1785.]

GENERAL LEWIS.

393

wounded. The Indian loss is supposed to have been about twenty in killed and wounded.

In concluding this imperfect sketch of one who performed no ordinary part in the settlement of the west, we regret that our means and time have not allowed us to prepare a more full and general biography.

Captain Brady married a daughter of Captain Van Swearengen, of Ohio county, who bore him two children, John and Van S., both of whom are still living. Captain Brady possessed all the elements of a brave and successful soldier. Like Marion, "he consulted with his men respectfully, heard them patiently, weighed their suggestions, and silently approached his own conclusions. They knew his determination only by his actions." Brady had but few superiors as a woodman: he would strike out into the heart of the wilderness, and with no guide but the sun by day, and the stars by night, or in their absence, then by such natural marks as the bark and tops of trees, he would move on steadily, in a direct line. toward the point of his destination. He always avoided beaten paths and the borders of streams; and never was known to leave his track behind him. In this manner he eluded pursuit, and defied detection. He was often vainly hunted by his own men, and was more likely to find them than they him.

Such was Brady, the leader of the spies.

GENERAL ANDREW LEWIS.

WE greatly regret our inability to give in the present edition, a comprehensive biography of this distinguished man. We were promised through a member of the family, material necessary to prepare the sketch proposed, but having been disappointed, it will be impossible to do more now than present a brief notice of the family, written by a gentleman of

394

SKETCH OF THE LEWIS FAMILY. [CHAP. III.

the Valley, whose position and relationship enables him to state many interesting facts of family history which otherwise might have escaped attention.

"John Lewis was a native and citizen of Ireland, descended from a family of Huguenots, who took refuge in that kingdom from the persecutions that followed the assassination of Henry IV. of France. His rank was that of an esquire, and he inherited a handsome estate, which he increased by industry and frugality, until he became the lessee of a contiguous property, of considerable value. He married Margaret Lynn, daughter of the laird of Loch Lynn, who was a descendant of the chieftains of a once powerful clan in the Scottish Highlands. By this marriage he had four sons, three of them, Thomas, Andrew, and William, born in Ireland, and Charles, the child of his old age, born a few months after their settlement in their mountain home.

"For many years after the settlement at Fort Lewis,1 great amity and goodwill existed between the neighboring Indians and the white settlers, whose numbers increased until they became quite a formidable colony. It was then that the jealousy of their red neighbors became aroused, and a war broke out, which, for cool though desperate courage and activity on the part of the whites, and ferocity, cunning and barbarity on the part of the Indians, was never equalled in any age or country. John Lewis was, by this time, well stricken in years, but his four sons, who were grown up, well qualified to fill his place, and to act the part of the leader to the gallant little band, who so nobly battled for the protection of their homes and families. It is not my purpose to go into the details of a warfare, during which scarcely a settlement was exempt from monthly attacks of the savages, and during which Charles Lewis, the youngest son of John, is said never to have spent one month at a time out of active

1 This was the home of the elder Lewis. It was a few miles below the site of the present town of Staunton, and on a stream which still bears his

name.

1772.]

PERILOUS SITUATION.

395

and arduous service. Charles was the hero of many a gallant exploit, which is still treasured in the memories of the descendants of the border riflemen, and there are few families among the Alleghanies where the name and deeds of Charles Lewis are not familiar as household words. On one occasion

he was captured by the Indians while on a hunting excursion, and after travelling over two hundred miles barefooted, his arms pinioned behind, and goaded by the knives of his remorseless captors, he effected his escape. While travelling along the bank of a precipice some twenty feet in height, he suddenly, by a strong muscular exertion, burst the cords. which bound him, and plunged down the steep into the bed of a mountain torrent. His persecutors hesitated not to follow. In a race of several hundred yards, Lewis had gained some few yards upon his pursuers, when, upon leaping a fallen tree which lay across his course, his strength suddenly failed and he fell prostrate among the weeds which had grown up in great luxuriance around the body of the tree. Three of the Indians sprung over the tree within a few feet of where their prey lay concealed; but with a feeling of the most devout thankfulness to a kind and superintending Providence, he saw them one by one disappear in the dark recesses of the forest. He now bethought himself of rising from his uneasy bed, when lo! a new enemy appeared, in the shape of an enormous rattlesnake, who had thrown himself into the deadly coil so near his face that his fangs were within a few inches of his nose; and his enormous rattle, as it waved to and fro, once rested upon his ear. A single contraction of the eyelid-a convulsive shudder-the relaxation of a single muscle, and the deadly beast would have sprung upon him. In this situation he lay for several minutes, when the reptile, probably snpposing him to be dead, crawled over his body and moved slowly away. I had eaten nothing,' said Lewis to his companions, after his return, 'for many days; I had no fire-arms, and I ran the risk of dying with hunger, ere I could reach the settlement; but rather would I have died, than made a

