.................................




Draper 5YY:53
A Pioneer Story
Major Riddle’s Sons Captured and Brought Up by Indians

The question is often disputed as to whether Tecumseh commanded at the battle of Fort Harrison. Mr. Boord says that he did, and tells the following story to prove it:

Stephen and Abraham Riddle, sons of Maj. Riddle, of Kentucky, were stolen in the early days of Kentucky by the Indians, and carried North. The youths were raised among the Indians and became warriors. Stephen married a squaw and became a chief on account of his bravery. But Abraham was never nothing more than a common, dirty Indian. At last Stephen tired of his Indian life, and longed to see the face of white people. He could remember his home in Kentucky, his father and mother and sister. He was a powerful chief and commanded many warriors. One day he called a council and told his warriors that he thought of going to see Gen. Wayne, then at Fort Wayne. The warriors all declared their determination to go with him, and they set off on their journey. They traveled from the Northwestern part of Indiana to near Fort Wayne. Chief Stephen did not wish to present himself suddenly before the fort with his warriors for fear it would create alarm. He waited in the timber till one of the soldiers came out to hunt, and captured him. He told the soldier that he meant him no harm, and that he wanted to see Gen. Wayne. The soldier conducted him and his band to within a few hundred yards of the fort, when, fearing treachery to the fort, he ran away from the Indians and alarmed the garrison. But Chief Steve succeeded in making the soldiers understand that he was friendly, and Gen. Wayne, accompanied by a guard, came out to treat with him. Wayne expressed astonishment that the Chief should talk such good English, and asked him why it was. Then the Chief told him his story and how he longed to see his pale-faced father and mother. Gen. Wayne was astonished. He knew Maj. Riddle, and knew that he had two stolen boys. “Where is your brother?” asked Gen. Wayne. “Here he is,” said Chief Steve, leading Abraham forward. But Abraham was an orney looking Indian, and Gen. Wayne did not “take shine to him.” “You return here when the moon has twice filled, and I will show you your father,” said the General. The Indians went their way, and Gen. Wayne sent a message to Maj. Riddle, in Kentucky, telling him that he had found his long lost sons. The Major came to the fort. His two sons had been there several days waiting for him. Chief Steve met his father with a dignified and chiefly air, and offered him the pipe of peace. The father recognized him. “Where is my other son?” asked the father. “My brother will not be here before to-morrow, as he is with the soldiers,” said Chief Steve. Abraham, in true Indian style, had picked up with the soldiers and got drunk on firewater. He had trashed every soldier in the fort, and it had been found necessary to “buck and gag” him to make him quiet. Maj. Riddle raged, and demanded that his other son be brought forthwith before him, and Gen. Wayne ordered him to be brought. When the father gazed upon him he declared him no son of his, and wanted to brain him. But Gen. Wayne reasoned with him, and at last the father recognized him. The two sons returned to Kentucky with their father, Steve taking his squaw. Steve was one of soldiers in Fort Harrison during the fight, and he declares that Tecumseh commanded, and that he could have killed him if he had so desired. Stephen afterwards became a Baptist preacher, and preached in Terre Haute in early days. His squaw did not take to civilized life, and he gave her ponies and sent her back to the tribe. Mr. Boord says that the northwest corner block house of the fort was burned during the fight. When the battle raged the hardest a soldier stood exposed to the view of the Indians, and for hours threw water on the flames to keep them from spreading. A woman handed him the water. Another soldier went up to help him and was instantly picked off. One Indian attempted to get into the fort by running through the flames, but he was overcome by the smoke and roasted to death. Soldiers in the fort say that many Indians were killed. The Indians threw their dead into the river, and when they were driven away the soldiers found a perfect road leading down the river where the Indians had dragged their dead. – Terre Haute Express – Aug 1883
Drape manuscript Collection, 5YY:54. 

Tecumseh

The Old Indian Napoleon was Undoubtedly at Ft. Harrison – A Historical Society Searching for the truth.

About six weeks ago, the Express published an interview with Mr. Boord, a gentleman well known in this city, and who has been here since the early days. Mr. Boord can be see on Wall street almost any day, and is quite spry for a man of 82 years old. His memory is remarkably clear, and he can talk for hours in a very interesting manner of the early times. In the interview alluded to, Mr. Boord stated that Tecumseh was at the battle of Ft. Harrison. This has always been a disputed question, but Mr. Boord’s statements of the affair are so forcible and so clear that it should set that mooted question at rest. Mr. Boord was raised in Bourbon county, Ky. IN that county a Baptist minister named Stephen Ruddle resided, who was once an Indian chief. Mr. Boord gives this minister as his authority for the statement that Tecumseh was at Ft. Harrison.
A few days ago the Express received the following letter.
ROOMS OF STATE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF WISCONSIN, MADISON, WIS.
September 19, 1883.

To the Editor of the Express/
Sir – I have just met with an article taken from your paper, stating, on the authority of a Mr. Boord, that Tecumseh shared in the attack on Fort Harrison in 1812. I have long been collecting material for a work on Tecumseh. If Mr. Boord is a resident of your place, please send him this note and the return envelope, with my request that he write me stating if what he relates came from Stephen Ruddle himself; and if so, whether Mr. Boord heard him narrate it. If not derived from Ruddle then from whom did Mr. Boord learn it.
I send you a copy of our Wisconsin Historical Society Collections, and one to your care for Mr. Boord.
Very truly yours,
Lyman C. Draper.

