Encounter
The period after the Revolutionary War was a time of rapid white expansion west of the
Allegheny Mountains and into the Kentucky and Ohio country. The Indians as well as
the white hunters and settlers generally carried a knife, tomahawk and single shot flintlock
rifle or musket. Usually they tried not to seek confrontation until the other parties’
strength and numbers were ascertained. Each had to decide whether the other was
friend or foe: to greet and share food, fight or run. If the interloper turned out to be
hostile, agility as well as speed and cunning were the best defense. Flight did not mean
cowardice. It was simply one of the many strategies used for survival. Shortly after the
siege of Boonesboro, Kentucky, in 1778, some of the Indians who remained in the area
began killing the settler’s cattle at a nearby settlement known as Logans’ Station.
Benjamin Logan went to drive his cattle nearer to the protection of the station since they
were scattered and had become quite shy. During his search, Logan encountered a
small party of Shawnee warriors who wounded him two or three times and shattered his
arm. Logan ran to an area of brush and canebrakes. He had to hold his thumb in his
mouth so that his broken arm wouldn’t swing freely and get hung up in the brush. Logan
made it back to the security of the station, recovered from his wounds and had a long,
distinguished political career before and after Kentucky’s statehood.