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The commissioners could make no such concessions, as must have been foreseen by the Indians and their evil advisers.

Gen. Wayne moved his forces from Fort Greenville, where he had wintered, and on the day of August, 1794, obtained a decisive victory over the Indians, almost under the guns of the British fort. After destroying villages and fields the whole length of the Maumee and the Au Glaize, his army returned to Greenville, where he passed a second winter. In the following summer delegates from the several tribes met him, and after a conference extending over five months, a treaty was signed, leaving the Indians with the dimensions of their territories vastly curtailed, and themselves for the first time recognized as the children of a new father, "The Fifteen Fires," as they called the United States.

Gen. Wayne's success, and the happy negotiations of ChiefJustice Jay, terminated the differences, for the present at least, between our government on the one side and the Indians and Great Britain on the other. The several military posts held by the English within our territory, including Fort Miami, erected by Gov. Simcoe, were surrendered early in 1796; Gen. Wayne, authorized by the president so to do, receiving possession of them on behalf of the United States. He at once arranged to have Detroit and the other works provisioned and garrisoned, and late in the season embarked by way of the lake for Erie. On the way he was attacked with gout of the stomach, of which he died before the vessel reached the port.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY DIVIDED-WILLIAM HENRY HARRISON APPOINTED GOVERNOR OF THE INDIANA TERRITORY-ITS SUBDIVISION INTO COUNTIES-BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF GOVERNOR HARRISON-TECUMSEH AND HIS BROTHER THE PROPHET'S CONFEDERACY-ORGANIZATION OF ILLINOIS TERRITORY-INDIAN HOSTILITIES-THE ADVANCE OF POPULATION-CONCLUSION.

PEACE being secured, emigration poured into Ohio so rapidly, extending itself westward to the Great Miami, that at the beginning of the year 1800 the population was nearly sufficient to entitle the territory to be advanced to the second grade of government.* Accordingly, on the 7th of May of that year, congress passed an act for a division of the territory, to take effect on the 4th day of the following July.

By this act all that part of the Northwest Territory lying "to the westward of a line beginning at the Ohio, opposite the mouth of Kentucky River, and running from thence to Fort Recovery, and thence north until it shall intersect the territorial line between the United States and Canada, shall, for the purposes of temporary government, constitute a separate territory, to be called the Indiana Territory."

The territory eastward of this line retained the old name of the "Territory of the United States northwest of the Ohio River," and by the terms of the act Chillicothe was made the seat of government of the latter, and Vincennes of the former, territory. Gen. Wm. H. Harrison, then delegate in congress for the old Northwest Territory, was appointed governor, and John Gibson, secretary, of the new Indiana Territory. The governor reached Vincennes early in the year 1801, having been preceded thither by the secretary the

*Under the Ordinance of 1787 there were two grades of territorial government. The first was composed of the judges and governor; the second grade began when the inhabitants numbered sixty thousand, and consisted of a territorial legislature, comprising a house of representatives, elected by the people, and a council, appointed by the president and senate of the United States.

Old Land Laws, p. 451. The name given to the western subdivision could not have been more appropriate, as it contained within its boundaries the most numerous and by far the most populous Indian tribes east of the Mississippi. The name Indiana, however, was not original, having been formerly applied to a tract of country on the southeast of the Ohio, about the Great Kanawha, granted to Col. George Morgan, Indian trader and agent, prior to the beginning of the revolutionary war.

TERRITORIAL COUNTIES.

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previous July. Gov. Harrison called the judges of the territory together at Vincennes for the purpose of passing the necessary laws and setting the machinery of government in motion. On the 3d of February the governor issued proclamations altering the boundaries of Knox, Randolph and St. Clair counties, previously formed, and creating the new county of Clark. By the terms of the first proclamation the county of Knox was extended some thirty miles into Illinois, south of Vincennes, and extending from thence north by a little east to the mouth of the Calumet River, A line was extended from the westward boundary of Knox through the "Sink-Hole Spring”— a prominent landmark on the west side of the state, nearly on the present boundary line between the counties of Randolph and St. Clair — to the Mississippi. The territory south of this line was called Randolph county, Kaskaskia being the county seat. All of Illinois west of Knox, the whole of Wisconsin, and all that part of Michigan lying north of a line drawn northeast from the mouth of the Calumet River and west of the dividing line between Ohio and Indiana, extended north through the Straits of Mackinaw, the boundary between the United States and Canada, was formed into the county of St. Clair, the county seat of which was established at Cahokia. The county of Knox began at the "cave in the rock," on the Ohio, thirty miles below the mouth of the Wabash, thence up the Ohio to the mouth of Blue River, and up this stream to the crossing of the old road from Vincennes to Louisville; from thence to the nearest point on White River, and up the same to the branch thereof which runs toward Fort Recovery, and from the head-springs of said branch to Fort Recovery; thence along the line separating Ohio from Indiana until its intersection with the line drawn northeast from the mouth of the Calumet River, and thence southward along the eastern boundary of St. Clair and Randolph counties to the Ohio River at the cave in the rock. The new county of Clark was a gore, its base being on the Ohio, between the mouths of the Big Blue and Kentucky rivers, bounded on the west by Knox county, and on the east by the Indian line of cession, running from the mouth of the Kentucky river north by east to Fort Recovery. Springfield, near the Ohio River, was made the county seat of Clark, while Vincennes remained the county seat of Knox, as before.