An Express reporter met Mr. Boord, yesterday, gave him the book, and showed him the letter/
“Did Mr. Ruddle tell you himself, Mr. Boord?” asked the reporter.
“Yes; I have heard him tell it a hundred times. There was a little mistake in your interview with me. Ruddle was not in the fort during the fight, but it was another man whom I had reference to as being in the fort.”
“What were Mr. Ruddle’s grounds for saying that Tecumseh was at the battle of Fort Harrison.?”
“I will tell you,” said he, “Stephen Ruddle and his brother were stolen by the Indians when very young, and carried into captivity. Stephen married an Indian woman, and became very popular with the Indians. They made him chief. During that time he became acquainted with all the noted Indian chiefs. He knew Tecumseh and the Prophet as well as I know you or any other person in Terre Haute. When Chief Stephen went to see General Wayne, as I told you in the first interview, and told Wayne who he was, and was found by his father Colonel Ruddle, he was taken home to Kentucky. He was educated and became a minister. His father was very rich. He lived within a quarter of a mile of my father, in Bourbon county, Kentucky. During the war of 1812 Stephen was hired by the United States government to go among the Indians and talk peace to them. He was with them during all that time. He knew every movement they made. He has told me, and I have heard him tell others that he knew that Tecumseh was at the battle of Fort Harrison, but was not at the battle of Tippecanoe. He said that Tecumseh told him so, and told him that if he had been at Tippecanoe the battle would never have taken place. The Prophet was a bad Indian, and taught the Indians to believe that the Great Spirit would protect them, and that the white man’s bullets would not touch them.”
“What kind of man was Ruddle when you knew him, Mr. Boord?”
“He was a very pious man; a straight forward and truthful man. He was looked upon by all who knew him as a truthful man, and reliance could be placed in everything he said.”
The above account, as given by Mr. Boord, is as authentic as any ever related. Mr. Boord is known by nearly every man, woman and child in Terre Haute, and he is known as a straight forward, honest gentleman. If Ruddle was the kind of a man Mr. Boord describes him, there is no reason to doubt his story. The Historical society can put great reliance in the statements.



Draper 5YY:56-56(3)

Terre Haute, Ind. Oct. 31, 1883
Mr. Lyman Draper,
Madison Wis.
Dear Sir,
Yours of the 27 of Sept was duly received. I take pleasure in answering it. I see their has been some mistake – Ruddell was not at Fort Harrison at the time of the battle – I heard Ruddell say that Tecumseh was at the battle of Fort Harrison. Ruddell was sent by government to preach to the Indians in the north of Indiana & Ohio. Ruddell was taken prisoner at Nine years of age and lived with the Indians until he was married and had two children. He was made a chief of, and was acquainted with Tecumseh. Stephen Ruddell was not at Fort Harrison at the time of the battle. Stephen knew Tecumseh and I heard him say Tecumseh was at Fort Harrison at the time of the battle. I believed it for Stephen Ruddell was raised from the time he was nine years old with the Indians, became a chief had a squaw and two papooses and when he got home his father gave him some education and he became a Baptist minister and the Government sent him to preach in the north of Ohio and Indiana to the Indians. His father was rich and Stephen had a good farm and several slaves to work it. He was considered a religious, a trustful, and trustworthy man. I have spent some time in tring to find a survivor of the battle of Fort Harrison but have been unable to do so. But my best information is that there is now no person alive who took part in that engagement.
Abraham Ruddell a brother of Stephen was a soldier in the war of 1812 and served under Gen. Harrison and acted as a spy, and was at Winchester’s defeat and when our forces surrendered, the Indians by an robbury and mal treat any the prisoners. Abram Ruddell told me that the officers applied to Gen. Proctor who was then in command for protection, but he saw that he could not help them, they then sent for Tecumseh and he stopped the Indians at once. Tecumseh said to proctor “it is a shame you allow your prisoners so badly treated” and appears to be very angry – I heard about the same statements from one Kenater, who served with Ruddell and was a prisoner with him.
Abraham Ruddell was a man of affluence and shuned any in that community and was regarded as a man of truth. If there is any further information that I can give you in this regard I will gladly do so. With Kindest regards.
I am Very Truly Yours.

Geo. G. Boord.



1W:271

Capt Ferguson to Col. Harmar, Fort McIntosh, Sept 16th 1786.

“I went to Pittsburgh after a deserter last Monday, where I met with the person who gives the enclosed information. Capt. Ashton & myself thought it prudent to have Girty & Brickell sworn, fearing the news might be only an Indian trader’s finesse. The other person who wishes his name concealed is one [George] Loveless, whose father lives down the Ohio in Virginia; he was examined separately, a day after the others, & I am led to believe his information may be depended on, as he had a better opportunity of obtaining it than the others, from connections with the Indians, for he has a sister married to one Williams, a half Indian; & from this sister he got a great part of what was in agitation among the Indians, & the rest from his own personal knowledge.” [this sister was Sarah “Soharass” Loveless who married a half Indian named Isaac Williams.]

“Fort Pitt, Sept 14th, 1786 – A person [George Loveless] who for many reasons wishes his name not to be known, makes the following report: that he was made prisoner six years ago by the British & Indians, & has since generally resided in the Indian country….”