Simon Girty, senior, was, as early as 1740, a licensed trader on the frontiers of the province of Pennsylvania. About that period he located on or near Shearman's Creek, in now Perry county, and here his son, Simon Girty, who figures so conspicuously in the annals of border life, was born in January, 1744.
There were three other brothers, Thomas, George, and James. In 1750, the father and sundry other " squatters " on Shearman's Creek, were dispossessed of their settlements by the sheriff of Cumberland county and his posse, by direction of the Provincial authorities. For several years previous the Shawanese Indians on the Juniata demanded their removal, but warnings were of no use, and at last the strong arm of the law was invoked, the settlers taken into custody, and their cabins burned.
Girty, with his family, removed at first to the east of the Susquehanna, near where the town of Halifax is situated, and afterwards to the Conococheague settlement, where, it is said, he was killed in a drunken bout. In 1756, his widow was killed by the savages, and Simon, George, and James were taken captives by the Indians. Thomas, the eldest, being absent at his maternal uncle's on the Antietam, was the only one who escaped. Simon Girty was adopted by the Senecas under the name of Katepacomen, became an expert hunter, and in dress, language, and habits a thorough Indian. The author of " Crawford's Campaign " says that " it must be passed to his credit that his early training as a savage was compulsory, not voluntary as has generally been supposed." George Girty was adopted by the Delaware?, became a fierce and ferocious savage, while James, taken into the Shawanese tribe, became no less infamous as a cruel and blood-thirsty raider of the Kentucky border,
" sparing not even women and children from horrid tortures." To return to Simon Girty. His tribe, although having their homes in southern New York, roamed the wilderness northwest of the Ohio, and when the expedition under Colonel Bouquet, at the close of the Pontiac war of 1764, dictated peace to the Indian tribes on the Muskingum, one of the hostages given up by the Ohio Indians, was the subject of our sketch. Preferring the wild life of the savage, Simon Girty escaped and returned to his home among the Senecas. One of the conditions of the treaty referred to, was the yielding up by the Ohio Indians of all their captives, willing or unwilling.
This being the case, Girty was returned to the settlements, and took up his home near Fort Pitt on a little run emptying into the Allegheny and now known as "Girty's Eun." In the controversy with the Virginia authorities, Girty espoused their cause, and he figures quite conspicuously in the difficulties of Dr. John Connolly and his party with the govern ment of Pennsylvania. In the unprovoked war of Lord Dun-more, in company with Simon Kenton, he served as hunter and scout. He subsequently acted as Indian agent, and became intimately acquainted with Col. William Crawford, at whose cabin, on the Youghiogheny, he was a frequent guest, and, it is stated by some writers, although without authority, was the suitor for the hand of one of his daughters, but rejected.
At the outset of the Revolution, Simon Girty was a commissioned officer of militia at Fort Pitt, took the test oath as required by the Committee of Safety, but in March, 1778, deserted to the enemy in company with the notorious Alexander McKee and Matthew Elliott. It is not known what was the real cause of the defection of Girty, but it is more than probable that not being fully trusted by the authorities, an application for a captaincy in the Eighth Regiment of the Pennsylvania Line in the Continental service having proved unsuccessful, his innate hatred of everything Pennsylvanian, led him to add treason and disloyalty to his long catalogue of misdeeds.
Well skilled in Indian lore, he had frequently acted as interpreter at Indian treaties, and was, therefore, known to the British officers in command on the Lakes, who were well acquainted with his courage, shrewdness, and above all, his savage ferocity. The deserters were warmly welcomed by the enemy; while at Pittsburgh the little band of ardent patriots were thrown into consternation by the sudden and uncalled for treachery. The perfidious Delawares on the Muskingum who were vascillat-ing in their neutrality, were almost persuaded by Girty to become hostile to the Colonies, while some of the Shawanese actually "took up the hatchet'' and began their marauds upon the remote frontier settlements. Simon Girty himself now began his wild career by sudden forays against the borderers, and in his fierceness and cruelty out-did the Indians themselves. Hence the sobriquet of " Girty the White Savage." Heckewelder, in his most interesting narrative of his missionary life, does not give a very pleasing picture of Girty. The latter had planned the destruction of the Moravians, owing to their powerful influence with the Indians and their efforts to procure peace to the frontiers, and in July, 1779, made a futile attempt on the life of that "Apostle to the Indians," the Rev. David Zeisberger. He caused, however, the breaking up of the missionary establishments on the Muskingum.
