Settlers Attack Pack Trains Near Fort Loudoun, March 6, 1765

The period immediately following Colonel Bouquet’s successful expedition against the Indians at Muskingum October, 1764, was one of comparative peace, but this did not long continue.

A most interesting episode occurred about this time in the Conococheague Valley, from the North to the South Mountain. The people who had been driven off had gradually returned and were now determined to make a better stand against the enemy. They raised a sum of money and recruited a company of riflemen, of which James Smith was elected captain. They dressed in Indian fashion and painted their faces red and black like the Indian warriors.

Two of the officers had long been in Indian captivity, and they drilled their men in Indian discipline, and so expert did this company become that it was recognized by the British Government and Captain 170Smith received a commission in the regular service under King George III, and the following year was with Bouquet’s expedition against Muskingum.

George Croghan, the deputy agent for Indian affairs, went to Fort Pitt in February, 1765, and brought about the meeting with Sir William Johnson, whereby on May 8, 1765, a definite treaty of peace was made with the Delaware.

When Croghan set out from Philadelphia for Fort Pitt, March 1, 1765, he gave a pass for a large number of wagons belonging to Boynton and Wharton, of Philadelphia, loaded with merchandise, which was intended as presents for the Indians at Fort Pitt.

But the people of Cumberland County took the law into their own hands to prevent warlike stores being supplied to savages recently in arms against them. These goods were hauled to Henry Collins, at Conococheague, and there he contracted to pack them on eighty-one horses, by which they were to be delivered into Fort Pitt.

This large transaction alarmed the country and William Duffield raised and armed about fifty of the trained men of that valley and marched to Fort Loudoun, where Duffield made a request that this consignment of goods be stored up until further orders, but this was refused, and on March 6 the pack train proceeded on its journey.

The same morning a large company started from the house of William Smith, one of the Justices of Cumberland County. They came up with this pack train at Sideling Hill, about seventeen miles beyond Fort Loudoun, when sixty-three of the horse loads were burned or pillaged.

A sergeant and twelve men of the Highlanders sent from the fort, went through the neighborhood, saved the balance of the goods, captured several persons, five rifles and four smooth bore guns.

The traders, after losing their caravan, went back to the fort and complained to the commanding officer. It was then that three hundred riflemen marched to Fort Loudoun and encamped on the hill in sight of the fort.

James Smith, a relative of Justice Smith, and the captain who served with Bouquet, appeared in a few days at the head of a large crowd of his infuriated neighbors, and declared that they would suffer death to the last man, rather than let the prisoners be put to jail at Carlisle.

Two months later another caravan of horses laden with liquors, etc., for the troops at Fort Pitt, under a pass from the commander there, arrived at Fort Loudoun, about May 1, and were relieved of their burden in the fort. The drivers led their horses out to pasture, when about thirty men, with their faces painted black, rushed upon them, flogged the drivers, killed five horses and burned all the saddles. In the battle which ensued one of the attacking party was wounded.

Again Captain James Smith led his neighbors to the fort. He was 171accompanied by three Justices who demanded right to search the goods in store there, but intended for transportation to Fort Pitt.

Lieutenant Charles Grant, of the Highlanders, commandant of the fort, explained that the general had committed the goods to his care, but had ordered an inventory to be taken before a justice of the peace, but this inventory could not be taken in the presence of a mob.

The vigilance men threw off the restraints of decent appearance by issuing the following:

“Advertisement. These are to give notice to all our Loyal Volunteers to those that has not yet inlisted, you are to come to our Town and come to our Tavern and fill your Belly’s with Liquor and your mouth with swearing, and you will have your pass, but if not, your Back must be whipt and mouth gagged. * * * We will have Grant, the officer of Loudoun, whip’d or hanged. * * * The Governor will pardon our Crimes, and the Clergy will give-us absolution, and the Country will stand by us; so we may do what we please. * * * free toleration for drinking, swearing, sabbath breaking, and any outrage what we have a mind to, to let those Strangers know their place. * * * We call it Hell’s town, in Cumberland County, the 25th May, 1765. Peter’s Township.”

The crowning deed was reserved for May 28. Lieutenant Grant, while riding about a mile from the fort, was fired upon. His horse started suddenly at the crack of the rifle and he was thrown off. Captain James Smith and others seized him, carried him six miles distant and kept him a prisoner all night in the woods. He was there threatened unless he agreed to give up all the arms taken from the rioters.

Governor Penn and General Gage were humiliated by these insults to the King’s uniform and their inability to punish the offenders, but the more serious concern was in the obstruction of the communication for traders with their goods to reach the Illinois country, where the French across the Mississippi, were ready to obtain an influence by commerce.

While allegiance of the Indians was thus jeopardized, white men began to creep over the mountains and encroach upon land not yet sold by the aborigines. Red Stone settlement was thus made, at the risk of another war. Gage sent a detachment of Highlanders to this region to compel all whites west of the Alleghenies to return to their own provinces, but those who left soon went back again with others.

On June 4, 1765, Governor Penn declared trade with the Indians open from June 20 to all inhabitants of the Province who should apply for and obtain his license.

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