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 NARRATIVE 
 
 OK THE LIFE OK 
 
 GENERAL LESLIE COMBS; 
 
 EMr.i:Arix(T incidents in the early history of the 
 
 NORTH-WESTERN TERRITORY. 
 
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 ^ AJe^ errata have crept Id the acoompanying biogmphy. which the reader will he kind enough to 
 
 On page 12, for Fort Meigs, on the myrth side of the river, read Fort Winchester, on the .outh side 
 
 On page 15. for third of May, read fifth of May. Also, a little below, for two days a.ui nights 
 
 read during an entire day and night. ^ ' 
 
 On page 1 7, for Upham, read Upshur. 
 
NARKATIVE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 LIFE OF GENERAL LESLIE COMBS, 
 
 OF KENTUCKY, 
 
 EMBRACING INCIDENTS IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE NORTH-WESTERN TERRITORY. 
 
 The biography of men in the Republic 
 who have raised themselves by their own 
 unaided talents and energies above the level 
 of the general mass of the community in 
 which their lot has been cast, must be both 
 entertaining and instructive to their fellow- 
 countrymen. Doubly instructive and pro- 
 fitable, in a more extended view, are these 
 personal histories, when they relate to the 
 lives and fortunes of those who may be 
 reo"arded as representative men — types of 
 chisses that constitute essential or important 
 elements in our national character, and 
 which, thoudi somewhat heterogeneous in 
 their origin and diverse in their features, 
 have yet become, through the harmonizing 
 and fostering influences of our republican 
 institutions, consolidated and blended into 
 a congruous whole, known and recognized 
 throughout the world, distinctively as the 
 American character. 
 
 Nor are these essential and characteristic 
 elements referable solely to peculiar nation- 
 al origins. On the contrary, local and other 
 circumstances, irrespective of nationalities, 
 liave formed some of the most distinctive, 
 and, in a national point of view, impor- 
 tant of these elements. Of this kind were 
 the circumstances attending the early settle- 
 ment of our Western country ; circumstances 
 which overbore and nearly obliterated all 
 distinctions of national origin, blending and 
 consolidating all such elements in the com- 
 prehensive, distinctive national one, rep- 
 resented by the Western hunter, pioneer 
 and settler, as combined in the same indi- 
 vidual. 
 
 Nurtured amidst stirring scenes, and ac- 
 customed frc>m early childhood to a life of 
 activity, hardship, exposure, and thrilling ad- 
 venture — hence a Lardy, enterprising, bold, 
 
 and fearless race ; and leading the free and 
 untrammeled, life of the backwoods, and 
 breathing from infancy the atmosphere of 
 unrestrained freedom and independence — 
 hence a frank, generous, hospitable race, 
 endued with an unsophisticated and plain 
 sense of right, with a ready disposition to 
 uphold and protect it, as well as a keen na- 
 tive sense of wrong, and an impulsive instinct 
 to repel and redress it; the men of this race 
 have ever been foremost, whether in extend- 
 ing the area of civilization and of the Re- 
 public, by felling the forest and subduing 
 the rank prairie, or in defending our nation- 
 al rights and avenging our national wrongs 
 on the field of battle. 
 
 It was this race, represented by and 
 speaking through a Henry Clay and others 
 of that stamp, which aroused our Govern- 
 ment to a declaration of war, to vindicate 
 our violated national rights on the ocean, 
 early in the present century; and it was 
 this race themselves, who, at the call of 
 their country, rushed with an unexampled 
 unanimity and alacrity to the field, while, 
 in some parts of the country, but too many 
 of the more immediate neighbors and kin- 
 dred of those citizens whose rights of per- 
 son or property on the sea had been out- 
 raged, not only refused to respond to this 
 national call, but sought to thwart the pur- 
 poses of the Government, by opposing its 
 measures adopted for the purpose of obtain- 
 ing redress, in some instances, by acts little 
 short of treason. And it is to the descend- 
 ants of this race, already numbering mil- 
 lions of hardy, unflinching republicans, to 
 which our country must look for a patriotic 
 and generous support of its institutions, as 
 a united whole, whenever the violence of 
 ultra factions in the extreme North or South, 
 
(c 
 
 "^9 9 S 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 impelled by whatever motives, shall seek to 
 overturn the institutions established by our 
 revolutionary forefathers. It is then that 
 the people of the great West, the descend- 
 ants of the pioneer, hunter race, will — as 
 one of her representatives declared in his 
 place in a late Congress — have something to 
 say on the final question of union or dis- 
 union. 
 
 As being a worthy representative of this 
 race, and also one whose early life and ad- 
 ventures are intimately connected with an 
 interesting and instructive, but now almost 
 forgotten portion of our national history, as 
 relating to the West, we shall dejiart some- 
 what from our ordinary jtractice, and allow 
 ourselves more space and latitude than usual, 
 in detailing the personal narrative of the sub- 
 ject of the present memoir. 
 
 General Leslie Comus is descended, 
 on the side of his mother, whose maiden 
 name was Sauau Riciiardso.v, from a re- 
 spectable Quaker family of Maryland, con- 
 nected by blood with the Thomases and 
 Snowdens. His father was by birth a Vir- 
 ginian, and served as a subaltern officer in 
 the revolutionary army under Washington, 
 at the siege of Yorktown and capture of 
 Lord Cornwallis. He soon afterwards emi- 
 grated to Kentucky, and was engaged in 
 all those dangerous and sometimes bloody 
 scenes which resulted in driving out the In- 
 dians, and devoting that rich and beautiful 
 region to the cause and purposes of civihza- 
 tion. 
 
 Both his parents have been dead for sev- 
 eral years ; and as their youngest of twelve 
 children, he has erected over their humble 
 graves, within a few miles of Boonesboro, 
 appropriate tombstones. On his father's are 
 inscribed the simple facts, that he was a 
 '■''Revolutionary Officer and a Hunter of 
 Kentucky^ A simple, aflecting, and sug- 
 gestive tribute to the unpretending but 
 sterlinfj worth of one of that class of men 
 which has impressed its cliaracteri>tic traits 
 as honoraldy Jis it has indelibly uii uur na- 
 tional character: "a hunter of Kentucky;" 
 ono of that fearless, enterprising, stlf-relying, 
 frank and generous race, which, as the hardy 
 pioneer of civilization in our Western sav- 
 age wilds, lias extended the area of the Ke- 
 public over those once almost illimitable 
 forests and jirairies, and, by its valor and 
 devotion to country, has contributed so much 
 to our national greatness and fame. 
 
 Seven only of his children survived him ; 
 amonjr whom was divided his hundred-acre 
 farm in Clarke county, which had furnished 
 his only support in raising his large fom- 
 ily. Of course their means and opportuni- 
 ties of education were limited; but, fortu- 
 nately for the subject of this memoir, when 
 he was but ten or eleven yeare of age, the 
 Rev. Joux Lyle, a Presbyterian clergyman, 
 opened a school of a higher order than was 
 usual in the country in those days ; and in 
 it he was taught the Latin language, as 
 well as English grammar, geography, and 
 the lower branches of mathematics. His 
 progress in all his studies was rapid, and 
 he soon became the pet of his venerable in- 
 structor, as he was the pride of his aged 
 parents. 
 
 This state of things continued about three 
 years, when Mr. Lyle removed to a neigh- 
 boring county; and for a time our young 
 scholar was compelled to remain at home, 
 and assisted in cultivating the farm. The 
 great anxiety, however, of both his parents 
 to give him as liberal an education as possi- 
 ble, was soon gratified by their being able 
 to place him in the fomily of a French gen- 
 tleman residing near Asldand, whose lady 
 taught a few scholai-s, and under whose in- 
 struction he remained for a year ; his time 
 being mainly devoted to the acquisition of 
 her native language. That admirable lady 
 is yet alive, and still residing in her humble 
 home, one of her daughters having married 
 a son of Henry Clay. 
 
 Shortly after returning home, he was 
 placed as the junior deputy in the clerk's 
 office of Hon. S. H. Woodson, in Jessamine 
 county, and w;»s residing there, when the 
 last war was declared against Great Britain. 
 The excitement in Kentucky, on the occur- 
 rence of that event, pervaded all ages and 
 classes. 
 
 • Even those who are old enough to re- 
 member the events of those times, but who 
 were born and have always lived in the 
 eastern portions of the country, can have 
 little idea of the intensity of feeling aroused 
 bv this event among the hardy inhabitants 
 of Kentucky and \\\z frontier portions of the 
 north-western country. In that region, the 
 interval between the close of the war of the 
 Revolution and the declaration of the sec- 
 ond war with the same power, had witnessed 
 an almost uninterrupted struggle between 
 the Western pioneer settlers and the native 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 IT) 
 
 o 
 
 tribes of those regions, who, as was well 
 known, were continually instigated and paid 
 by British agents to harass and devastate 
 our infont settlement". Hence the national 
 animosity against the mother country ex- 
 cited by the War of Independence, so for 
 from having been allayed or effaced in those 
 parts, as was the case to a considerable ex- 
 tent in the East, by the lapse of thirty years 
 of peace, nominal as regarded the Western 
 frontier, had, on the contrary, been gradually 
 increasino; and becomino: intensified down to 
 the very moment of the declaration of war 
 in 1812. This feelinc: reached its acme 
 when that same power whose agents had so 
 lono[ been incitino- the savasres to ruthless 
 forays on the defenseless and peaceful set- 
 tlements, now entered into alliances with 
 them, and, by offering premiums for the 
 scaljjs of men, women, and children, incited 
 them to redoubled zeal in the prosecution 
 of their instinctive and inhuman mode of 
 warfare. 
 