On the 16th of August, 1781, Girty led a strong force of Indians against Bryant's Station, five miles from Lexington, Kentucky. The Kentuckians, says Butterfield, " made such a gallant resistance, that the Indians became disheartened and were about abandoning the siege when Girty, thinking he might frighten the garrison into a surrender, mounted a stump within speaking distance and commenced a parley. He told them who he was; that he hourly looked for reinforcements with cannon, and that they had better surrender at once; if they did so, no one should be hurt; otherwise he feared they would all be killed. The garrison were intimidated; but one young man, named Reynolds, seeing the effect of this harangue, and believing his story, as it was, to be false, of his own accord answered him: ' You need not be so particular to tell us your name; we know your name, and you, too. I've had a villainous, untrustworthy cur-dog this long while, named Simon Girty in compliment to you; he's so like you-just as ugly and just as wicked. As to the cannon, let them come on; the country's roused, and the scalps of your red cut-throats, and your own, too, will be drying on our cabins in twenty-four hours.' This spirited reply produced good results.
Girty in turn was disheartened, and with his Indians soon withdrew." Passing over further detailed accounts of the numerous murderous forays against the Americans, we come to that noted campaign against the Sandusky Indian towns in 1782, led by Col. William Crawford. Girty's brutality reached its climax when he viewed with apparent satisfaction the most horrible and excruciating tortures which that ill-fated but brave and gallant officer was doomed to undergo; and this episode in his career has placed his name among the most infamous, whose long catalogue of crime causes a shudder as the details are penned, even after the lapse of a century.
During the next seven years little is recorded of this desperado, save that he married, the year after Crawford's defeat, Catherine Malott, a captive among the Shawanese. They had several children, and she survived her husband many years, dying at an advanced age. Notwithstanding Girty's brutality, depravity, and wickedness, he never lost the confidence and esteem of the Indians; during the several campaigns which resulted so disastrously to the Americans, the advice of Simon Girty was conclusive. It is stated that after St. Clair's defeat " a grand council was held at the confluence of the Maumee and the Auglaize by nearly all the Northwestern tribes, to take into consideration the situation of affairs; and Simon Girty was the only white man permitted to be present;" and as in the subsequent conference of 1793, it was determined mainly through the exertions of Girty to continue hostilities.
The same year, when commissioners, on the part of the United States, attempted to negotiate with the Confederated Nations for an adjustment of our difficulties with the Indians, Girty acted as interpreter. His conduct was exceedingly insolent; and it is related that he was not only false in his duty as an interpreter, but that he run a quill or long feather through the cartilage of his nose cross-wise, to show his contempt for the American gentlemen present. At the defeat of Gen. St. Glair, Girty was present on the British side, and saw and knew Gen. Richard Butler, second in command, who lay upon the field writhing from the agony of his wounds.
The traitor told a savage warrior that the wounded man was a high officer, whereupon the Indian buried his toma-haw in Gen. Butler's head, whose scalp was immediately torn off and whose heart was taken out and divided into as many pieces as there were tribes engaged in the battle. With the victory of Wayne in 1795, which .forever destroyed the power of the Indians of the Northwest, and which resulted in the famous treaty of Greenville, Girty sold his trading establishment, and removed to Canada, where he settled on a farm just below Maiden, on the Detroit river, the recipient of a pension from the English government.
Here he resided until the war of 1812, undisturbed, but almost blind and incapacitated for active service. After the capture of the British fleet on Lake Erie, and the retreat of the British army from the eastern banks of the Detroit river, Girty followed, remaining away from his home until after the proclamation of peace, when he returned to his farm at Maiden, where he died in the autumn of 1818, aged over 70 years.
It is a difficult matter at this remote day to give a correct estimate of the character of Simon Girty, yet enough has been said to show that he was a heartless villian, and no bravery, courage, or seeming compassion for Kenton, or one or two others whose lives he interceded for and saved, can compensate for that one hellish deed which he could have prevented-the burning of Col. Crawford. He seemed to revel in the very excess of malignity, and above all in his hatred to his countrymen. The recent attempt to make a hero of him has proved futile. Without one redeeming quality,
" all the vices of civilization engrafted upon those of a savage state," we have a picture for all time that of Simon Girty.
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