Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-21

mother, who was close behind, rushed at the
door and bolted it, and was only just in
time. can tell you, Mr.. Curwen, the bolts
are strong in those cabins, and if the cabin
will stand the door will stand. This was
Just what the door had been built for.
''The redskins did not mean to be kept out
by bolts, and, little boy as 1 was, knew
what they were doing when they began to
hack at the door with their tomahswks. It
is queer, sir, but the thing I remember is a
great bit of wood breaking out and hitting
me on the head. and seeing the axe come
through. Then the hole grew bigger and
bigger, and more axes came through; then
my mother told me to get under the bed,
which did not do. But she stood in the
corner, with fathers axe, waiting till the
first Indian stuck his arms through the hole,
and then his head. The minute his head
came in she hit him hard with the back of
the axe twice, and can see the blood run
down on the floor now, Mr.. Curwen. He
had got so far in that he hung, sir, in the
hole, and she was soall-fred wild that she
pulled him in. We had not had a chance
to cry out before another Of the critters
poked his head in in the same way. She
waited minute longer this time, till half his
body was in, and she hit him in just the
same way, on the back of the head. Then
there came third, and then there came
fourth, and my mother dragged them all
back and laid them out in the corner. Then
the critters outside began to guess what had
happened, and no more came in at the door.
They were gone SO long that she nailed her
bread board oyer the hole; but then she
heard noise on top of the cabin. My
mother knew what it was, but she did not
dare go near the chimney for fear of the
door, so she threw her kife to Inc, and told
fba foaf fhar had md fho
feathers into the fire. do not think was
in the least frightened; was wide awake,
you may be sure, and threw the feathers into
the fire. And I was just in time; two of
them came pitching down the great wooden
chimney smothered by the smoke, and fell
into the open Goals. By this time my
father had come to, and got on his feet.
He found his gun, which she had not had
time to handle he blew out the brains of
one of them, and she finished the other with
the axe. My father said afterward that
another man tried to get in, but he got as
good as he sent, and went away bowling.
They tell this story all up and down the
valley now and one of these copperhead
redskin blackguards said afterward, when
he came into Cumberland to trade, "Things
was bad; the white squaws fought worse
than the long knives"
Curwen did not wonder that q boy who
could tell such stories as this had in his
blood the elements Of a scout or Indian
hunter, and aner he had heard this story he
did not so much wonder that he did not
succeed in impressing upon Glendenin the
sentiments of humanity with regard to the
redskins, which he had brought with him
from his Eastern home.
Which such help as the long oars and
stout arms of the recruits gave, with the oc-
casional good luck of heavy rains swelling
the current of the river, the boat made as
fast progress as anyone ought to have ex-
pected. Master Harry Curwen, who was
eager to show the woman he loved that he
had found place in the world and was re-
spected by other people, thought that the
boat did not go fast enough. And particu-
larly, when, by the vagaries of the current.
he found himself sailing directly east when
his heart was rushing west, he quarrelled
with fortune as young men will. But, what
with an occasional extra glass of grog, which
he took the responsibility of serving out to
the crew, and what with making the days as
long as he and the sergeant dared, the boat
made the shortest trip, as it proved, which
had yet been made, and arrived safely at
Fort Harmar. When the last day came,
the young man dressed himself in his uni
form as an officer Of the Massachusetts
militia, assumed such military aspect as he
could, and reported to General Harmar.
To say the truth, he was a little disap-
pointed when he came to see the fort. He
had seen Fort Pitt as he passed it, but had
supposed that that was an exception to what
he was to find westward. The word fort
gave him associations of what he had read
of Marlborough's campaigns and Of Fred
erick, and ne was a little disappointed when
he found that the deiences most to be relied
upon were the stout wooden posts, which
were erected 'Just like a pale fence" as he
wrote home to one of his Salem friends only