On the 29th of November, 1802, the eastern division of the northwest territory became a state, and was admitted into the Union, bearing the name of Ohio. While Ohio had remained as the northwest territory, the peninsula of Michigan was attached to it for judicial purposes. The greater portion of the peninsula had

been organized into a county and given the name of Wayne, in 1796, by Gov. St. Clair, who was present with Gen. Wayne, at Detroit, when that post was surrendered to the United States by the English commander. By the act of congress providing for the admission of Ohio as a state, Michigan was taken from Ohio and attached to the Indiana territory. The people of Ohio resented what they considered as an illegal interference by congress, in thus disposing of territory which, under the ordinance of 1787, would have remained as a part of and tributary to Ohio, until such time as it was formed into a state.*

Gov. Harrison, on the 24th of January, 1803, issued a proclamation establishing the county of Wayne, the boundaries of which embraced the whole of the lower peninsula, except a strip running the length of Lake Michigan west of Branch county, and a small portion of Indiana and Ohio lying north of a line drawn due east from the southern extremity of the lake.+

On the 11th of January, 1805, congress established Michigan as a separate territory, and Gen. William Hull was appointed as its governor, Detroit being designated the capital. +

Gov. Harrison brought with him the prestige of an established reputation as a military officer and a statesman. As ensign he served with Gov. St. Clair, and as aide-de-camp of Gen. Wayne, he bore a distinguished part in the successful campaigns of the latter against the northwest Indians. He was secretary of the northwest territory and a delegate in congress from the eastern division. On the formation of the Indiana territory he was not only made its governor, but commissioned as superintendent of Indian affairs in the northwest, which he administered with a skill and success never equaled by any other person through whom our government has had dealings with the Indians. During the long period he had

* By a literal construction of the ordinance of 1787, all that part of Michigan lying east from a line drawn from the mouth of the Miami north to the middle of the Straits of Mackinaw would have belonged to Ohio, while the territory lying west of this line would have remained as a part of Indiana until it was formed into a state.

The proclamation defines the boundaries as follows: "Beginning at a point where an east and west line passing through the southerly extreme of Lake Michigan would intersect a north and south line passing through the most easterly bend of said lake; thence north along the last mentioned line to the boundary of the United States; thence along the said boundary line to a point where a due east and west line passing through the southerly extreme of Lake Michigan would intersect the same; thence west to the place of beginning, and which said county shall be designated and known as the county of Wayne, and that the inhabitants of said county shall have and enjoy [from the date hereof] all the rights, privileges and immunities whatsoever which to a county and the inhabitants thereof in any wise appertains." Detroit remained as the seat of government, and the officers who held commissions in the old county of Wayne were continued in office. Vide Executive Records of the Indiana territory.

The name Michigan is derived from the two Chippewa Mitchaw (great) and Sagigan (lake). Vide Blois' Gazetteer of Michigan, p. 177.

charge of the Indian affairs, he extinguished the title of the Indians to a greater part of the territory within the limits of Indiana and Illinois, and in all his dealings with this unfortunate race his conduct was marked with a uniform kindness and fair dealing that won for him the most implicit confidence and esteem of the Indians themselves and the applause of the government. His private and

GEN. HARRISON.

official correspondence abundantly illustrate the tender regard he had for the Indians, and the care with which he always sought to protect their rights against the designs of the unscrupulous, while at the same time he was equally solicitous to shield the white people against all aggressions from the red. It is said that Gov. Harrison was personally acquainted with almost every prominent chief of the many tribes within his jurisdiction, and by his address, tact and wellknown integrity, he attracted to his person many of the leading These prominent traits en

savages in bonds of closest friendship. abled him to exert an influence over the Indians that few other men could have commanded, and by the exercise of which he often restrained the lawlessness of the savage and protected the pioneer's cabin.

Beginning with the time of his appointment as governor, and ending with the close of the war of 1812, his vigilance and skill during all the time of that memorable struggle shielded the extended lines of the western frontier from incursions of the savages. The early settlers of western Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Michigan might well have hailed him as the "father of the west.'

His fame as a soldier and commander is a part of the military history of the country. He was born in Charles City county, Virginia, February 9, 1773, and died April 4, 1841, at Washington, of an illness supposed to have been induced in consequence of the fatigue and excitement incident to his inauguration as the ninth president of the United States.

*The vignette of Gov. Harrison was supplied by Harper Bros., copyright owners of Lossing's Field-Book of the War of 1812, from which it is taken.