mirror of
https://github.com/nhammer514/textfiles-politics.git
synced 2024-12-25 23:39:30 -05:00
60 lines
3.0 KiB
Plaintext
60 lines
3.0 KiB
Plaintext
|
Newsgroups: freenet.shrine.songs
|
|||
|
|
From: aa300 (Jerry Murphy)
|
|||
|
|
Subject: Who Will Mourn for Logan?
|
|||
|
|
Date: Wed, 24 Jan 90 15:40:03 EST
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
WHO IS THERE TO MOURN FOR LOGAN?
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
On April 22, 1749, Talgayeeta, better known as John Logan to the white men in
|
|||
|
|
the area, was made Mingo Chief of the Cayuga Indians at Shamokin, PA. He made
|
|||
|
|
his home in western Pennsylvania a safe haven for all people, white or red. He
|
|||
|
|
was always the peacemaker, never entering into the atrocities blamed on either
|
|||
|
|
side except as a man of peace. He was widely known and respected through all
|
|||
|
|
levels of government in the Colonies and in the Iroquois League, as well as
|
|||
|
|
throughout the Indian Nations of Ohio and other nearby states. His wife and
|
|||
|
|
children caught smallpox from the whites, none of them survived but Logan.
|
|||
|
|
Still, he remained a peacemaker.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Twenty-five years later, while Chief Logan and his nephew were on a hunting
|
|||
|
|
trip, white surveyors under the direction of Michael Cresap held a party in
|
|||
|
|
honor of the family of Logan, following which they murdered them and mutilated
|
|||
|
|
their bodies. The dead included his father, his sister, his brother, his
|
|||
|
|
brother-in-law, and several of his friends and neighbors. In his grief, Logan
|
|||
|
|
swore revenge and retaliation.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
His retaliation was swift and sure, and finally led the white rulers to seek
|
|||
|
|
peace. The Governor of Virginia, Lord Dunmore, summoned all the local Indian
|
|||
|
|
leaders to a council. Logan refused to come, sending instead this message which
|
|||
|
|
has made his name famous throughout not only Ohio, but in world capitals.
|
|||
|
|
Logan's headquarters were dominated by a giant Elm tree, under which he composed
|
|||
|
|
this reply to Lord Dunmore. The reply was presented by an interpreter, John
|
|||
|
|
Gibson, on October 20, 1774.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry and I
|
|||
|
|
gave him not meat; if ever he came cold or naked and I gave him not clothing."
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan remained in his tent,
|
|||
|
|
an advocate for peace. Nay, such was my love for the whites that those of my
|
|||
|
|
own country pointed at me as they passed by and said, 'Logan is the friend of
|
|||
|
|
the white men.' I had even thought to live with you, but for the injuries of one
|
|||
|
|
man, Colonel Cresap. He last spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, cut off all
|
|||
|
|
the relatives of Logan; not sparing even my women and children. There runs not
|
|||
|
|
a drop of my blood in the veins of any human creature. This called on me for
|
|||
|
|
revenge. I have sought it. I have killed many. I have fully glutted my
|
|||
|
|
vengeance. For my country I rejoice at the beams of peace. Yet do not harbor
|
|||
|
|
any thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan has never felt fear. He will
|
|||
|
|
not turn on his heels to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan?
|
|||
|
|
Not one."
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
A monument commemorating this event is at Logan Elm Park, 6 miles south of
|
|||
|
|
Circleville, OH, erected in 1919. Another monument to Logan is in Fort Hill
|
|||
|
|
Cemetery, Auburn, NY.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Logan died in 1780, his elm tree died in 1964.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Who is there to mourn for Logan?
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Gerald E. Murphy
|
|||
|
|
Copyright (c) 1988
|
|||
|
|
|