32.8 America: a.d. 1701 to 1800  (Page 16/20)

As the century ended in 1800, Jefferson ran for president. It is interesting that clergymen were against him. He felt that both the Episcopalian and the Congregational churches hoped to be named as the established Church of the United States, but he had "sworn upon the Altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man". (Ref. 20 )

We must return to events west of the Appalachians during and after the American Revolution. Shawnee hatred of the Virginians virtually assured that the former remaining in Ohio would oppose the colonists during the war. In January 1778 a war party from the Chalahgawtha (Chillicothe) village captured Daniel Boone and some companions at the Blue Licks on the Licking River. Boone later escaped, but all through the summer of 1778 Shawnee warriors fell upon Kentucky settlements, burning, capturing horses and taking scalps. Such raids and counter attacks by such as Colonel John Bowman's 200 mounted volunteers continued through 1779. Although few Indians were killed, the Americans captured many horses and much Indian property. Somewhat demoralized, many Shawnee tribesmen retreated down the Ohio and eventually crossed the Mississippi, establishing new villages in what is now Missouri.

White settlers crowded into Indian lands in southern Ohio and the remaining Shawnees turned to British Indian agents, who assured them that they still owned their lands. Hoping to forestall more bloodshed, the United States negotiated a series of treaties with the Iroquois, Wyandots and other tribes during 1784 and 1785 and assembled a delegation of Shawnees at Fort Finney in January of 1786. American agents told these Shawnees that they must give up their land claims east of the Miami and acknowledge the sovereignty of the United States over all their villages. The Indians were astonished, but under threats of destruction of their women and children, Kekewepellethe and other Shawnee leaders, signed the documents, but they soon lashed out again at white settlers in southern Ohio. Two federal expeditions were sent out against the Shawnees - the first under General Josiah Harmar and the next under Governor St. Clair, who had almost 2,000 regulars, militia and volunteers. The Shawnees with Miamis, Potawatomis, Delawares and other allies, killed over 630 Americans and the latter had to admit disaster. During the spring of 1794 the British built a new Fort Miamis at modern Toledo