Four Weeks in a Block House No. 48

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Ironton Register, Thursday, June 11, 1896
OLD TIMES
FOUR WEEKS IN A BLOCK HOUSE
(by John G. Wilson)
No. 48

Submitted by Sharon M. Kouns

For the Register.
In the early settlement of the western part of Virginia now called West Virginia, the settlers built themselves a bullet proof house, out of hewn logs, about forty feet square, surrounded by a stockade and a deep ditch. Holes were cut to shoot from and a chimney was built with fireplace for cooking purposes. The roof was covered with heavy timber and that covered with dirt to make it fireproof. This kind of a house was called a block house. The door was made double thick so as to resist the rifle bullet, a well was dug within the stockade, so as to have water available for themselves and stock when besieged by the Indians.
The story as it was related to me happened in the month of May. The settlers had been warned by the scouts and hunters that the Indians on the Miamis were preparing for a foray against the whites and for them to keep strict watch. The men went to work in the field with their rifles strapped on their backs, ever on the alert, expecting at every moment to hear the crack of the rifle and the warwhoop of the savage. Their wives kept their little values packed ready to flee to the harbor of safety, the block house, where they had taken corn, bacon, and bedding, everything they could spare, knowing that when the attack came, there would be no time to gather up only what could be caught up in a moment.
On one bright day about 9 o'clock in the morning, the attack came. The men were plowing, with their rifles strapped to their backs, when with the crack, crack of many guns and the appalling warwhoop of the savage, several of the settlers fell dead or wounded. They were all in one field helping their neighbors whose corn was the best. The survivors unstrapped their guns and commenced firing at the approaching savages, who were coming on with tomahawk in hand. As the bullets of the whites began to tell on their numbers, dropping one here and another there, they turned and ran to the nearest trees where they loaded their guns. The whites preceded by their wives who at the first alarm had grasped their young children and whatever else they could carry, had made haste to the block house and were safe within its sheltering folds.
My narrator said that his mother gathered him under one arm, and the bed in the other, made her way safely to the block house. He was about two years old and, of course, tells the story as it was related to him by his mother. His father escaped without harm and with those who were not hurt, and helped the wounded, keeping the Indians at bay until they were all safe. A laughable incident transpired, during the retreat to the block house. A Yankee fresh from New England, had his rifle knocked from his hand by a ball, and there was no time to stop to pick it up, and when he entered the fort, the first thing he said to his wife who was looking for him, with many fears that he was either killed or wounded, was much relived to hear him call out, "Nine pound ten gone, Betty." He alluded to the loss of his gun which had cost him 9 pounds and 10 shillings, English money. The Indians, as soon as they saw that the whites had escaped, proceeded to scalp the dead, kill all the horses and cattle they did not want to take away with them, and then laid siege to the block house. They placed their men on every side, and fired volley after volley at the port holes, but no one inside were hurt, and the bullets rattled harmless against the stout oak logs.
The men in the block house took turn on watching, and whenever a savage showed himself, a bullet was sent in his direction, and being good marksmen they seldom missed. The women attended to the wounded, cooked, moulded bullets and did all in their power to help their husbands, fathers and brothers. Fortunately they had a well inside of the stockade which afforded them plenty of water, but they did not have as much provisions as they should have had and many an ominous shake of the head told what the one was thinking; but they were stout of heart and were inured to danger in all its forms, and in case of scant rations, it was only to buckle the belt tighter and endure; but the women and the little ones, there was the rub! And when night came on and most of them were asleep, the oldest of that little company held a council of war Indian fashion, and one after another spoke giving in low tones his idea of what to do. Several of them had been in the Indian war with Wayne and Harrison and having lived most of their lives on the border were well versed in all the wiles of the red men. When each had spoken they agreed on the following.
They were to defend the fort to the last extremity, but before the food was entirely gone, two of the strongest and swiftest runners were to be let out at the gate, about midnight, during a storm if possible, and they were to -- G.
(Continued next week.)