 A series of revolting atrocities perpetrated 
 early in the war by the savages, many of 
 them under the very eye, and with the ap- 
 proval or connivance of the commanders of 
 their British allies, especially of the noto- 
 rious Colonel, and for these his acts pro- 
 moted or brevetted General Proctor, whose 
 memory the voice of outraged humanity will 
 consiofn to eternal infamv, aroused the whole 
 Western country to a pitch of intense excite- 
 ment, which manifested itself in a universal 
 cry for revenge, and a spontaneous rush to 
 the field.* 
 
 * " Exasperated to madness by the failure of 
 ther attempt, September 4, 1812, on Fort Har- 
 rison, [defended by Captain Zacliaiy Taylor.] a 
 considerable party of Indians now madi- an inuj)- 
 tion into the settlements on the Pigeon Roost fork 
 of White river, where they barbarously massacred 
 twenty-one of the inhabitants, many of them wo- 
 men and chiklron. The children had their brains 
 knocked out agaiust trees ; and one woman, who -was 
 pregnant, was ripped open, and her unborn infant 
 taken from ht-r, and its brains knocked out. How- 
 ever, this was but a small matter ; it amounted to 
 no essential injur;/ ; it was all for the best, as it 
 was done by the disciples of the Wabash Prophet, 
 who was in a clo.-;e and holy alliance with George 
 the Third, defender of the faith, and legitimate 
 sovereign of the Bible Society nation, which is the 
 bulwark of our most holy religion. Yet it excited 
 the indignation of the uncivilized republican inti- 
 dels in the neighboring settlements of Indiana and 
 Kentucky." — McAfee. History of the late War in 
 the Western Country, pp. 154-6. 
 
 It cannot therefore be wondered at, that 
 the son of an old soldier and hunter, who 
 had often listened of a winter evening to his 
 father's thrilling details of Indian fights, and 
 ambuscades, and hairbreadth escapes, should 
 be infected with the contagion, and long, 
 boy as he was, to throw away his pen and 
 seize some implement of war. 
 
 Young Leslie Combs had just passed his 
 eighteenth birthday, and was, by law, subject 
 to militia duty, although he had not been in- 
 scribed on any muster-roll. Kentucky was 
 called upon for several thousand troops, and 
 he hoped to be one of the soldiers enlisted 
 in the great cause of " sailors' rights and free 
 trade with all the world," in defiance of Bri- 
 tain's proud, insulting claim, as mistress of 
 the seas, to insult our flag and seize our sea- 
 men. He accordingly borrowed a fowling- 
 piece, and set himself to work to acquire the 
 manual exercise as taught by Baron Steuben, 
 then the only approved master in such mat- 
 ters. It was supposed that a draft would be 
 necessary, but, instead of that, there were 
 more volunteers than were required to fill the 
 quota of Kentucky, and young Leslie's pa- 
 rents objected to his going, inasmuch as two 
 of his elder brothers had previously joined 
 the troops ordered to the northern frontier, 
 under General Winchester. It wa-s not long 
 after they marched, however, before his con- 
 tinued and earnest importunities, sometimes 
 urged with tears in his eyes, prevailed upon 
 them to let him go. Equipping himself as 
 a private of cavali-y as speedily as possible, 
 about a month after the army marched from 
 Georgetown, Kentucky, he started alone on 
 their track, hoping to overtake them in time 
 to partake of their glorious triumphs in Ca- 
 nada, for, like the rest, he never dreamed of 
 disaster and defeat. " I shall never forget," 
 to quote his words in after yeai-s, " the part- 
 ing scene with my beloved and venerated 
 mother, in which she reminded me of my 
 lather's history, and her own trials and dan- 
 gers in the early settlement of Kentucky, and 
 closed by saying to me, 'as I had resolved to 
 become a soldier, I must never disgrace my 
 parents by running from danger; — to die 
 rather than fail to do my duty.' This in- 
 junction was ever present to me afterwards, 
 in the midst of dangers and difficulties of 
 which I had then formed no idea, and stim- 
 ulated me to deeds that I might otherwise, 
 perhaps, have hesitated to undertake and 
 perform." 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 Hero properly closes what raay be termed 
 the first chapter of his personal history ; be- 
 cause from this time ho threw off boyhood, 
 and entered upon a career more befitting 
 manhood. 
 
 Before proceeding with the personal nar- 
 rative of our subject, and in order to enable 
 the reader the better to understand the scenes 
 of danfjer and sutferiucf throutjh which he 
 passed during the unfortunate campaigns of 
 1812-13, we will briefly sketch the situation 
 of the great North-western Territory, now 
 composing some six or seven sovereign States 
 of this great republican confederacy. From 
 just beyond Urbana and Dayton, in western 
 Ohio, to the northern lakes in one direction, 
 and the Mississippi river in another, was one 
 unbroken wilderness, inhabited only by In- 
 dians and wild beasts, with the exception of 
 a few scattering settlements on some of the 
 principal rivers, at great distances from each 
 other. There was a small fort at Detroit, 
 one at Mackinac, and one at Chicago, besides 
 Forts Wayne and Harrison, each garrisoned 
 by a few regular troops. William Hull 
 was Governor of the Territory of Micliigan, 
 and William Henry Harrison of Indiana. 
 In viuw of the growing difficulties with Great 
 Britain in the spring of 1812, Governor Hull 
 received the appointment of Brigadier-Gen- 
 eral in the army of the United States, and 
 was sent to Ohio to take command of the 
 forces ordered to Detroit to protect that fron- 
 tier in case of war. These consisted of the 
 fourth regiment of regulars, under Colonel 
 Miller, and three regiments of Ohio volun- 
 teers, under Colonels Duncan McArthur, 
 Lewis Cass, and James Findlay. War was 
 declared on the 18th June, 1812, while Gen- 
 eral Hull was on his tardy march through 
 the northern swamps of Ohio towards De- 
 troit. His liaggage, which liad been sent by 
 way of the lake, was captured in attempt- 
 ing to pass Maiden, at the mouth of the De- 
 troit river. He himself soon afterwards 
 reached Detroit, issued his famous procla- 
 mation, and talked largely of overrunning 
 Upper Canada, for effecting which object ho 
 had ample forces under his command; in- 
 stead uf doing which, however, he very soon 
 retreated back to the American shore, and 
 on the IGth August disgraoefully surren- 
 dered his urmy and the whole of Michigan 
 Territory to General Brock, commanding the 
 British forces on that frontier. 
 
 Mackinaw had been forced to capitulate 
 
 a month earlier, and Chicago had been 
 abandoned on the 15th of Auofust, and its 
 garrison murdered or captured by a large 
 force of Indians, who had received news of 
 Hull's retreat from Canada, and thereupon 
 resolved to unite with the British against 
 us, as they had been jjreviously urged to do 
 by Tecumseh, then rising into power among 
 the northern tribes on this side of the Ame- 
 rican and British boundary line. 
 
 Thus our whole frontier trom Lake Erie to 
 the Mississi})pi river w:is left utterly unde- 
 fended except by two small forts — Wayne 
 and Harrison — one at the junction of the 
 St. Joseph and St. Mary rivers, forming the 
 Maumce of the Lake, the other on the 
 far-distant Wabash. Both were defended by 
 block-houses and wcx^den pickets, both were 
 attacked by the Indians at about the same 
 time, and Captain Zack Taylor, defending 
 Fort Harrison, as we have before intimated, 
 with most unflinching heroism, laid the foun- 
 dation of that subsequent career of militaiy 
 glory and self-devotion, which finally elevated 
 him to the Presidential office. 
 
 Three regiments of Kentucky volunteers, 
 under the command of Colonels Scott, Lewis, 
 and Allen, and one regiment of regulars, 
 under Colonel Wells, had, in the mean time, 
 been ordered to the north-western frontier, to 
 reenforce General Hull. The former rendez- 
 voused at Georgetown on the 1 Gth of August, 
 and after being addressed by the old veteran, 
 General Charles Scott, then Governor of Ken- 
 tucky, and by Henry Clay, were mustered 
 into the service of the United States. The 
 best blood of Kentucky, the sons of the old 
 hunters and Indian fightei-s, could be found in 
 this little army. Two membei"s of Congress 
 were among the j>rivates in the ranks. Lit- 
 tle did they imagine, while listening to the 
 soul-stirring appeals of the great Kentucky 
 oratur, that, instead of marching to Canada 
 to aid in its conquest, on that very day 
 the white flag of disgraceful surrender had 
 been hung out by the coward or the trai- 
 tor Hull from the battlements of Detroit; 
 and that their own career of anticipated vic- 
 tories and glory would terminate in dis:\ster, 
 as it did, on the bloody battle-field of Raisin, 
 on the following 22d day of January. Gen- 
 eral James Winchester had command of this 
 force, and marched on the 1 7th by way of Cin- 
 cinnati, (then a small town on the Ohio river, 
 opposite to Newport,) towards the north- 
 western frontier ; and it was not until they 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 had passed the Kentucky border tliat tlic 
 news of Hull's surrender reached thcni. 
 
 Governor Harrison liad acquired very 
 considerable fame by his glorious victory at 
 Tippecanoe the preceding November, and 
 was in Kentucky at that time on a visit. So 
 soon as the events just above related were 
 communicated to the Government at Wash- 
 ington, three or four additional regiments of 
 volunteers were ordered from Kentucky, 
 and the Governor of Kentucky prevailed on 
 Governor Harrison to accept the office of 
 Major-General, and to hasten with the forces 
 then in the field, and a large body of mount- 
 ed Kentucky militia, to the relief of Fort 
 Wayne. 
 
 This, it will be remembered, he accom- 
 plished, and forced the Indians and their 
 British auxiliaries to retreat precipitately 
 towards Canada, without dariri<j to ensxaofe 
 him in battle. 
 
 By selling a small piece of land (all he 
 had on earth) devised to him by a deceased 
 elder brother, he soon completed his outfit 
 as a volunteer, and, armed with holsters and 
 broadsword, with only fifteen dollars in his 
 pocket, he started for the north-western 
 army, which was then marching with all 
 possible speed towards the frontiers of Ohio, 
 in order to reenforce General Hull. Never 
 having been forty miles from home before 
 this time, young and inexperienced as he 
 was, nothing but his burning zeal for the 
 cause to which he had devoted himself 
 could have sustained him against all the 
 perils and hardships of his long journey. 
 When he arrived at Piqua, beyond Dayton, 
 he fouiid crowds of Indians, men, women, 
 and children, principally from the neighbor- 
 ing Shawanee villages, who were besieging 
 the commissary's and quartermaster's apart- 
 ments for food, blankets, and ammunition. 
 He had never before seen such an array of 
 yellow-skins, and was gratified to find at the 
 same place several companies of mounted 
 thirty-day volunteei-s, hastening to the fron- 
 tiei-s after the news of Hull's surrender reach- 
 ed Ohio and Kentucky ; in company with 
 whom he proceeded through the wilderness 
 to St. Mary's, distant twenty or thirty miles. 
 At that place he met General Harrison on 
 his return from the relief of Fort Wayne, 
 after turninij over his command to General 
 Winchester, of the regular army. The next 
 day and night, in company with three or 
 four friends, he made the the journey to Fort 
 
 Wayne, distant about sixty miles, through 
 an unbroken wilderness, infested with hostile 
 savages ; and there found the troops in mo- 
 tiun towards Old Fort J )efiance, at the junc- 
 tion of the Maumee and Auglaise rivers, and 
 was attached by general orders as a cadet to 
 the first regiment of Kentucky Volunteers, 
 under Colonel Scott. In this capacity he 
 continued to do duty the remainder of the 
 campaign, going out on all scouting-parties, 
 and thus becoming well acquainted with the 
 whole surrounding country. Some of them 
 were attended with great hazard, and all of 
 them with extra fatigue and hardship, even 
 when compared with the starved and naked 
 condition of all that wing of the army. 
 
