Frederick Ice chapter 1

This is the rough draft of a historical novel about Frederick Ice. He was a real person, my ancestor. I have used what history I have, and filled in with my imagination. The Reverend Harry Smith actually wrote in his diary. And also George Washington wrote in his diary. The Battle of Galudoghson also is historical fact. I have used names where I had them, and filled in the rest. It is fiction, but as historically accurate as I could make it be. Frederick signed his name as "Iaac" on some papers. Probably pronounced as "Yahtz" (since is Dutch) and began signing as "Ice" which was sometimes misread as "Jice." Other variants were "Iecye" and "Icyce" and some think "Ten' Eyck." Dates are impossible to accurately pin down. Everybody has an opinion. His first wife was probably Mary Margaret Galloway. His second wife was Eleanor Livingston (Leviston?). Frederick's farm at Morgantown WV, where his children ran Ice's Ferry, lies under the waters of Cheat Lake. Again, this is historical fiction based on the traditions of my family.
R. D. ICE © 1996



FREDERICK ICE
Rhoderick D. Ice

I shouted and screamed to high heaven when I saw her lying in a pool of blood! Mary Margaret, my beloved wife, murdered by a war party of Mohawk Indians. Three of my children kidnapped. This was something I could not forgive nor forget. It is forever burned into my memory.

My life changed when those Mohawk Indians raided my home in 1745. It was a common enough story and it happened many times on the frontier. But it was different when it happened to me. I helped organize a militia right after that, and we determined never to let such a thing happen again. That is, we tried to prevent it happening. We fought against the bad Indians, and the good Indians helped us. But the bloody French were always agitating. Maybe you know all about that.

As I look back over the years, this is my story. I think my memory is still good. I have used names and places as you might best understand now. Yet of course a lot of time passed before there was a Pittsburgh or a Steubenville. I was born about 1680 as I remember being told. It was in the Northwestern corner of Germany, in an area called East Friesland. That made me a Hollander, yet the area was cut off from Holland when separation was enforced on my ancestors. We were people who had lost our country. My lifetime has now spanned more than a century. I wrote my Last Will And Testament in 1788. And I'm not dead yet.

Let me speak here. I am Reverend Harry Smith. During the summer of 1793 I saw a man said to be 113 years old, ride to meeting on a horse led by his son, who was himself an old man. He was a German (Hollander) known by the name of "Daddy Ice", throughout the country. I visited him during his last sickness and found his intellect had not failed as much as might be expected. I preached at his funeral in 1796 and it was a solemn time. While I preached, his children, then old gray-haired people, and his grandchildren wept. This was a man who had braved the wilderness and raised two families against the odds of nature, Indians, New Governments, poor transportation and nonexistent roads, and all. But Frederick as a pioneer had lived as many others in the early days of our Nation.

The Indians were always amazed to see me and my family, because we are the Blond People. Our hair is almost white and our eyes are a blue-gray. This has always been a dominant family characteristic. And, barring accidents, we have been very long-lived people. I say accidents, but most often wars. My father was killed in a skirmish with government forces. They wouldn't leave us alone. And then there were always the French who seemed to meddle just to make things worse than they were.

I have mixed feelings about the Indians. Some think of them as children of nature - but they are not, certainly not children! Nor are they to be ignored as ignorant savages. I have lived at times in their villages . Some of my best friends are Indians. I would be willing to put my life in their hands and I have done that at times. Yet they do not think like we do and many are not to be trusted. I buy land, and it is mine. They do not understand that concept. They roam the woods and kill and eat what they find. They cannot understand that livestock belongs to the farmer. They see a hog and kill it, and the farmer gets mad and perhaps shoots at them. It isn't only language that divides us. How can we communicate when we see things so differently?

Indians raided settlers in Pennsylvania in the early 1700's. Many of my friends moved on down here to the mountains of Virginia hoping to be safe. But there seemed to always be trouble in those days. There was a terrible battle over in the Valley of Virginia in December 1742, at a place they called Galudoghson. Some trigger-happy White man shot first and then everything exploded! It never should have happened. But it did. There was an report about it published in the Pennsylvania Gazette in January, 1743. Let me tell you about it as we pieced the details together from what we heard.

