range, marked as running from N. E. to S. W. lies in the peninsula forming the present State of Michigan. On the east side of the range the "Miamis river," a very short stream, flows directly east into Lake Erie, while the "Obaysh," (Wabash) or St. Jerome, river rises on the west side of the same mountain range, near where the city of Jackson now stands, flowing only a little west of south to the Ohio.

He says:

In 1758 this route was described by Du Pratz; "From the Missouri to the Oubache (the Ohio) is a hundred leagues. It is by this river that one goes to Canada from New Orleans to Quebec. This voyage is made by going up the river (Mississippi) to the Oubache (Ohio), then they go up this river to the river of the Miamis (the Wabash), continue this route to the portage, and when they reach this place seek natives of this nation, who make the portage in the space of two leagues. This road completed they find a small river which flows into Lake Erie."-Translated from Du Pratz Da Louisiane, 1,147, and the accompanying map gives the route and portage as above described.

The French were then in peaceable possession of all the west but their domination soon came to an end. Most of the western posts were transferred to the English in 1760. It was on the 29th of November, 1760, that Detroit fell into hands of the English, and soon after an officer was sent southward to take possession of the Fort Miami (now Fort Wayne), and Ouatonon, which guarded the communication between Lake Erie and the Ohio.— Parkman, Consp. of Pontiac, 156 and 169.

This was undoubtedly Ensign Holmes, with a detachment of 60th rifles, or "Royal Americans." Not more than 600 or 800 men of this regiment garrisoned all the forts of the west. A full history of this regiment would be a history of the country west of the Alleghenies, from this time until the revolutionary period, but, unfortunately, no such history is known to exist.

The 60th Rifles, or Royal Americans, was a regiment organized in 1755, under the direction of the Duke of Cumberland, expressly for American service. It was to consist of four battalions of 1000 each, to be raised from among the German and Swiss emigrants; £81,178 was voted by parliament to raise it.

German and Swiss officers were to be provided, and an act of parliament was passed to authorize them to be commissioned. Its ranks at this time were filled by provincials of English as well as of German descent. Henry Boquet was a Swiss, of the Canton of Berne, and was a soldier from boyhood, serving under the king of Sardinia, and afterwards that of Holland. He accepted a Lieut.-Col.'s commission in the regiment in 1755, and was Col. of the 1st Battalion at this period. He was made a Brig.-Gen'l in 1765. The regiment was honored with the post of danger in all the Indian wars along the very extended frontier. One of its battalions was defending Fort George on the Lake of that name and was nearly annihilated by the massacre so vividly described by Cooper in the Last of the Mohicans, when they had surrendered to Montcalm. Another guarded the Pennsylvania frontier, and the rest were scattered among all the forts of the great west, exposed to all the horrors of Pontiac's bloody wars. A namesake of the writer, Capt. Robertson, was captured by the Indians near Detroit, put to death, and the skin of one of his arms used for a tobacco pouch.-Parkman, Consp. of Pontiac, 230; Smollet's England, 3475.

In 1763, according to Sir William Johnson, the Miamis had about 800 fighting men, but this included a portion of their allies, the Kickapoos. Parkman says of them at this period: "On the water of the Wabash and Maumee dwelt the Miamis, who, less exposed, from their position, to the poison of the whisky keg, and the example of debauched traders, retained their ancient character and customs in greater purity than their eastern neighbors."-Consp. of Pontiac, 1,151.

He says "From Vincennes, one might paddle his canoe northwards up the Wabash until he reached the little wooden post of Ouatonon, thence a path through the woods led to the banks of the Maumee. Two or three Canadians or half-breeds, of whom there were numbers about the Fort, would carry the canoe on their shoulders; or, for a bottle of whisky, a few Miami Indians might be bribed to undertake the task. On the Maumee, at the end of the path, stood Fort Miami, near the spot where Fort Wayne was afterwards built.-Ib., 156.