 As these events have no doubt lonrj since 
 passed from the memories of those not im- 
 mediately connected with them, and the 
 ]irincipal history of them, written by Colonel 
 McAfee, is nearly out of print, we take leave 
 to quote from his authentic work, " The 
 History of the late War in the Western 
 Country," printed in 1810, the following 
 jiassages, fii-st remarking that the left wing 
 of the north-western army, under General 
 Winchester, (General Harrison having some 
 weeks before received the appointment of 
 Major-General from the President of the 
 United States, and assumed the chief com- 
 mand,) was encamped six miles below Old 
 Fort Defiance, on the Maumee : 
 
 "About the first of November' they became ex- 
 tremely sickly. Tlie typhus fever raged with vio- 
 lence, so that sometimes tliree or four would die in 
 a day. Upwards of three hundred were daily on the 
 sick-list; and so discouraging was the prospect of 
 advancing, that about the first of December they 
 were ordered to build huts for their accommoda- 
 tion. Many were so entirely destitute of shoes and 
 other clothing, that they must have frozen if they 
 had been obliged to march any distance ; and 
 sometimes the whole army would be for many 
 davs entirely without flour." (Pp. 183-4.) 
 
 "From the 10th to the 22d of this month, (De- 
 cember.) the camp was without flour, and for some 
 time before they had only half rations ; poor beef 
 and hickory roots were their only subsistence. At 
 the same time, fevers and other diseases raged in 
 almost every tent, in wiiich the sick were exposed 
 not only to hunger, but to the inclemency of the 
 seasoa" (Vide pp. 1S5-6.) 
 
 General Winchester had received ordera 
 from General Harrison, as soon as he had 
 accumulated twenty days' provisions, to ad- 
 vance to the rapids, forty-four miles lower 
 down the river than his present camp, and to 
 commence building huts, to induce the enemy 
 
6 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 to believe he was going into winter-quarters. 
 It was indispensable to occupy the rapids, 
 the subsequent site of Fort Meigs, with a 
 force sufficient!}- strong to protect the pron- 
 fiions, stores, and- munitions of war, which 
 were to bo forwarded from the other wings 
 of the army, located at Fort McArthur and 
 Upper Sandusky, previous to a contemplated 
 rapid movement upon Maiden and Detroit. 
 From the 22d to the 30th of December, 
 active preparations were being made for this 
 change of position, which was to bring the 
 American forces so much nearer to the 
 enemy. The river being frozen over, they 
 were obliged to take the baggage on their 
 backs, or on rickety sleds, to be hauled by 
 the men, for all their horses which had not 
 been sent into the interior in October or 
 November, had starved to death. 
 
 "Having provided for the eick, and assigned 
 guards to attend and protect Iheni, the march for 
 the rapids was commenced on the 30th December. 
 At the same time, Mr. Leslie Combs, a young man 
 of intelligence and enterprise from Kentucky, who 
 had joined the army a.s a volunteer on its march 
 fi-om Fort Wayne to Fort Defiance, accompanied 
 by Mr. A. Riddle, as a guide, was sent with dis- 
 
 Eatches to inform the commander-in-chief (General 
 [arrison) of this movement, in order that provi- 
 sions and rei-nforccments might be forwarded as 
 soon as possible. General Winchester expected 
 to be met by these at the rapids by the 12th of 
 January. This, however, was prevented by an 
 unmense fall of snow, which, as Sir. Combs had to 
 traverse on foot a pathless wilderness of more than 
 one hundred miles in extent, retarded him for four 
 or five days longer in reaching even the first point 
 of destination, (Fort McArthur,) than -would other- 
 wise have been necessary to perform tlie whole 
 route."— J/f4/cc, p. 201. 
 
 These dispatches consisted of a brief note, 
 introducing young Combs to General Har- 
 rison, "as a youth whose information as to 
 the intended movements of General Win- 
 chester could be entirely relied upon ;" and 
 at the same time he was fully pos.sessed by 
 General Winchester, con6dentially, of all his 
 intentions, whicli it was deemed unsafe to 
 intrust to jiaper, inasmuch as his journey 
 was to be tlirough a region full of saviigos, 
 who might take his scalp and capture his 
 pa}ifrs. These confidential cotnnuuiications, 
 intrusted to him alone, and by him duly 
 made to General Harrison, enabled him, in 
 1840, to vindicate the old hero of Tippeca- 
 noe with entire success, before the American 
 people, against the foul aspci-sion cast upon 
 uim by his enemies in reference to the 
 
 subsequent disastrous defeat of General 
 Winchester at the river Piaisin, on the 22d 
 January, 1813. 
 
 What he suffered on this tramp may be 
 imagined, but cannot well be described. He 
 had been accustomed only to wear his sword, 
 after sending his horse to the interior, and 
 their daily marching had ceased for some 
 two months. He was on this occasion 
 loaded with a heavy musket and accoutre- 
 ments, in addition to a blanket and four 
 days' provisions on his back. The snow 
 conmienced falling on the morning of the 
 31st December, and continued without in- 
 termission tsvo days and nights, so that on 
 the third day of their journey, young Combs 
 and his companion found it over two feet 
 deep. They were in a dense forest, without 
 path or compass, and only guided by the 
 unerring skill of his companion, who had 
 been some fifteen years in early life a cap- 
 tive among the Indians in this region, and 
 was well skilled in all their ways and cus- 
 toms. Several nights they encamped in the 
 black swamp, and could not find a place to 
 lie down and rest, even on the snow, but 
 were compelled to sit up all night with a 
 small fire at their feet, made of such old 
 brush as they could collect, and, wrapping 
 themselves in their blankets, shivered through 
 the loniT hours till daylight enabled them 
 again to resimie their tu-esome march. On 
 the sixth day, their four days' provision was 
 entirely exhausted, and they had early put 
 themselves on short allowance. Young 
 Combs was oxtromoly ill nearly all night, 
 so much so, that it was concluded that 
 Riddle must leave him in the morning to 
 his fate, and for himself make the best of 
 his way to the nearest settlement or fort, 
 and endeavor to save Combs, if he should 
 survive till his return. Fortunately for our 
 young volunteer, his natural strength of con- 
 stitution, and, it may be added, his unJUnch- 
 ing resolution never to stop while he could 
 walk, overcame his disease, and ho kept 
 moving for three days and nights longer, 
 without a mouthful of food for either him- 
 self or his companion, except slijipery elm 
 bark. On the ninth evening, after dark, 
 they reached Fort McArthur, then under 
 command of General Tupjier. 
 
 Every attention was paid to young Combs 
 by Cren'eral Tupper and his stall", on his ar- 
 arrival at the head-quarters of that general. 
 But his sufferings had been so great, that he 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 was prostrated for clays afterwards on a bed 
 of sickness ; ;is, in addition to hunger and 
 fatigue, his feet were badly frost-bitten, and 
 liis arm joints stiffened with rheumatic 
 pains, from whicli he has never since recov- 
 ered. Being unable to proceed to Upper 
 Sandusky, where General Harrison was 
 posted, his dispatches were conveyed to him, 
 with a brief letter from liimself, by a special 
 messenger on horseback, the day after his 
 arrival at Fort McArlhur. 
 
 As soon as it was considered safe for him 
 to leave his quartei-s, he was furnished with 
 a sled, two hoi'ses, and a driver, and pro- 
 ceeded as speedily as possible through the 
 snow to the rapids, distant about ninety or 
 one hundred miles by way of UuU's trace, 
 which place he reached on the evening of 
 the 19th of January, expecting to find Gen- 
 eral Winchester's army encamped there, as 
 that general had told him he would be. 
 Instead of this, he met the news of Colonel 
 Lewis's glorious victory of the 18th, at river 
 Raisin, over the British and Indians, thirty- 
 six miles in advance of the rapids, and about 
 twenty miles only from Maiden, the head- 
 quarters of the British army in Upper Can- 
 ada. Disappointed and mortified that a 
 battle had been fought in his absence, and 
 apprehending the speedy recurrence of an- 
 other similar event of a more conclusive 
 character, as General Winchester had him- 
 self gone on with the flower of his forces that 
 morning, to reunforce Colonel Lewis; with- 
 out waiting for General Harrison, who was 
 expected in a day or two, with a portion of 
 the right wing of the army, he determined 
 to lose no time in reporting himself at 
 head-quarters. Accordingly, on the 20th, 
 in the evening, he set off on foot, with his 
 blanket and one day's rations on his back, 
 and without his old heavy musket, to over- 
 take Major Cotgreve's battalion, which was 
 understood to have been hurried forward by 
 General Harrison from Lower Sandusky, 
 with two or three pieces of light artillery, in 
 the direction of the river Raisin. He soon 
 accomplished his object, as the Maumee was 
 frozen over from shore to shore, and he 
 could travel on the ice with much greater 
 rapidity than by land through the deep 
 crusted snow. 
 
 W^ith them he found another young 
 Keutuckian, with a small pony, loaded with 
 his baggage and provisions, proceeding to 
 join his regiment, from which he had been 
 
 separated for some time. The night of the 
 21st was bright, clear, and beautiful, but in- 
 tensely cold, with a full moon shining; and 
 at two o'clock his newly found companion 
 and himself determined to make an effort to 
 reach the river Raisin before the next night. 
 So anxious were they to accomplish this 
 purpose, that they forgot for the time their 
 being on hostile ground, as recognized by 
 Hull in his articles of capitulation, and that 
 there were one or two villages intervening 
 between them and theirpoint of destination. 
 Whether they should encounter in them 
 friend or foes, and how many murdering 
 Pottawatamies might be prowling through 
 the forests, were not taken into account ; 
 onward they resolved to go, and at all 
 hazards. 
 
