Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/347

Rh and improving lands near the Big Kanhaway River, had ſeen another party of white men, who informed them that they and ſome others had fell in with a party of Shawneſe, who had been hunting on the ſouth weſt ſide of the Ohio, that they had killed the whole of the Indian party, and that the others had gone acroſs the country to Cheat River with the horſes and plunder, the conſequence of which they apprehended would be an Indian war, and that they were flying away. On making enquiry of them when this murder ſhould have happened, we found that it muſt have been ſome conſiderable time before we left the Indian towns, and that there was not the ſmalleſt foundation for the report, as there was not a ſingle man of the Shawneſe tribe, but what returned from hunting long before this ſhould have happened.

We then informed them that if they would agree to remain at the place we then were, one of us would go to Hock Hocking River with ſome of their party, where we ſhould find ſome of our people making canoes, and that if we did not find them there, we might conclude that every thing was not right. Doctor Wood and another perſon then propoſed going with me; the reſt of the party ſeemed to agree, but ſaid they would ſend and conſult captain Creſap who was about two miles from that place. They ſent off for him, and during the greateſt part of the night they behaved in the moſt diſorderly manner, threatening to kill us and ſaying the damned traders were worſe than the Indians, and ought to be killed. In the morning captain Michael Creſap came to the camp. I then gave him the information as above related.