First Hand Account of the Slaughter and Scalping of 700 U.S. Soldiers on the Wabash
General Arthur St. Clair, the commanding officer of the army on November 4th, 1791,
700 Men Slaughtered and Scalped on the Wabash River by the Miami Indians
The coming victory over St. Clair was clearly the result not of overwhelming numbers, but of superior generalship. Here on the banks of the Wabash about daylight on the morning of November 4th, 1791, Little Turtle assailed St. Clair's army in front, on both flanks, and also at the rear near the close of the action, which was about half-past nine o'clock in the morning. At this time it became necessary to make a charge in order to clear the way to the road, so as to permit the retreat of the remnant of the army, which was hurled headlong down the trail, southward for a distance of three or four miles, with terrible slaughter by the victorious and triumphant Indian warriors. No such defeat had heretofore occurred in American history, not even that of General Braddock in 1775. Down to the present time it has only been surpassed once, the disastrous defeat of General Custer on the Big Horn, June 25th, 1876. St. Clair's defeat was described by one Mr. Thomas Irwin in a diary which he kept at the time. He was a wagoner in St. Clair's army. He says, "That battle always reminded him of a furious thunderstorm that comes up quick and rapidly, and soon disappears, leaving havoc and desolation in its path."
The escape of Stephen Littell was remarkable. At the commencement of the battle he was in the extreme advance. Being unable to keep up with his comrades in their precipitate flight, he sprang aside and hid in a dense thicket as the yelling savages rushed by in hot pursuit. Here he remained some time in dreadful suspense as the roar of the battle died away in the distance, the Indians being in full chase of the flying army. He then ventured slowly forward until he reached the scene of the night's encampment. Awful was the scene presented to him there, the bodies of some seven hundred of the killed and wounded encumbering the ground for the space of about three hundred and fifty yards. It was a cold, frosty morning. The scalped heads presented a very revolting spectacle. A peculiar vapor or steam ascended from them all. Many of these poor creatures were still alive, and groans were heard on all sides. Several of the wounded, knowing that as soon as the savages returned they would be doomed to death by torture, implored young Littell to put an end to their misery. This he refused to do. Ling anxious as to the fate of his father, and seeing among the dead one who bore a strong resemblance to him. he was in the act of turning over the body to examine the features when the exultant and terrific shouts of the returning savages fell upon his ear, and already he could see through the forest the plumed warriors rushing back. It so chanced that an evergreen tree of very dense foliage had been felled near where he stood. It was his only possible covert. He sprang into the tree and turned its branches as well he could around him. Scarcely had he done this when the savages came bounding upon the ground like so many demons. Immediately they commenced their fiend-like acts of torture upon all the wounded. The scenes he continued to witness were more awful than the imagination could possibly conceive. Here our sub ject remained until a suitable time arrived for him to make his escape, which he did — the only one left to tell the sad story of the awful battlefield.