 After twelve or thirteen hours' laborious 
 trudging through the snow and ice, one 
 leading and the other driving their httle 
 half-starved pony, they arrived at a small 
 village about ten miles from the river 
 Raisin, to witness a scene of consternation 
 and distress never before presented to their 
 view. An American soldier, without hat, 
 coat, or shoes, had just arrived from the dis- 
 astrous field of Raisin, with an exaggerated 
 account of that bloody affair, and the whole 
 population were preparing to lly towards 
 the American array, supposed to be ap- 
 proaching under General Harrison, by way 
 of the ice on the lake and river. While 
 hesitating whether to beheve this most pain- 
 ful news, and return, or treat it as the tale 
 of a coward, and proceed to the scene of 
 action, they discovered another fugitive in 
 the distant prairie approaching them, who, 
 on his arrival, confirmed all they had just 
 heard, with the additional fact, that the In- 
 dians were pursuing the flying troops under 
 Winchester and Lewis, in the direction to- 
 wards their present location. In a very short 
 space of time, with the exception of a few 
 Canadian Frenchmen and one family of 
 whom we shall presently speak more parti- 
 cularly, the whole village was depopulated, 
 leaving houses and furniture, barns, grain, 
 stock, every thing but the little bedding, 
 food, and clothing they could pack on their 
 sleds and carryalls, and scudding for life on 
 the ice towarcls the rapids. It was a scene 
 never to be forgotten by our young soldier. 
 It was the first time he had ever seen war, 
 fiice to face, or rather the effects of war. He 
 had read and thought and dreamed of bat- 
 
8 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 ties and their awful desolations ; but this 
 miniature likeness was his first pei-sonal 
 view, and it sickened and saddened his 
 heart. We will not stop to moralize, but 
 proceed with our facts.* 
 
 The Frenchmen above mentioned, young 
 Combs understood, were Indian tradei-s ; and 
 from their knowledge of several Indian lan- 
 guages and general friendly intercoui-se with 
 them, they had remained, with the hope of 
 being able to save their friends' property 
 from the torches of the enraged enemy. 
 The family before spoken of consisted of 
 husband, wife, and five children, the largest 
 about twelve years old. They were distrib- 
 uted between a small one-horse sleigh and 
 
 * " Massacee of Raisin. — Proctor [Colonel] 
 then agreed to receive a surrender on the follow- 
 ing terms : that all private property should be re- 
 spected ; tiiat sleds should be sent next morning 
 to remove the sick and wounded to Amherstburg, 
 on the island opposite Maiden ; that in the mean 
 time they should he protected by a guard ; and 
 that the side-arms of the officers should be restored 
 to them at Maiden. [Query : Why were their 
 side-arms taken from them at all, if treachery was 
 not contemplated ?] . . . About 1 2 o'cK)ck, the 
 prisoners were marched off. Drs. Todd and 
 Bowers, of the Kentucky volunteers, were left with 
 the woundetl ; and Major Reynolds, [an American 
 officer and prisoner also,] with two or three inter- 
 preters, was all the guard left to protect them. . . . 
 About sunrise, instead of sleds arriving to convey 
 them to Maiden, a large body of Indians, perhaps 
 two hundred in number, came into the town, paint- 
 ed black and red. . . . They began first to plun- 
 der the houses of the inhabitants, and then broke 
 into those where the wounded prisoners were 
 lying, some of whom they abused and stripped of 
 their clothes and blankets, and then tomahawked 
 them without mercy. . . . The few who were 
 judged able t(j inarch, Avere saved and taken off 
 towards Maiden ; but as often as any of them gave 
 ' out on the way, they were tomahawked and left 
 lying on the road. . . . For the ma.<sacre at the 
 river Raisin, for which any other civilized (Govern- 
 ment would have dismissed, and perhaps have 
 gibbeted the commander, Colonel Proctor received 
 the rank of Majortitnital in the British army. . . 
 Proctor, after he had left the battle-ground, never 
 named thegiuirdsnorsleds which he had juomiscd 
 for the wounded ./Iwcr/cfljis ; nor wuuKI he pay 
 any attention to the subject, when repeatedly re- 
 minded of it by General Winchester aiul Majnr 
 Madison, [pri.soners.] Captain Klliut [of tin- ]?ritish 
 army] once replied to their solicitations, that " the 
 Ind'uiHH vrre very excellent surgeons ! . . . The 
 prospect of their release, however, was now very 
 gloomy, as Proctor liad issued an oriicr, furlndding 
 individuals to purchase anymore of thou, \^lhe pri- 
 soners,) while a stipulated price was still paid for 
 all the scalps limught in by the savages T — Hcc 
 McAfee, pp. 210-21. 
 
 an ox-sled loaded with cooking utensils, food 
 and bedding. The latter vehicle could not 
 proceed, as all the rest had done, on the ice, 
 because the oxen were unshod, and the 
 owner did not know that Hull's old road 
 by land back to the Maumce was suffi- 
 ciently free from ol^struction to enable him 
 to save his family by that route. Fortu- 
 nately, Combs and his companion had just 
 traveled that way, and could assure him of 
 its entire practicability, and that, moreover, 
 troops were advancing by it at that very 
 time, with whom they had encamped the 
 previous night. Having done thus much, 
 the dictates of ordinary prudence — the law 
 of self-preservation, doomed by some the firet 
 law of nature — might have impelled our 
 young officer and his companion to disen- 
 cumber their pony of his pack, and with his 
 aid have saved themselves from the much- 
 apprehended tomahawk and scalping-knife 
 of the Indians, reeking and red as they were 
 with the blood of their gallant associates and 
 friends at Raisin. 
 
 Cut in the boys' hearts of our youthful 
 adventuroi-s there was a "higher law," a 
 dull/ which they thought they owed to the 
 army in their rear, and the helpless family in 
 their presence, which induced them to give 
 up the pony to the two soldiei-s, together 
 with blankets to protect themselves; direct- 
 ing them to ride alternatoly, and hasten back 
 to General Harrison with the sad tidings 
 they had just communicated to them, and 
 which was to blast all his cherished hopes 
 of a successful invasion of Upper Canada 
 that winter. 
 
 At the same time, throwing their packs 
 upon the ox-sled, our adventurers started 
 the terrified family in the same direction, 
 remaining themselves some distance in the 
 rear, to give notice of approaching danger, 
 and as far :ls possible save these families, if 
 it should come on themselves. 
 
 Young Ilensloy, his Kentucky compan- 
 ion, had a musket ; Tessier, their proti'-go, 
 had a fusee or shot-gun, and Combs himself 
 was armed with a sword and belt-pistols. 
 Their march was of couree very slow ; but it 
 seemed to our ardent young officer that ho 
 had never before seen oxen move with such 
 a tardy pace. They knew not at what mo- 
 ment their oars would bo saluted with the 
 savage war-whoop in thoir rear. Thus they 
 proceeded till the road was lost in darkness, 
 hoping to meet Major Cotgrcve's batUiUou, 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 9 
 
 and were forced to encamp by the road-side. 
 They watched all night, one of thein about 
 a hundred paces from the tire, on the trace 
 towards Raisin, and at dawn tiiey again re- 
 sumed their slow retreat. They had not 
 gone over two or tliree miles, when, instead 
 of meeting: an armed band which would ijive 
 them comparative safety, they found Cot- 
 greve's baggage-sleds and artillery aban- 
 doned in the road, with all the marks of 
 sudden and precipitate tiight. "I shall not 
 pretend," Combs subsequently writes, " to 
 describe our feelings at this unexpected siglit ; 
 but thank Heaven we did not abandon our 
 voluntarily assumed charge, but resolved, 
 come what would, to save them or perish 
 with them." 
 
 Just before sunset, they came in sight of the 
 Maumee river, and at the same time discov- 
 ered that Winchester's camp, left in charge 
 of General I'ayne, some three or four miles 
 up the river, was in tiaraes. At tii*st they 
 supposed that the British and Indians had 
 gotten ahead of them by way of the lake 
 and river ice, and had defeated the remnant 
 of the left wing of the army and General 
 Harrison's rei'iiforcements, and that their own 
 destiny was sealed. They were soon relieved, 
 however, from this painful apprehension, by 
 discovering; a wounded soldier who had 
 made his escape by that route, and assured 
 them that no enemy had passed him. 
 
 We shall only refer to so much of the mili- 
 tary operations about this period on that fron- 
 tier as may render the personal narrative of 
 the subject of the memoir intelligible. The 
 two flying soldiers to whom Uensley had 
 promptly abandoned his pony at Combs' 
 suggestion, and determined to aid the latter 
 in bringing off the distressed family, had, it 
 seems, communicated to Major Cotgreve the 
 same alarming information they had given 
 to Combs, " that at least jive thousand In- 
 dian warriors were in hot pursuit, under 
 Tecumseh and Dixon,'''' and thus caused his 
 precipitate retreat. They reached General 
 Winchester's old camp at the rapids, at 
 which General Harrison, in the mean time, 
 had arrived with a small body-guard early 
 on the 22d, having traveled all night, and 
 caused him to abandon the position north 
 of the Maumee, set tire to the camp, and 
 fall back to the south side of Portage river, 
 some fifteen or twenty miles nearer the Ohio 
 settlements on Hull's trace. 
 
 Young Combs followed in his footsteps 
 2 
 
 across the river on the ice, after sundown on 
 the 23d, and arrived on the opposite side of 
 rortatje river on the eveninfj of the 24th, 
 with his small caravan, iinich to the surprise 
 and joy of his friends, who had already 
 numbered him among the dead. Having 
 been mainly instiumental in saving three of 
 that gallant band of Kentuckians, who had 
 marched to the frontier some five months 
 before, with such devoted patriotism and 
 buoyant ho])es of military glory, for the first 
 time since he met the news of the disaster, 
 ' ho now felt safe from [lursuit, and gratified 
 more than words could express that he had 
 had the nerve to do his duty. 
 
