A History of the Valley of Virginia by Samuel Kercheval (1833; 3rd ed. 1902)

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LEWIS WETZEL.

The following narrative goes to show how much may be effected by the skill, bravery, and physical activity of a single individual, in the partizan warfare carried on against the Indians, on the western frontier.

Lewis Wetzel was the son of John Wetzel, a German, who settled on Big Wheeling, about fourteen miles from the River. He was amongst the first adventurers in that part of the country. His education, like that of his cotemporaries, was that of the hunter and warrior. When a boy he adopted the practice of loading and firing his rifle as he ran. This was a means of making him so destructive to the Indians afterwards.

When about thirteen years old, he was taken prisoner by the Indians, together with his brother, Jacob, about eleven years old. Before he was taken he received a slight wound in the breast from a bullet, which carried off a small piece of his breast bone. The second night after they were taken, the Indians encamped at the Big Lick, twenty miles from the River, on the water of McMahan's Creek. The boys were not confined. After the Indians had fallen asleep, Lewis whispered to his brother, Jacob, that he must get up and go back home with him. Jacob, at first objected, but afterwards got up and went along with him. When they had got about one hundred yards from the camp they sat on a log. Well, said Lewis, We can't go home barefooted; I will go back and get a pair of moccasins for each of us; and accordingly did so, and returned. After sitting a little longer, Now, said he, I will go back and get father's gun, and then we'll start. This he effected. They had not traveled far on the trail by which they came, before they heard the Indians coming after them. It was a moonlight night. When the Indians came pretty nigh to them, they stepped aside into the bushes, let them pass, then fell into their rear and traveled on. On the return of the Indians they did the same. They were then pursued by two Indians on horseback, whom they dodged the same way. The next day they reached Wheeling in safety, crossing from the Indian shore to Wheeling Island, on a raft of their own making. By this time Lewis had become almost spent from his wound.

In the year 1782, after Crawford's defeat, Lewis went with a