It was early in December, the year 1742, in the Valley of Virginia, on the South Branch of the North Branch of the James River, at a place called Galudoghson. An English Plantation House stood on the trail which comes from the northeast going southwest toward the Carolinas. Captain John McDowell and his company of men were stationed there.

Hop Brooks was standing guard on the front porch of the house. As he looked to the north he saw Indians slip out of the woods. He ran inside to tell the captain.

"Cap'n McDowell! There's Indians coming. I seen them come out on the trail just at the edge of the woods. One of them has a pole with something white tied on it."

"Don't get in an uproar. They could be friendly. We'll just wait. But keep your gun ready."

Hop Brooks went back out on the porch. The Indians were about a quarter of a mile away. He stood and watched as they came down the trail. He counted thirty-three in the group. They were clearly a war party, but he could not identify the tribe they belonged to. As they came closer he thought they must be Delawares, judging from their markings.

When they were almost there, Hop went to the doorway and shouted: "Henry, come out here and speak to these Indians."

Henry could speak the two main Indian languages and he served as the translator.

Henry came out to stand on the porch, and then Captain McDowell came out also.

While the others stayed back a respectful and safe distance, the Indian who appeared to be the oldest and who seemed to be the leader came up to the porch. He held a pole with a white rag tied on it.

He held up his hand in a salute and jabbered a few words in a guttural language, with an English word or two mixed in.

"I can't understand him," Henry said. "His name must be Shikellimo, as near as I can understand." He tried to speak to the Indian in the languages he knew, and even tried French, but to no avail.

The other Indians who were waiting were nervous and seemed to be getting more so. Certainly the Indians and the English had no reason to trust each other.

Finally Shikellimo made signs to say that they were friendly, and that they were a war party on their way south to fight another tribe. As you know, the Indians used sign language when they could not understand each other's languages. But this wasn't a very good way to communicate.

Then the Indian took a rolled up paper out of his pouch and held it out to Henry.

Henry unrolled the paper and read it. "Cap'n McDowell, he's got a pass signed by Justice Hogg in Pennsylvania. This says he has safe passage down to the Carolinas."

"Here, let me read that."

Captain McDowell studied the paper for a while, then gave it back to Henry, who then handed it to the Indian.

"Henry, tell him that we honor the pass, but we have no authority to renew it or to give them safe passage on south of here."

Henry tried for several minutes to communicate this to Shikellimo. But how can you communicate with an Indian who doesn't think like you do in the first place, and doesn't understand what you are trying to tell him?

Finally Captain McDowell just shook his head.

"Henry, take them around back to the kitchen and see that they get enough food for the whole bunch. And give them a jug of whiskey."

"Yessir, Cap'n." Henry made signs to the Indian, who then turned to his men and called two of them to come help. They went around the house to the kitchen door.

The Indians took their food and started on down the trail toward the south, then stopped at the edge of the woods and made camp.

Early the next morning Hop stood on the porch and began taking a good look around at things. One of the others had stood night guard. This was frontier. Couldn't be too careful.

As Hop looked to the south he could see signs that the Indians were still camped there. He went in to tell Captain McDowell.

A week went by with the usual people coming and going in this remote area. Colonel James Patton would be due in soon. The Plantation House was a center of activity and also an army post.

"Cap'n McDowell," Henry said, "what're we going to do? You've given them more food and more whiskey and those Indians are still here."

"I've thought on it," said McDowell. "You take a company of men and ride on down there. Make them understand that we cannot renew their pass to go south. They have got to go back north the way they came. Tell them they have another day or two. Then we must take action."

Of course the Indians did not wait a day or two, but gathered up their bundles and started south just as soon as Henry and the company of men had left. They traveled all night and were soon some distance away.

But all this did not go unnoticed. Captain McDowell had scouts roaming the area at all times.

"Sound the assembly!" Captain McDowell shouted. "We've got to go do something about those Indians."

A company of soldiers was soon gathered. That is to say, some soldiers and more militia. And they were as ignorant about the Indians as the Indians were about the English. The scene was set for tragedy.

