Show FIL N K N the mazeppa american P k err 0 I 1 W 7 r butter or mazeppa by milert arvd 1300 HEK 1 4 4 t rill V 4 0 st L y 4 4 simon kenton daniel boone kf bg L W PORTRA T bo HART nl 4 by ELMO SCOTT WATSON T nv AS just years ago th s month that a stirring advel ture befell a frontiersman on the banks of the ohio river the story of which not only became a class c in border history but fastened upon this ft froin the title of the american mazeppa and was ras the inspiration for a famous picture upon which two artists of world renown collaborated the frontiersman was ras simon kenton or simon butler as he was ras also known the picture was simon butler or mareppa Amerl Americ cain aln and the two tro artsis art ats were ere join jean francois millet the I 1 ren hman famed for his the angelus and the and karl bodmer the swiss who was ras one of the earl earliest lest and greatest painters of the american indian in the summer of col john bowman commander of the fort at harrodsburg Harrods burg ky sent three men S mon kenton alexander Mont goin cry ery and george dark clark not ahr george rogers clark on a spying expedition to the shawnee indian town of chillicothe Chilli beyond the ohio river A short time before this kenton and montgomery accompanied a party led by daniel boone on a similar spying expedition to paint creek town in ohio recaptured four horses which the inglai s had taken from the kentuck y set tiers and brought them back safely to logans logan s station so when the three men started out to scout for bowman they took along a quantity of salt and some halters in case they should have a chance to capture some more ind indan an horses such a chance d d present itself and on the bight might of september 8 9 1778 they fled from chilli taking with rith them seven indian horses by riding h hard hird ird all night all the next day and the next night they reached the ohio river en on the morning ruing of september 11 only to find its a 0 whipped up by a storm that they could notly not e the horses to plunge in and swim for lucky shore despite te the certainty of pursuit by the andl ans they resolved to wait there until the river should subside instead of selecting the three best borses horses and making their escape while there was still time as kenton himself later admitted they should have done the result was that on the morning of september 13 a party of shawnees jumped them as they were preparing to round up the horses and proceed down the ohio to con island where there was a garrison of ken tuel tuc klans lans kenton was the first to fall into the hands of the enemy montgomery coming to his aid fired at the indians but missed and fled for bis his life falth fib some of the savages in hot pur suit in the meantime dark clark dashed down to the river plunged pun ged in and clinging to a piece of driftwood managed to reach the kentucky shore she tue indians who had been chasing i t f i 1 I 1 i i i ery soon returned bringing with them his scalp and they took turns slapping kenton the flee pice with it exclaiming as they did 0 o you steal indian boss hoss huh the shawnees were in an ugly mood for daniel boone had recently es from them and returned to Boones bor ough in time to help beat off an indian attack attach on that fort but now they had a captive who v as almost as great a foeman as boone and they had no intention of allowing him to escape they knew him for a brave man and they were resolved that he should show how a brave man can d e which meant that he was doomed to the torture stake stale however they would wait until they had re turned to chillicothe Chilli where all the members of the tribe could enjoy his death agonies in the meantime they would inflict upon him a long series of beatings and other cruelties always making sure that none of the injuries should prove fatal so as they started north for Chilli chillicothe there began for kenton that adaven ture which for its momentous succession of per Us its transitions and hairbreadth escapes has not its parallel in all tl ti e adventurous annals of western border history it would be impossible to condense all the per its of those two months within the brief scope of this article so only the highlights can be given the first one was his famous mazeppa ride which came the next morning after his capture among their recovered horses the in deans found a wild unbroken three year old and on this animal they fastened their prisoner ty ing his hands behind him and his feet under the horses belly around his neck they tied a halter with its ends fastened to the horses neck and talk tall when this was ras done they released the horse and gave it a harp blow to start it on its ts way ray As they did so one of them exclaimed you like indian horse huh bull you ride one now at once the horse began to rear reir and pitch to rid itself of its burden then started to run through the woods bushes and brambles tore at kenton s feet and legs and low hanging branches of the trees raked his face and body but his greatest danger lay in his being shaken loose loos efrom from the horse for then he would rould be strangled by the halter around his neck before his captors could stop the fear maddened ani ant mal mat however he managed to hang on some how and after a while rhile the three year old ceased its efforts to throw him off and quietly followed the others during the next two days kenton renton was again and again tied on the colt but by this time it I 1 lad ad become more accustomed to him and after a few plunges it quieted down and c circled him along qu etly hii the ret of the party upon his arrival at Chilli chillicothe the cruel preliminaries limin aries to his torture at the stake began he was ras forced to run the gauntlet the first of nine he was ras to run before at last he was ras tied to the stake then the shawnees Shiw nees decided to take him to their principal village atom I 1 a tor for UK if H wt last act of the drama on the way I 1 a 9 was waa forced to run the gauntlet at every village through which he and his captors passed at N appa tomika the first of his miraculous escapes came to pass for there he was lecog nihed by simon girty the white renegade as simon butler kenton renton had taken that name when he fled from virginia early in his career a comrade in arms during the dunmore war and girty succeeded in winning over the shaw nees to freeing their prisoner but his freedom was ras short lived for a war party which returned from an unsuccessful raid in virginia demanded that tha t his torture proceed aven girty could not prevail against them but he did succeed su in hav ing the date for the torture postponed until the gathering of all the tribes at sandusky on the way to sandusky the famous mingo chief logan befriended kenton and spared him some sufferings ings but near sandusky he was again forced to run the gauntlet his ninth time ihen when preparations were going 7 forward for burning I 1 im at the stake again fate intervened As the torch was applied to the wood piled plied up around him a heavy rain started to fall and put it put it was two days before the wood was dry enough to try again in the meantime peter bruillard Drull Dru lard illard a british agent from detroit arrived and ransomed kenton so that he could be taken to detroit for questioning by gen henry ham ilton the british commander there kenton was held a prisoner at detroit until june 1779 when he escaped and safely made the perilous journey back to kentucky Ren tucky As for the story of how simon kenton renton the frontiersman became the subject for a famous picture by two celebrated artists it came about when karl bodmer a swiss artist accompanied maximilian prince of to america to 11 lustrate the book his royal patron was to write on travels travel in the interior of north america 1832 1834 after bodmer s return to europe he lived fo awhile at fontainebleau in france prance where wh re he wa wat a neighbor of jean francois millet he told mil let some of the classic stories of the american border especially that of kenton s mazeppa ride and millet began to make male drawings of indians in crayon and charcoal eventually he and bodmer collaborated in a series of lithographs bodmer doing the landscapes and horses and millet doing the human figures fl ures both indians and white men these were nere published in 1802 and one of them was simon butler or mazeppa Amerl Americ cain aln and this was another curious manifestation of the fate which intervened repeatedly in the life of simon kenton that his last portrait should be painted more than a decade after his death by a foreigner a man who had never seen him and who noted for being the delineator of quiet pastoral french scenes would rould be about the last man on earth one would expect to portray an in aident in the tumultuous life of an americal Ameri caa civa frontiersman I 1 0 0 oy R V eaters newspaper union MI M I 1 t s |