 The weather had moderated, and the rain 
 
 had been falling all day, so that the ice on 
 
 the river had split near the centre and bulged 
 
 I upwards, rendering it dithcult as well as 
 
 ' dangerous to cross. But nothing could stop 
 
 our young adsenturer's friends, when he 
 
 , came in sight, from rushing across to meet 
 
 him. Majors Hardin and Gano conducted 
 
 him to head-quarters, and introduced him 
 
 to General Harrison, informing him what he 
 
 had done. " It was a proud moment for 
 
 me," writes Mr. Combs, in reference to that 
 
 sight, '' thus to be presented : and while ho 
 
 } complimented me, and said I was worthy of 
 
 ' a civic crown, his eyes were moist with tears, 
 
 and mine were not dry. That tear-drop of 
 
 the hero of Tippecanoe fell upon my heart ; 
 
 and my untiring support of him in 1840, 
 
 when he was a candidate for the Presidency, 
 
 cannot be wondered at, although my first 
 
 choice then and ever had been Henry 
 
 Clay." 
 
 " I had no time," he continues, " on my per- 
 ilous retreat, to seek for my murdered friends 
 and fellow-soldiei-s at Kaisin. My eyes 
 were dry, and my nerves seemed rigid as 
 iron until all personal danger was over, and 
 all under my charge in safety." Of over nine 
 hundred officei-s and soldiei-s engaged in the 
 disastrous battle, only thirty-three escaped ; 
 all the rest were killed on the field, massa- 
 cred, or led into captivity. The news filled 
 the whole country with the deepest grief; 
 Kentucky was clad in mourning, and General 
 Harrison himself overwhelmed with sorrow 
 and disappointment. Vory soon afterwards, 
 the remnant of the Kentucky regiment en- 
 gaged in the conflict were discharged ; but 
 the subject of this memoir declined to leave 
 for some time, not knowing that the inva- 
 sion of Upper Canada was abandoned for 
 
10 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 the winter, till after Fort Meigs was erected, 
 and General Ilarrison himself, in a corapH- 
 nientary note, advised him of the fact, and 
 permitted him to return to Kentucky, with 
 the expectation of again joining him in the 
 spring with other volunteei"s. Thus ended 
 his first campaign. 
 
 When he arrived at home, with his clothes 
 much worn and badly soiled, his mother 
 met him with a tear and a smile, remarking, 
 in jest, that she was surprised to see him so 
 soon, as he had told her he would not return 
 until they had taken Canada. Ilis reply 
 was, " that he had only come home to get a 
 clean shirt." And she very soon found he 
 was in earnest. 
 
 The defeat at Raisin, and the discharge of 
 the remainder of the Kentucky troops, made 
 the situation of General Harrison, and the 
 whole north-western frontier, extremely criti- 
 cal. Of our old forts there remained in 
 our possession Forts Wayne and Harrison. 
 Fort Winchester had been erected on the site 
 of old Fort Defiance, and General Harrison 
 had built Fort Meigs at the foot of the Mau- 
 mee Kapids, on the south side of the river. 
 The latter wiis the only place at all }>repared 
 for an attack by heavy artillery ; and it was 
 to be expected that as soon as the ice on the 
 lake and river broke up in the spring, the 
 British, having eommand on the watei-s and 
 entire possessionof Michigan Territory, would 
 assail that position. It was of the first im- 
 portance, therefore, to have General Harrison 
 reinforced as soon as ])ossibIe, for the fall of 
 Fort Meiij^ would expose the whole north- 
 western frontier to tire and desolation. For 
 this purpose, General Green Clay marched 
 from Kentucky, early in x\^pril, with two regi- 
 ments of volunteei-s, taking the same route 
 which General Winchester had done. Hav- 
 ing made the necessary preparations, Coml)S 
 stiirted himself soon afterwards to rejoin 
 General Harrison at Fort Meigs, ;vs he had 
 promised to do, and overtook General Clay 
 at Dayton, Totally unprovided ju; that gen- 
 eral was with maps of the vast wilderness 
 into which he w;|,s about to plungf, the prac- 
 tical information which young Combs had 
 obtained on the previous campaign, as to the 
 geography of the ct)untry, il5 watercourses, 
 newly cut roads, Indian villages, &c., Arc, 
 was deemed of much importance ; and before 
 the expedition reached Pi<jua. he tendered 
 young Combs the appointment of Coptain 
 of Spies, with the privilege of selecting his 
 
 company from Colonel Dudley's regiment. 
 He had not expected a position so high or 
 responsible, and felt much diffidence of his 
 ability to discharge its dangerous duties. 
 
 The next day, another company was or- 
 ganized in Colonel 13oswell's regiment, com- 
 manded by an old Indian fighter under 
 Wayne, named Kilbreath ; and by way of 
 distinction afterwards, our young volunteer 
 was called the 6oy captain. Their pay 
 was thirty dollars per month extra; and he 
 had no difiSculty, therefore, in tilling his 
 company with active, gallant ritlemeu, but 
 one or two of whom, however, had seen 
 service. 
 
 When they reached St. Mary's Block- 
 house, General Clay divided his brigade, 
 sending Colonel Dudley's regiment across to 
 the Auglaise river, and descending the St. 
 Mary's himself, with Colonel Boswell's, in- 
 tending to unite them again at old Fort Defi- 
 ance. Captain Combs was attached to the 
 former ; and on their march down the Au- 
 glaise, an express reached them from Fort 
 Meigs, with the intelligence that General 
 Harrison was in daily expectation of an at- 
 tack, nd urging them to proceed with all 
 possible dispatch. Colonel Dudley imme- 
 diately summoned a council of officei-s to meet 
 at his quarters, where it was unanimously 
 resolved that General Harrison ought to be 
 apjirised of their approach, and his ordei"s, as 
 to the time and manner, received. How this 
 was to be acconijilished was then the ques- 
 tion. It was tifty miles from Fort Defiance, 
 where they expected to meet General Clay, 
 to Fort Meigs ; and it wjis deemed extremely 
 hazardous for any one to attempt to open 
 a communication between the two points, 
 especially as no one present, except C;tplain 
 Combs, knew the exact position of Fort ^Ieigs, 
 or had any knowledge of the intervening 
 country. He had remained silent during the 
 consultation, but now :ill eyes were turned 
 upi>n him, and he felt bound to speak. 
 "Colonel Dudley," said he, "General Clay 
 has thought proper to intrust me with an 
 imi«ortanl command, attached to your regi- 
 ment. When we reach Fort Defiance, if you 
 will furnish mo a good canoe, 1 will carry 
 your dispatches to (Jeueral Ilarrison, and re- 
 turn with his ordere. I shall only require four 
 or five vohmteers from my own company, and 
 one of my Indian guides to accomjiany me." 
 As may be supj)Osetl, his offer wa-^ joyfully 
 accepted, and the Colonel specially com- 
 
Oeneral Leslie Combs. 
 
 11 
 
 plimented him for his voluntary proposition, 
 as he said he should have had great reluct- 
 ance in ordering any officer upon such an 
 expedition. 
 
 The troops encamped at Fort Defiance 
 on the afternoon of the first of May. General 
 Clay, meanwhile, liad not arrived. Captain 
 Combs innnodiately prepared for his jioril- 
 ous trip. The two Walkei-s, Paxton, and 
 Johnson, were to accompanv him, as well 
 as the young Sliawanee warrior, ^/«c/l- 7'7,sA. 
 As they pushed off from shore at the mouth 
 of the x\uglaise, the bank was covered 
 with their anxious fellow-soldiers ; and Major | 
 Shelby remarked, looking at his watch, j 
 "Remember, Captain Combs, if we never i 
 meet again, it is exactly six o'clock when we 
 part ;" and he has since told Mr. Combs 
 that he never expected to see him again 
 alive. 
 
 Captain Combs would have started some 
 hours earlier, could his frail craft have been 
 gotten ready ; for he knew it would require 
 hard work, even with the aid of a strong cur- 
 rent, to reach Fort Meigs before daylight the 
 next morning. Placinof his Shawanee in the 
 stern, with a steering-oar, and two men at ' 
 the side-oai-s, alternately relieving each other, 
 the Captain took liis position in the bow, to 
 take care of their rifles and direct the course 
 to be pursued ; keeping as nearly as possible 
 in the centre of the stream, for fear of In- 
 dians on either side. By dark they had 
 come within distinct hearing of the distant 
 roar of heavy artillery in their front, and 
 knew that General Harrison's apprehensions 
 of an early assault upon his enfeebled posi- 
 tion were verified. These sounds were new to 
 their eai-s and highly exciting. Tt was late 
 in the night when they struck the head of 
 the rapids, and it seemed every moment as 
 if their light canoe would be dashed in pieces. 
 By lying flat on his face, the Captain could 
 form some idea of the course of the deep 
 channel, amid the war of watei-s which 
 nearly deafened them, by seeing the foam- 
 ing breakers glistening in the starlight. 
 When they apjiroached Roche debouf, whore 
 they were intbrmed there was a considerable 
 perpendicular fall in low water, they were 
 forced to land and haul their bark along the 
 margin of the southern bank till they had 
 passed the main obstruction ; and davlight 
 dawned upon them before they were again 
 afloat. They were still some seven or eioht 
 miles above the fort, and well knew that the 
 
 surrounding forests were alive with hostile 
 savages. 
 
 When the frightful ajipearance of the 
 swollen river first presented itself to the view 
 of our voyagers, one of the men urged Cap- 
 tain Combs to land, and endeavor thus to 
 get to the fjrt; but this plan was not to be 
 thought of. Three other alternatives re- 
 mained to him : to return and report the 
 na-^on of his failure to go any farther ; to re- 
 main where he was during the day, and make 
 an attempt to enter the fort the next night ; 
 or (o proceed at once. The first )ilan would 
 have been most prudent ; and if he had been 
 an old and experienced oflicer, of established 
 reputation for courage, perhaps it ought to 
 have been adopted ; but he was, as he has 
 since expressed himself a mere boy, with but 
 little military experience, intrusted with a 
 most important duty at his own instance ; 
 and his aged mother's last injunction was 
 fresh in his heart, as well as in his recollection ; 
 he Could not retreat. If he should determine 
 to remain where he was during the day, 
 they would most probably be discovered 
 and tomahawked before niirht. He there- 
 fore resolved instantly to (jo ahead, despe- 
 rate as the chances seemed aorainst him, and 
 risk all consequences. Not one of his brave 
 companions demurred to his determination, 
 although he told them thev W(,iu]d certainly 
 be compelled to earn their breakfasts before 
 they would have the honor of taking coffee 
 with General Harrison. 
 
