Mingo Indians Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

May 16, 1778: Wyandot and Mingo Indians Attack the Fort Randolph

On May 16, 1778, about 300 Wyandot and Mingo Indians attacked the garrison at Fort Randolph in Point Pleasant. Located at the confluence of the Ohio and Kanawha rivers, Fort Randolph was one of the most important military outposts in Western Virginia during the Revolutionary War.

The attack was perhaps in retaliation for the murder of Indian chiefs Cornstalk and Red Hawk and Cornstalk’s son Elinipsico months earlier. Cornstalk had led Shawnee forces in their valiant but failed effort against the Virginia militia at the Battle of Point Pleasant in 1774. Once the Revolutionary War started, however, Cornstalk, Red Hawk, and other chiefs from nearby Ohio wanted to remain neutral between the Americans and British.

Cornstalk and Red Hawk came to Fort Randolph to warn the Americans they could no longer control their warriors and that an attack could be imminent. Instead of accepting the intelligence information in good faith, the Americans detained the two chiefs at the fort. After an Indian attack on two white hunters in the area, local residents captured and killed the two chieftains and Elinipsico, who’d come looking for his father.

April 30, 1774: Family of Chief Logan Slaughtered in Hancock County

On April 30, 1774, one of the worst atrocities of the frontier era occurred in present-day Hancock County. A band of frontiersmen led by Daniel Greathouse slaughtered a group of Indians, including the family of Logan. Logan was chief of the Mingo Indians, a multi-tribal confederation allied to the Six Nations. During the four years he’d lived in the area, he had consistently tried to maintain peace.

After the murder of his family, though, Logan went on the warpath. He led raids throughout the upper Ohio Valley and into the Monongahela Valley. Shawnee and Delaware tribes then attacked settlements along the Ohio River. The summer of 1774 was one of the bloodiest on record in western Virginia.

In response to the violence, Virginia Governor Lord Dunmore launched a two-pronged assault. Dunmore’s War came to a head at the Battle of Point Pleasant, where, that October, Virginia militia defeated Shawnee warriors.

Logan skipped the subsequent peace negotiations but delivered to John Gibson a famous speech that was later quoted by Thomas Jefferson. In it, Logan grieved for his family and asked poignant, lingering questions about the treatment of Indians.

McColloch Leaps Into Wheeling Creek to Escape Attack: Sept. 1, 1777

On the morning of September 1, 1777, about 200 Wyandot and Mingo Indians attacked Fort Henry at Wheeling. The fort was defended by about 60 militia—nearly half of whom were lured outside the post and killed by the Indians.

The Indians then launched a siege of the fort for three days and nights. After burning cabins and outbuildings in the region, they withdrew across the Ohio River.

It was the first of two Indian attacks on Fort Henry during the Revolutionary War. The second attack, which occurred five years later, was the occasion for Betty Zane’s heroic actions.

The attack of 1777 produced a different story of bravery. A few militia escaped the initial Indian attack and made it to a nearby fort. That fort’s commander, Major Samuel McColloch, rode to lift the siege of Fort Henry, but he was trapped by Indians atop Wheeling Hill. McColloch spurred his horse to the edge of a cliff and leaped to the waters of Wheeling Creek far below. Amazingly, both he and his horse survived the leap.

Samuel McColloch was killed in another Indian ambush in 1782.

Greenville Treaty Ends Indian Threat to Western Va: August 3, 1795

On August 3, 1795, the United States and several Indian tribes signed the Treaty of Greenville. Although the treaty was signed in western Ohio, it had a major impact on the region that would later become West Virginia.

Under the terms of the treaty, the Indians ceded to the United States about two-thirds of present Ohio. By pushing the tribes west, it ended the threat of Indian attacks on the Western Virginia frontier.

For decades, Indians and pioneers had had continual conflicts on the Western Virginia frontier, with the violence peaking in 1774 and again during the Revolutionary War. Although Indian attacks waned in the years following the Revolution, there were still sporadic conflicts. The Treaty of Greenville brought peace to Western Virginia and sparked an influx of new settlement, while depriving Indians of even more of their ancestral land.

The treaty didn’t assure peace in Ohio, though, and places further west. Settlers immediately poured into territory promised to the tribes. Also, some Indian leaders, such as Tecumseh, refused to sign the treaty and began putting up long-term resistance.