The Bluffton news. [volume] (Bluffton, Ohio) 1875-current, 1948-04-01

work as any since performed by
police departments of metropolitan
cities.
As Capt. Charles Builderback, he
had commanded one of the companies
Of volunteer militia under Colonels
Crawford and Williamson during
their attack on Gnadenhutten, March
5, 1882, and the mass Staying of SO
Christian Indians at that Moravian
mission.
1t was Builderback who had shed
the first blood at the massacre when
he shot, tomahawked scalped Shebosh,
an old Moravian chief. Later he was
at the defeat of Crawford, who after
capture, was burned at the stake
near Carey, Wyandotte County. John
Slower, a Crawford scout, was saved
when a sudden storm frightened the
superstitious savages who were about
to burn him on Pickaway Plains a
few days later.
Indians AVenge Massacre
One by one, it appears, partici-
pants in the Moravian massacre were
being hunted down by the savages
and after seven years-when no
more hostile Indians were believed
to remain in western Ohio, they
found Capt. Builderback.
At his capture the savages made
certain of his identity. They asked
him his name. Charles Builderback,"
he replied, not connecting the attack
with the occurrence of nearly a
decade before. The warriors stared
at each other in malignant triumph.
r"Ha," one told Builderback, "you
kill many Indians-you big captain
you kill Moravians." That settled it.
Ruhama and Charles Builderback
were married in Virginia in 1885 and
moved over the mountains to the
Ohio country where they settled on
Short creek. Then they built a cabin
on the east bank of the Ohio, where
they lived until the savages found
Charles.
After the scalp was shown to the
widow, Builderback's scalp disappear
ed, Mrs. Builderback related.
Widow Returns Home
After her ransom by the govern
ment she was taken to Ft. Washing
ton, Cincinnati, from where she was
returned to the cabin in the little
clearing and corn and pumpkins
where the attack occurred. The widow
Builderback was again back home.
In 1871 she married John Greene,
one of Fairfield County's earliest
settlers and in 1898 they moved to
near Lancaster.
There, three miles west Of Lancas-
ter, the son of John and Ruhama
Greene was bon-the first white
child born in Fairfield County. Mrs.
Greene died in 1842-ten years after
the death of her second husband,
John Greene.
Readers will recall the story of
Gnadenhutten, already related in one
of the True Tales About Ohio. There
Crawford's and Williamson's Penn
sylvania volunteers, when on
punitive expedition against Indians
who had committed some depreda-
ton east of the Ohio River, came on
the Little Mission of Christian In
dians, separated the men from the
women and put the men in one large
cabin and the women and children
in another.
Closely guarded they remained
there all night while the troops
"deliberated" in a trial without jury
or representation, what their fate
should be. The deliberations con-
sisted of getting uproariously drunk
and spending the night in revelry
and carousal while the Indians spent
it in prayer.
Indians Slaughtered
Next morning the soldiers set
upon the Indians without warning
or mercy and ruthlessly killed all
of them. One soldier Dragged that
he had accounted for IT of the
Another handed his axe
to a companion remarking that he
had killed until his arm ached.
Though the warlike Delaware,
Wyandotte and Ottawa
tribes had little respect for the
Moravian Indians because of their
and peaceful character
istics, they took the view that they
were Indians just the same and that
their massacre should not go un-
punished.
Soon after the Gnadenhutten
episode the forces of Crawford and
were attacked near
Bucyrus and great part of the
troops killed. The remainder were |
routed and survived only by scatter
ed flight.
The only Indians who escaped
death in the Gnadenhutten massacre
were two boys about IA, who slipped
away through the forest. Both had
been scalped by the white men.
Gnadenhutten, now with but 870
contains the Gnadenhut- |
Ten State park-a nina-acre memorial |