 No one can well conceive his deep anx- 
 iety and intense excitement as he was ap- 
 proaching the last bend in the river which 
 shut the fort from their view. He knew 
 not but that, after all his risks, he might 
 only arrive in tjme to see the example of 
 Hull imitated, and the white flag of surren- 
 der and disirrace hunsf out from the walls ; 
 but, instead of that, as they swept rapidly 
 round the point, the fii-st object that met 
 their sight was the British batteries belching 
 forth their iron hail across the river, and the 
 bomb-shells flying in the air; and the next 
 moment they saw the glorious stare and 
 stripes gallantly floating in the breeze. " Oh, 
 it was a grand scene," writes Captain Combs. 
 " We could not suppress a shout ; and one 
 of my men, Paxton, has since declared to 
 me, that he then felt as if it would take 
 about a peck of bullets to kill him I" Cap- 
 tain Combs had prepared every thing for 
 action, by handing to each man his rifle 
 
12 
 
 General Leslie Combs, 
 
 freshly loaded, and in the mean time, keep- 
 ing near the middle of the river, which was 
 several hundred yards wide, not knowing from 
 which side they would be first attacked. 
 
 He hoped that General Harrison might 
 now and then be taking a look with his spy- 
 glass up the river, expecting General Clay, 
 and would see them and send out an escort 
 to bring them in. He did not know that 
 that General was beleaguered on all sides, 
 and hotly pressed at every point. At first 
 they saw only a solitary Indian in the edge 
 of the woods on the American side, running 
 down the river so as to get in hail of them ; 
 and they took him for a frifiidly Rhawanee, 
 of whom they knew General Harrison had 
 several in his service as guides and spies. 
 His steersman himself was for a moment de- 
 ceived, and exclaimed, in his deep guttural 
 voice, "Shawanee," at the same time turning 
 the bow of the canoe towards him. A mo- 
 ment afterward*, however, when he raised 
 the war-whoop, and they saw the woods full 
 of red devils, running with all their speed 
 to a point on the river below them, so as to 
 cut them off from the fort, or drive them in- 
 to the mouths of the British canu' )n, Captain 
 Combs' young warrior exclaimed, '■'■Potta- 
 watamie, God damn /" and instantly turned 
 the boat toward the opposite shore. The 
 race between the little water party and the 
 Indians was not long doubtful. The latter 
 had the advantajje in distance, and reached 
 the point before the former. Combs still 
 hoped to pass them with little injury, owing 
 to the width of the river and the rapidity 
 of the current, and therefore ordered his men 
 to receive their fire without returning it, as 
 he feared an attack also from the near shore, 
 which would require all their means of re- 
 sistance to repel. If successful, he should 
 still have time and space enough to recross 
 the river before he got within range of the 
 British batteries, and save his little band 
 from certain destruction. The first gun fired, 
 however, satisfied him of his error, as the 
 ball whistled over the canoe without injury, 
 followed Ijy a volley, which pro>tratid John- 
 son, mortally wounded, and also disabled 
 Paxton ; not, however, before they had all 
 fired at the crowd, and saw several tumbling 
 to the ground. Captain Combs was thus, 
 as a last hope, forced to run his craft ashore, 
 and attemjit to make good his way to Fort 
 Meigs on the north side of the river. To 
 some extent they succeeded. The two Walk- 
 
 ers soon left the party, by the Captain's 
 order, to save themselves; the Indian nobly 
 remained with Paxton, and helped him along 
 for six or seven miles, until he was so ex- 
 hausted with the loss of blood as to be un- 
 able to travel farther. Captain Combs was 
 less fortunate with poor Johnson, who, with 
 all his aid, could barelv draor himself half a 
 mile from their place of lauding, and both 
 he and Paxton were very soon captured and 
 taken to General Proctor's head-quartere. 
 They even reported, as was afterwards learn- 
 ed, that they had killed the Captain, and 
 showed as evidence of the fact his cloth coat, 
 which he had thrown off, putting on in its 
 stead an old hunting-shirt, after he left John- 
 son, so as to disencumber himself of all sur- 
 plus weight. His woodcraft, learned in the 
 previous campaign, now did him good ser- 
 vice, as it enabled him to elude his pursuers; 
 and after two days and nights of starvation 
 and suflfering, he again met Major Shelby 
 and liis other friends, at the mouth of the 
 Auglaise, on the fourth of Ma}-, in the morn- 
 ing, after all hope of his return had been 
 given up. The two Walkers were a day 
 ahead of him, and his brave young Indian 
 succeeded in making his way to his native 
 
 villajje. 
 
 The historian McAfee, page 264, in speak- 
 ing of another expedition of a somewhat si- 
 milar character, subsequently undertaken by 
 Major Trimlile, at the instance of General 
 Clay, thus alludes to the above : — 
 
 " To penetrate to the camp [Fort Meigs] thus 
 exposed in an open boat, was deemed extremely 
 hazardous. Such an attempt had already been 
 made bv Captain Leslie Combs, who was sent 
 down in a canoe with five or six men by Colonel 
 Dudley, on his airival at Defiance. The Captain 
 had reached within a mile uf the fort, when he 
 was attacked Viy the Indians .ind compelled to re- 
 treat, after bravely contending with superior num- 
 bers till he had lost nearly all his men." 
 
 Captain Combs' mouth and throat were 
 excoriated by eating bitter hickory buds, and 
 nothing else, for the last forty-eight hours. 
 His feet were dreadfully lacerated by tra- 
 velling in moccasins through burnt prairie.s, 
 and his body and limbs were all over sore 
 and chafed by constant exercise in wet 
 clothes, as he was compelled to swim seve- 
 ral swollen creeks, and it was raining part 
 of the time most violently. In this situation 
 he was ordered to bed in one of the boats 
 just preparing to descend the river with 
 General Clay's brigade. 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 13 
 
 He could not for days afterwards oat any 
 solid food, and yet early next morning he 
 found they were making a landing, just 
 above the scene of his disaster four days be- 
 fore, and that the two companies of spies 
 and the friendly Indian warriors were para- 
 ded on the beach, seemingly waiting for him 
 to come, although th^ surgeon had told 
 them he was unable to leave his pallet. Colo- 
 nel Dudley's regiment was soon all landed 
 and formed in three lines, preparatory to an 
 early engagement with the enemy, and Cap- 
 tain Combs was informed that the spies 
 were to constitute the vanguard. A battle 
 — a real battle — was to be fought ! delight- 
 ful thought! The British batteries were to 
 be stormed and destroyed, while General 
 Harrison was assaulting the Indians and 
 their allies on the opjDosite side of the river. 
 At last he would have a chance to do some- 
 thing to make up for all his previous suffer- 
 ings and misfortunes ; and he forgot every 
 bodily pain. In a few moments he was on 
 his feet, dressed. He was received with a 
 glad shout at the head of the vanguard, and 
 commenced the march in front of the left 
 flank, towards the enemy. Colonel Dudley 
 himself led the attacking column, and cap- 
 tured the batteries from the rear, without 
 the loss of a man. " The British flacr was 
 cut down, and the shouts of the American 
 garrison announced their joy at this consum- 
 mation of their wishes. General Harrison 
 was standing on the grand battery next the 
 • river, and now called to the men and made 
 signs to them to retreat to their boats and 
 cross over, as he had previously ordered 
 them, but all in vain." — McAfee^ ■page 270. 
 Just before the batteries were taken, a 
 body of Indians lying in ambush had fired 
 upon Captain Combs' command, and shot 
 down several of his men. He immediately 
 formed in front of them, posting Captain 
 Kilbreath on the left flank, while he himself 
 occupied the right, and maintained his 
 ground till reenforced by Colonel Dudley, 
 who felt the necessity of bringing him off 
 the ground, inasmuch as he had given him 
 no orders to retreat, and had determined 
 not to sacrifice him. Captain Kilbreath was 
 killed at his post, and Captain Combs was 
 slightly touched by a ball before he received 
 any assistance. They soon after routed the 
 enemy, and pui*sued them by successive 
 charges of bayonet some two or three miles 
 through the swamp. In the mean time the 
 
 British had retaken their batteries, and driven 
 off our left column, which had been left to 
 guard them. The Indians, too, were largely 
 reenforced, and were trying to surround the 
 American detachment, or, at any rate, to 
 cut them ofl'from their boats. Under these 
 circumstances, a retreat was ordered, with 
 directions again to form at the batteries, it 
 not then being known to the party that they 
 had been retaken. As had been the case 
 at Raisin, and will ever be repeated with 
 raw troops, the retreat caused much disor- 
 der and confusion, and cost the Amencans 
 most dearly, for many of the wounded were 
 now tomahawked and scalped ; amono- them 
 their brave, unfortunate commander. Colo- 
 nel Dudley. Captain Combs' position threw 
 him in the rear in this movement, and, al- 
 though severely wounded in the shoulder 
 by a ball, which remained lodged in his 
 body, and bleeding profusely, he was enabled 
 now and then to make a rally and drive 
 back the painted devils, when they would 
 be rushing up too closely upon his com- 
 mand. He had no idea that those in front of 
 him had surrendered, until he found him- 
 self in the midst of the British regulars, and 
 trampling on the thrown-away arms of the 
 Kentucky troops. And here and thus his 
 long-desired battle ended — a second river 
 Raisin bloody massacre.* 
 
 The brilliant early history of an Alexan- 
 der and a Napoleon, which had ever vividly 
 floated in his mind in glorious visions as 
 to his own unaided military career, were 
 now exchanged for the agonizing reality of 
 a prisoner of war ; and yet he had not half 
 
 ^ — ' r 
 
 * "The prisoners were taken down to the 
 British head-quarters, put into Fort ilianii, and 
 the Indians pernoitted to garrison the surrounding 
 rampart, and amuse themselves by loading and 
 firing at the crowd, or at any particular individual 
 Those who preferred to inflict a still more cruel 
 and savage death, selected their victims, led them 
 to the gateway, and there, under the eye of General 
 Proctor, and in the presence of the whole British 
 artny, tomahawked and scalped them .' . . . As 
 soon as Tecumseh beheld it, [the carnage,] he 
 flourishid his sword, and, in a loud voice, ordered 
 them " for shame to desist. It is a disgrace to 
 kill a defenseless prisoner.'" His orders were 
 obeyed, to the great joy of the prisoners, who had, 
 by this time, lost all hopes of being presen-ed. Id 
 this single act, Tecumseh displayed more human- 
 ity, magnanimity, and civilization, than Proctor, 
 with all his British associates in conmiand, dis- 
 played in the whole war on the north-western 
 frontier." — McAfee, pp. 271-2. 
 
u 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 reached the goal of torturing exposure which 
 the afternoon of that dreadful day was to 
 bring upon him. 
 