They started off, the soldiers led by Captain McDowell, riding horses, with the militia on foot following behind them. They began a forced march to try to overtake the Indians, who were now some miles away.

After six or seven hours, toward evening, they came upon the Indians.

Shikellimo faced the soldiers as they arrived. He held up his hand in a sign of peace. But both groups of men were tense. Neither knew just what the other intended.

"Henry, tell them we mean them no harm. Tell them they must return back north. Tell them this will be best for all."

Again, Henry tried to communicate this message. He tried to speak words they might understand, and he used the signs. But to no avail.

Then disaster struck.

One of the Indians slipped into the woods to relieve himself.

Immediately one of the militia raised his gun and fired, wounding the Indian.

Shikellimo immediately fired his gun, killing Captain McDowell. Others had their guns trained on McDowell as well, and he was struck by three bullets. Now both sides blazed away with their guns and several were killed. In perhaps ten minutes it was all over.

To the Indians, the English had attacked them under flag of truce, stupidly, treacherously, recklessly. This was only one more link in the chain of misunderstanding between the English and the Indians.

The militia retreated as rapidly as possible. And so did the Indians. There was no pursuit. Later the Indians returned to the battlefield, carried off their dead, "stripped" the White bodies, and carried off the horses and provision that were scattered on the field. The war party had been so reduced in numbers that they now returned north, dividing into two groups.

Meanwhile Colonel Patton had come to the Plantation House, bringing reinforcements.. When the stragglers came in, they told him what had taken place. He tried to persuade them to return immediately to the field of battle to secure the dead and bring them back. But the men refused and would not go. Finally they did agree to return the next day.

The next morning, Colonel Patton came out to stand on the front porch of the Plantation House.

"Attention!" he shouted. "Gather around me. We've got to go to the field of battle and bring back the bodies of our dead."

In a few minutes they left, taking along some pack horses and a wagon.

Now, you would think those soldiers and Colonel Patton knew something about Indians and warfare on the frontier. But when they got to the field of battle, they were amazed that the Indians had been there before them. Of course the Indians had carried off their own dead; and also stripped and scalped the white bodies. That's just how it is out here on the frontier.

On the Virginia frontier, the youth of the Six Nations met a race of men who were as sudden, as daring, as brave and agile as themselves. Some "white" men took up Indian methods of fighting and became fierce Indian-hunters, devastating the Indian warriors. The Indians never had a chance because they would not work together. They fought each other - as they had for centuries. They sold land rights to the settlers and then did not honor what they had done, because they did not know what they had done. They did not understand treaties and that they were making promises about future action.

But the English were really stupid in the way they dealt with the Indians. Unfortunately the English did not understand the Indians and did not make friends with them. The French were quick to take advantage of this. And so most of the Indians joined with the French in fighting the settlers. I knew there would be trouble ahead. It did come to a climax later, around 1754, in the French and Indian War against the American Colonists. Both sides did horribly cruel and inhuman things to each other. Isn't war always like that! But the Indians had "sold their birthright" by slaughter and mayhem. The settlers could not ignore this. Tragically the friendly Indians suffered along with the guilty.

In 1750 the English actually occupied only a narrow strip of land along the Eastern coast, about 1,000 miles in length. But they claimed everything from Newfoundland to Florida as having been discovered by the Cabots. The French claimed the land all around this, from Quebec to New Orleans and upward to the Great Lakes. They supported their claims with a cordon of forts. Both claimed the land along the Ohio River, and there the rub came in. The rights of the Indians were completely ignored. In 1749 the English Crown gave rights to 800,000 acres along the Ohio River to the Ohio Company.

Now, I can understand what it means to forfeit lands and home. I had lived through all that in the Old Country. The Ohio Company held a business session about the lands along the Ohio River. I wasn't actually there, but I got the report about it. Some Indian Chiefs spoke. "Where is the land of the Indians? The English claim all on one side of the river, the French all on the other side. Where does the Indians' land lie?" And I knew just how they felt.

But I do blame certain of the Indians more than anyone else. War was their way of life and they gave no quarter. More Indians were killed by other Indians than by the white settlers. They fought and killed each other rather than working together. Those bloody French exploited them and sent them against us. It could have been different.