396

SUCCESSFUL DEFENCE.

[CHAP. III. meal of the generous beast.' During this war, an attack was made upon the settlement of Fort Lewis, at a time when the whole force of the settlement was out on active duty. So great was the surprise, that many of the women and children were captured in sight of the fort, though far the greater part escaped, and concealed themselves in the woods. The fort was occupied by John Lewis, then very old and infirm, his wife, and two young women, who were so much alarmed that they scarce moved from their seats upon the ground floor of the fort. John Lewis, however, opened a port-hole, where he stationed himself, firing at the savages, while Margaret reloaded the guns. In this manner he sustained a siege of six hours, during which he killed upwards of a score of savages, when he was relieved by the appearance of his party.

"Thomas Lewis, the eldest son, labored under a defect of vision, which disabled him as a marksman, and he was, therefore, less efficient during the Indian wars than his brothers. He was, however, a man of learning and sound judgment, and represented the county of Augusta, many years in the House of Burgesses; was a member of the convention which ratified the constitution of the United States, and formed the constitution of Virginia, and afterwards sat for the county of Rockingham in the House of Delegates of Virginia. In 1765, he was in the House of Burgesses, and voted for Patrick Henry's celebrated resolutions. Thomas Lewis had four sons actively participating in the war of the Revolution; the youngest of whom, Thomas, who is now living, bore an ensign's commission when but fourteen years of age.

"Andrew, the second son of John Lewis and Margaret Lynn, is the General Lewis who commanded at the battle of Point Pleasant.

"Charles Lewis, the youngest of the sons of John Lewis, fell at the head of his regiment, when leading on the attack at Point Pleasant. Charles was esteemed the most skilful of all the leaders of the border warfare, and was as much be

1780.]

A VIRGINIA MATRON.

397

loved for his noble and amiable qualities as he was admired for his military talents.

"William, the third son, was an active participator in the border wars, and was an officer of the revolutionary army, in which one of his sons was killed, and another maimed for life. When the British force under Tarleton drove the legislature from Charlottesville to Staunton, the stillness of the Sabbath eve was broken in the latter town by the beat of the drum, and volunteers were called to prevent the passage of the British through the mountains at Rockfish Gap. The elder sons of William Lewis, who then resided at the old fort, were absent with the northern army. Three sons, however, were at home, whose ages were seventeen, fifteen and thirteen years. Wm. Lewis was confined to his room by sickness, but his wife, with the firmness of a Roman matron, called them to her, and bade them fly to the defence of their native land. 'Go my children,' said she, 'I spare not my youngest, the comfort of my declining years. I devote you all to my country. Keep back the foot of the invader from the soil of Augusta, or see my face no more.' When this incident was related to Washington, shortly after its occurrence, he enthusiastically exclaimed, 'Leave me but a banner to plant upon the mountains of Augusta, and I will rally around me the men who will lift our bleeding country from the dust, and set her free.'

"I have frequently heard, when a boy, an anecdote related by an old settler, somewhat to this effect:-The white, or wild clover, is of indigenous growth, and abounded on the banks of the rivers, etc. The red was introduced by John Lewis, and it was currently reported by their prophets, and believed by the Indians generally, that the blood of the red men slain by the Lewises and their followers, had dyed the trefoil to its sanguine hue. The Indians, however, always did the whites the justice to say, that the Red man was the aggressor in their first quarrel, and that the white men of