 The pen of the historian has long since 
 given to the world some of the leading events 
 to which we refer, and they have, perhaps, 
 passed from the memory of the reader; but 
 we do nut recollect ever to have seen an au- 
 thentic account published from any one of 
 the unfortunate captives, and shall, there- 
 fore proceed to give in substance that of Cap- 
 tain Leslie Combs. General Proctor, who 
 ONved his elevation from a colonelcy to a pre- 
 vious victory, stained by the most revolting 
 atrocities, and wlio witnessed, if not per- 
 mitted those horrid atrocities committed 
 on the present occiision by his Indian con- 
 federates, was afterwards dismissed from the 
 British army for his disgraceful flight from 
 General Ilanison and retributive justice, at 
 the battle of the Thames. 
 
 Immediately on the surrender of each 
 successive squad or individual, as they ar- 
 rived at the batteries, they were marched oflf 
 in single file down the river towards the 
 Biitisli head-quarters near old Fort Maumee, 
 then in a very dilapidated condition, having 
 been given up to us and abandoned shortly 
 after \\'ayne's victory, some twenty yeai-s be- 
 fore that time. Very soon the Indian warriore, 
 fresh from the conflict, (in some instances, 
 boys and squaws,) comuit-nced the operation 
 of insulting and plundering the prisoners. 
 A grim Indian on horseback, painted black 
 and red in alternate rings around his eyes, 
 rode up to Captain Combs and snatched his 
 hat from his head. Soon afterwaids, another 
 rushed upon him, and, regardl»jss of his pain, 
 tore his coat from his back, tearing loose at 
 the same time the bandages with which his 
 brother had bound u]> his bleeding- shoulder. 
 Othei-s robbed him of what liltlc money he 
 had in his pockets, not sparing even a small 
 penknife and pocket-comb. In one instance, 
 when he had nearly arrived at the old fort, 
 and a "devili>h-looking fellow" was handling 
 him very roughly — the more so, perhaps, as 
 his honext intentions ujion the captive wore 
 unrewarded, in consequence of his having 
 been previously cleaned out — a good-looking 
 Canadian non-commissioned officer, as the 
 Captain judged from his dress, interfered for 
 his i)rotection, and lost his life for his hu- 
 manity. The Captain was hurried onwards, 
 and suddenly observed, ashc approached the 
 fort, a number of painted warriors ranged 
 
 on each side of the pass-way from the open- 
 ing of a triangular ditch in front, some sixty 
 feet or more to the old gateway of the 
 main fortification; and on either side and 
 among them were lying prostrate in the mud 
 a number of human bodies, entirely naked, 
 and in all the ghastliness of violent deatlis 
 produced by the war-club, the tomahawk, 
 and the scalping-knife. Never before had 
 our ca[itive seen such a horrid sight. A man 
 would not be able to recognize his own father 
 or brother after the scalp had thus been torn 
 from his head, his whole countenance would 
 be so distorted and unnatural. There was 
 some poetry in the great excitement of mortal 
 strife and skill in open battle, when all were 
 armed with deadly weapons ; but here the 
 prisoners were nearly naked, with a chilling 
 rain and fierce hail beating upon them for 
 the hist hour, and totally defenseless, in 
 the midst of infuriated foes bent on their 
 destruction. There was not the slightest 
 poetic thought in our captive's head; all 
 now was matter-of-fact — real prose. Ue felt 
 very uncomfortable, and decidedly avei-se to 
 proceeding any farther, and so notified an 
 English soldier near him ; but he replied that 
 there wjis no alternative, and urged the pri- 
 soner forward. During this brief delay, the 
 prisoner in his rear stepped before him, and 
 in another moment the work of death was 
 done upon him. He was* shot down with a 
 pistol in the hands of the first black fiend on 
 the left side of the terrific gauntlet, and fell 
 across the track, which was all the way slip- 
 prey WMth fresh-shed blood. Our Captain 
 leaped over his body, and ran through into 
 the fort unhurt, and found himself at once 
 in the midst of several hundred of his fellow- 
 sutlerers, who had been equally fortunate. 
 They were surrounded by a small r>ritish 
 guard ; but, thank Heaven ! no more Indians 
 were in sight. Whether it was our Captain's 
 youthful aj>pearance, his bloody shirt, or 
 mere savage fancy that saved him, he did 
 not know, nor stop to inquire. He again 
 felt safe from cold-blooded massacre, what- 
 ever else might befall him. He was left to 
 indulyfe this iile;isant delusion for a few short 
 minutes. Very soon, however, atler the last 
 })risoner had followed him in, by which time 
 it seems the Indian hosts who had driven 
 them into the net of the British had iissem- 
 bleil around the prisoners' unsiife temjiorary 
 habitation, they at once demanded tliat the 
 latter should bo given up to them ; and 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 15 
 
 beino- refused, they simultaneously broke in 
 the old crumbling walls uf the fort, and sur- 
 rounded thcni on all sides, giving nttcrance 
 at the same time to the dreaded war-whoop. 
 "When the prisoners first entered the old 
 fort, they were ordered to sit down, for fear 
 the Indians would fire on them over the 
 walls, whicii had crumbled down and were 
 very low in some places. 13ut as soon as 
 the savages had burst in upon them, they all 
 instantly rose to their feet, and an old friend 
 near Captain Combs proposed that they 
 should attempt to break through the enemy 
 and get to the river. Captain Combs showed 
 him his crippled shoulder by way of reply, 
 and he afterwards told the Captain that he 
 himself could not swim, but preferred drown- 
 ing to death by the tomahawk and scalping- 
 knife, and presumed the Captain would also. 
 The guard quieted their apprehensions for 
 a short time, until a tall, raw-boned Indian, 
 painted black, commenced shooting, toma- 
 hawking, and scalping the prisoners nearest 
 to him, and could not be stopjjed until he 
 had thus dispatched and mutilated four, 
 whose reeking scalps were immediately seen 
 ornamentins: his waist-belt. One of these 
 was a private in Combs' own company, who 
 fell so near the Captain that his blood and 
 brains sprinkled his clothes. The shrieks of 
 these men in their dying agonies seemed for 
 months afterwards to ring in his eai-s, and the 
 crushing in of their skulls by the repeated 
 blows of the war-club was most horrid. 
 
 At this time, too, the immense mass of 
 Indians around the prisoners again raised 
 the war-whoop, and commenced throwing 
 oft' the skin caps which protected the locks 
 of their guns, preparatory for immediate 
 use. The unfortunate captives then firmly 
 believed their time had come ; and they pre- 
 pared to sell their lives as dearly as possible. 
 There was a rush towards the centre, with a 
 cry of terror, the guard calling as loudly as 
 possible for General Proctor or Colonel Elliott 
 to come in, or all the prisoners would be 
 murdered. At this critical juncture, a noble- 
 looking Indian, unpainted, dressed in a hunt- 
 ing-shirt or fi\iek-coat and hat or cap, came 
 striding briskly into the midst of the sur- 
 rounding savages, and, taking his position 
 on the highest point of the wall, made a brief 
 but most emj>hatic address. Combs could 
 not undei-staud a word of what he said ; but 
 it seemed to receive the general assent of the 
 ludiaus, as was indicated by their grunts and 
 
 gestures, and he knew from his manner that 
 he was on the side of mercy. The black devil 
 only, who had just committed the four mur- 
 ders, growled and shook his head ; but upon 
 receiving a stern look and apparent jjositive 
 Command from the spoaker, whirled on his 
 heel and departed, much to the general joy 
 of the prisoners, as it convinced them that 
 the orator had power as well as eloquence. 
 The next day Captain Combs asked of a 
 IJritish officer the name of the Indian who 
 had thus interfered and saved them. He 
 rcjilied : " It was Tecumseh.''* 
 
 "It was the first and last time," Mr. 
 Combs afterwards writes, " I saw this great 
 warrior. Since the days of King Philip, 
 no single Indian had ever possessed so much 
 j)ower over his race ; for, from the Capes of 
 Florida to the Lake of the Woods, he had 
 been able to produce one simultaneous up- 
 rising of the tribes against us, in the war 
 with Great Britain. And yet I do not 
 think, judging by his appearance, he could 
 at that time have passed his fortieth year. 
 When afterwards I heard of his untimely 
 death at the battle of the Thames, while at- 
 tempting to urge forward his forces, and re- 
 gain the battle which Proctor's cowardly 
 flight had lost, I could not repress a sigh of 
 regret, a feeling in which I doubt not all 
 of my companions on the bloody third of 
 May participated." 
 
 " The prisoners," says McAfee, page 2Y2, 
 " were kept in the same place [the old fortj 
 till dark, during which time the wounded 
 experienced the most excruciatnig torments. 
 They were then taken into the Pritish boats, 
 and'carried down the river to the brig Hun- 
 ter and a schooner, where several hundreds 
 of them were stowed away in the hold of the 
 brig, and kept there for two days and nights,"' % 
 without, we are assured on the authority of 
 Mr. Combs, either food or bedding of any- 
 kind for the wounded, or the slightest surgi- 
 cal attention. 
 
 Fortunately for himself. Captain Combs 
 was on board the schooner, which was less 
 crowded than the brig, and had the ball ex- 
 tracted from his shoulder by a British sur- 
 geon early the next morning ; and, as soon 
 as his name and rank were known, he was 
 invited into the Captain's cabin, and treated 
 with marked attention and politeness. It 
 was there he learned that the party which 
 
 * McAfee, pp. 271-2, aa quoted in a former note. 
 
