Mary Jemison & Frances Slocum
During colonial times from New England to North Carolina Indian raids on outlying farms and settlements were a source of constant fear. Often conducted by small war parties moving quickly and difficult to detect, the raids would often result in the burning of homes and barns, slaughtered livestock and the killing and scalping of scores of settlers. Sometimes the Indian raiders would take captives especially young women and children. The Indian raiders would then retreat to their home areas forcing their captives to endure a march of many hardships. For those who survived the march, captivity among the Indians awaited. Many children were sold or traded to other tribes and to the French in Canada; others were adopted into Indian families. Women were taken as white squaws, many living out their lives as wives and mothers in the village hierarchy. Two such instances are illustrated by the lives of Mary Jemison and Frances Slocum, Pennsylvania girls taken captive in their youth and adopted into Indian villages where they grew to adulthood, married and became respected members of their tribes.
Commodore Perry and the Battle of Lake Erie
September 10, 1813
The Battle of Lake Erie fought on the lake’s western end on September 10, 1813 near Put-in-Bay pitted American and British naval forces in a climatic struggle for control of the Great Lakes. The battle became the most important and certainly the bloodiest naval engagement of the War of 1812, made a national hero of the American commander Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry and added his motto “Don’t Give Up The Ship” to a lexicon of cherished American naval and military quotes. The battle is largely remembered through a painting in the U.S. Capitol by W.H. Powell depicting Perry transferring his flag and command to the Niagara as his original flagship Lawrence lay crippled and blazing in the water. In addition to the painting there is a diorama of the fighting at the Milwaukee Public Museum. Both the painting and the diorama are commonly portrayed on postcards. Additionally, monuments to Perry and his victory are found in a number of locations in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Following is a work in progress checklist of known postcards portraying events, monuments and historical miscellany for Commodore Perry and the Battle of Lake Erie.
The Wyoming Massacre Monument
The Battle of Wyoming or its more commonly known name, “The Wyoming Massacre” was a brief but bloody skirmish between Connecticut settlers living along the upper Susquehanna in Pennsylvania and British loyalists and a loose confederation of Iroquois tribes from New York. It was part of a larger and longer frontier war waged mainly throughout central and western New York in 1777-1778 evolving out of a British strategy to resist patriot expansion and settlement and supporting military force and also blunting possible French ambitions in reclaiming parts of Canada lost in the French and Indian War.