PORTRAITS OF VALOR
“…�ow � �ave burie� the �atchet, an� �expec� that none �f �y �olor �ill ever again �ind it ou�. � �ow tell �ou that �one �n particular can �ustl� �laim this �roun� – �� belong� �n �ommo� �o �ll. N� earthl� bein� has an �xclusiv� �ight to i�.” - ��ie� ��rh��
While Harrison and Croghan were defending forts, another turn of events brightened the prospects for the Americans. A coalition of Indian tribes still living in western Ohio had a change of heart about their relationship with their Ohio neighbors. The Wyandot Chief Tarhe, better known as the Crane, was considering a new alliance.
the lingering British continued to stir the pot. A series of campaigns against the Shawnee, Miami and Wyandot towns led by Colonel William Crawford, then General Arthur St. Clair, and finally General Josiah Harmar failed to reign in the tribes. In 1792, General Anthony Wayne embarked on the war path. He set out on a slow and deliberate march up western Ohio, building forts along the way. The expected confrontation came in August 1794 at Fallen Timbers (near present day Mary Jane Thurston State Park), a forest along the Maumee River that had been toppled by a tornado. Tarhe joined forces with the Shawnee Chief Blue Jacket in a scheme to hide amid the jumble of tree trunks and ambush the soldiers as they passed through. Wayne responded nimbly to the attack, turning the Indians’ advantage of heavy cover into a trap without an escape.
Over the course of his long life, Tarhe had seen his share of conflict, and felt his share of resentment over the invasion of his home by the pioneers, as well as the broken promises of the British. Tarhe had just reached manhood when, in 1763, the British king declared that the colonists were forbidden from settling in the native American lands west of the Appalachian mountains. Like his fellow Wyandot warriors, Tarhe grew concerned about the growing number of frontier settlements in the Indian lands, and was prepared to take action. By the time the royal governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, had organized a militia to confront the Indians in the Ohio territory in 1774, Tarhe had become an influential leader. Tarhe helped unite the tribes in a collective effort to drive away the Virginia military. He fought bravely alongside Chief Cornstalk and his Shawnee warriors in their bloody surprise attack on Dunmore’s Captain Lewis at Point Pleasant on the Ohio River. Although Lewis lost nearly one-fifth of his men in the grueling Battle of Point Pleasant, he held his ground and the fight was counted as a defeat for the Indians, who eventually retreated. Tarhe honored the peace agreement that followed the battle, which called for the Indians to yield the land south of the Ohio River to the settlers. Tarhe was a man of his word, and he expected the same of others. He was a passionate defender of his tribe’s interests, but he was also reasonable and pragmatic. He held no personal animosity toward the white settlers – his wife was French Canadian, and his son-in-law, Isaac Zane,4 was a Virginia captive who had been adopted into the tribe. During the 1780s, tensions on the frontier escalated. The Indian lands in the Ohio territory continued to shrink as the U.S. Congress negotiated treaties with various tribes. Incoming settlers continued to violate the treaty terms, the Indians continued to retaliate, and 4
Now a seasoned warrior of 52 years, Tarhe fought with gusto. He and his fellow Wyandots were in a particularly vulnerable position near the river bank. Tarhe was seriously wounded in the arm during the fierce fighting, and at the end of the day, he was the only Wyandot chief to survive. Despite his injuries, Tarhe helped ensure that the Wyandot women and children were evacuated from their camp on the Sandusky River to the relative safety of Sandusky Bay. Tarhe recognized that the Battle of Fallen Timbers was a decisive win for the Americans, and that, with Wayne in charge, it was better to be friends than adversaries. When Wayne initiated the Treaty of Greenville in 1795, Tarhe offered his signature and his sincere pledge to uphold it. The treaty terms drove the tribes out of their towns along the southern reaches of the Muskingum, Tuscarawas, Scioto, Great Miami and Little Miami Rivers, leaving the northwest territory along the Sandusky and Maumee rivers for Indian occupation. More than a dozen years later, when Tecumseh sought to enlist neighboring chiefs in his resistance movement, Tarhe refused. Tarhe was no coward and he did not shrink from his duty as a warrior, even as an old man. However, the counsel of years and experience had taught Tarhe that resistance had come at too dear a cost. He believed that sustaining the peace was now in the best interest of his people.
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