16 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 had defoated him on his forlorn trip had 
 borne back his uniform-coat in triumph, 
 which was recognized by Paxton, and they 
 asserted thev had killt-d the wearer, showing 
 some recent rents, which they averred were 
 buUet-lioles. P.ixton himself, whom Cap- 
 tain Combs found on board, beheved he was 
 dead, as he last saw him with the coat on 
 his back. 
 
 The prisoners were finally liberated on 
 parole, and sent across the lakf in open 
 boats to the mouth of the Huron river, with 
 a wilderness of some forty or fifty miles be- 
 tween them and the nearest settlement in 
 Ohio, at Mansfield. Captain Combs had 
 neither hat nor coat, and did not exchange 
 his shirt, although covered with mud and 
 blood, till he reached the town of Lancaster. 
 There they were all decently clad, and most 
 kindly entertained by the citizens. 
 
 Late in May, he again reached his father's 
 humble farm in Clarke county, and soon 
 afterwards w;is sent to McAllister's school, 
 near Bardstown, to improve his somewhat 
 neglected education. It was a year or two 
 before he was notified of his exchange ; and 
 in the mean time he had commenced the 
 study of the law, which was to be his means 
 of livelihood through life. 
 
 "Whether it was in his blood, or that he 
 took the disease in his early boyhood from 
 hearing his father talk of his revolutionary 
 services and Indian " scrimmages," certain it 
 is that, long before he arrived at manhood. 
 Combs used to feel as young Norval did, 
 while with his father on the Grampian hills, 
 an humble swain — an anxious desire for 
 military renown. " I am not even yet," he 
 writes, " entirely cun-d of the disease, and 
 have all my lift-, till within the last few years, 
 devoted a portion of my time to military 
 tactics, in training the militia, havino: long 
 
 smce re 
 
 ached 
 
 the 
 
 hiichest fjrade. At the 
 first tip of the drum, I instinctively catch 
 the step, and keep it as long as the music 
 reaches my ear." 
 
 When the Mi^xicans were invading Texas, 
 in 183C,'7 and '8, and General Gaines was 
 posted on our south-western frontier, which 
 was considered in some danger, he called 
 upon Kentucky for help. The Governor 
 immediately gave General Combs authority 
 to raise ten coinpanios, and march to his re- 
 lief. He accordinjrlv issued his iiroclama- 
 tion, and had the otier of more than forty 
 volunteer companies in a very short time. Ho 
 
 selected ten, formed thorn into a regiment, 
 and wiis ready to embark from Louisville, 
 when the President of the United States 
 countermanded the order, and thev were 
 discharged. 
 
 So, too, ten years afterwards, when rumors 
 reached us that General Taylor was in front 
 of a Mexican force, on the Rio Grande, of 
 more than double his strength in point of 
 numbers, and Congress had authorized the 
 President to receive the services of fifty 
 thousand volunteers, General Combs issued 
 his general ordei-s, commanding all the regi- 
 ments under his command to assemble at 
 their several places of annual parade, to see 
 what could be done. The following is an 
 extract from that order, dated May 18, 
 1846 :— 
 
 "The Major-General does not doubt that the 
 same noble spirit which precipitated the gallant 
 sons of Kentucky upon every frontier where an 
 enemy was to be found, during the late war, will 
 again animate his fellow-soldiers; and he calls 
 upon them, in tiie name of liberty and patriotism, 
 I to luisten to the rescue of the American army on 
 the Rio Grande, to share their victories, or avenge 
 their disasters, if any have befallen them." 
 
 Several regiments of volunteei"s were soon 
 enrolled, and it was supposed by all that the 
 command would be given to General Combs. 
 But such was not the case. He was not in 
 favor at Washington ; and, although his 
 proclamation was republished in the "Union," 
 and his energy and patriotism every where 
 complimented, none but political partisans 
 were appointed to high offices ; some of 
 whom were made generals, who had never 
 " set a squadron in the field," nor were fit to 
 do it. The Constitution of the L' nitod States 
 wa'i, in the opinion of General Combs, vio- 
 lated by depriving the States of the right to 
 officer their own militia ; and he was over- 
 looked and superseded. Again, although 
 opposed to the annexation of Texas, as pro- 
 posed and finally consummated, yet, when 
 war was declared, he desired to see it sjieedily 
 fought out, and terminated by an honorable 
 peace. He, therefore, again made an effort 
 to be employed in the military service, and, 
 with this view, addressed a letter to the 
 President, when more volunteers were called 
 for, offering to raise a full division, if he 
 wt)uld only allow those who were willing to 
 risk their lives for their country to choose 
 their own officers. He even went to Wash- 
 ington, and renewed the ofl'er in person to 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 17 
 
 the President and Secretary of War ; but 
 it was declined politely, yet positively. His 
 remonstrances on the occasion wore in plain 
 English, as may be remembered, for thoy 
 formed the subject of remark by the public 
 press at the time, and very likely Mr. Marcy 
 has not entirely forgotten them. No one 
 was present at their brief interview in his 
 oflBce. General Combs soon afterwards re- 
 signed his office, in consequence of the gross 
 injustice which he felt had been done him. 
 He would not consent to be treated as a 
 mere recruiting-sergeant to raise troops for j 
 those whom he regarded as party pets, 
 without military experience or aptitude to 
 command in the field. 
 
 Having risen from the ranks to the office 
 of captain in two campaigns, without the aid 
 of friends or fortune, by repeated acts of self- 
 devotion, Leslie Combs had returned home 
 naked and penniless, a cripple for life. Yet 
 he did not apply for a pension from the 
 War Office, as did othei-s — even Colonel 
 Johnson, who received his in full. When 
 urged to do so, he replied, that his blood 
 was as red, and shed as freely, as that of 
 Colonel (afterwards Governor) Preston, of 
 Virginia ; and that, poor as he was, he 
 would never receive a pension unless granted 
 freely by special act of Congress, as had 
 been done in Colonel Preston's case. But 
 he had no friend at court ; and no member 
 of Congress looked into the matter for 
 twenty years, when Mr. Allan, of the Lex- 
 ington (Mr. Combs') district, took it in 
 hand, and the result was a report in favor 
 of granting the pension. A bill was then, 
 and not till then, passed by Congress, unani- 
 mously, we believe, in both Houses, which 
 was approved by President Jackson, giving 
 him a pension from that date — half-pay for 
 life — but nothing for the past. 
 
 By the aid of a relative, who allowed him 
 the gratuitous use of his office and books, he 
 studied law, and obtained a license as an 
 attorney at the age of twenty-three, and 
 immediately went to hard work. Although 
 far from being as well versed in his profes- 
 sion as he felt he ought to have been, his 
 energy, industry, and punctuality soon pro- 
 cured him a large share of business, and 
 enabled him to marry, and take upon him- 
 self the responsibility of a family. 
 
 This was his situation when the great 
 effort was made in Kentucky to destroy 
 Hekrt Clay, because he voted for Mr. 
 3 
 
 Adams for President. His enemies in the 
 Lexington district, and especially in Fayette 
 county, were most violent and bitter in 
 denouncing him ; and at one time, in 1820, 
 thoujjht they could at the next election cer- 
 tainly carry the county against him ; their 
 leader. General McCalla, having only failed 
 by sume nine or ten votes ;it the previous 
 election. It was under these circumstances 
 that Mr. Combs was urged to become a 
 candidate for the Legislature. From his 
 early boyhood he had been devoted in feel- 
 ing to that illustrious man, looking upon 
 him, as he ever since has done, as the "fore- 
 most man of the age," as well as the most 
 vilely pui-sued, persecuted, and calumniated 
 V)y his enemies. Although in a mann.r a 
 stranger to him — for Combs' youth, and Mr. 
 Clay's almost continued absence from Ken- 
 tueky in the public service, had given the 
 latter no opportunity to know the former 
 except as a passing acquaintance — Mr. 
 Combs determined to enter upon his de- 
 fense and support ; and for three successive 
 years he canvassed the county from end to 
 end, meeting Mr. Clay's enemies every 
 where before the people ; literally taking 
 his life in his hand, and defying them. The 
 first year he was elected by nearly one hun- 
 dred majority, and the last by about five 
 hundred ; thus placing the party in an im- 
 pregnable majority. He then returned to 
 his profession, and soon not only regained 
 his lost clients, but also obtained many new 
 ones. 
 
 But it was contrary to Mr. Combs' nature 
 to be an idler, or an humble follower of any 
 man. When, therefore he entered upon the 
 public service, he went earnestly to work, as 
 he had previously done in his profession. 
 Kentucky was at that time flooded with a 
 depreciated paper currency, worth about fifty 
 cents to the dollar, issued by the " Bank of 
 the Commonwealth," an institution which 
 owed its origin to what was then called the 
 " Relief" paity, and which afterward became 
 the Democratic or Loco-foco party in that 
 State. Of public improvement^, the State 
 could boast none ; there were not five miles 
 of turnpike-road within her wide borders ; a 
 railroad had not even been thought of west 
 of the mountains. As Chairman of the 
 Committee of Finance, at the second or 
 third session of his membership, he digested 
 and reported a bill, which, after a severe 
 strug'de, and some slight modification, be- 
 
18 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 came a law, proNnding for the winding up, I party shocked by the injustice done to their 
 gradually and without oppression, of the i great leader. 
 
 whole paper system; and no attempt has He had kept Mr. Clay fully advised of 
 since been made to renew it. \ every stt-p taken, of every hope and fear 
 
 He also devoted himself to the cause of ! which he entertained, up to the final con- 
 internal improvement, advocating turnpike i summation of the combined efforts of General 
 charters, and proposing the first one for a . Harrison, General Scott, and Mr. Webster, 
 railroad, when even Massachusetts could i which finally defeated him. He behoved 
 only boast of one, some four miles long, ' then, and has never doubted since the elec- 
 frum the granite quarries to Boston. | tion, that Mr. Clay could easily have tri- 
 
 He was again a member of the Legislature , umphed over Mr. Van Buren. The people 
 in 1833-4, and, as Chairman of the Com- 1 were tired, sick to death of his heartless 
 mittee on Internal Improvements, reported selfishness and evident incompetency, and a 
 a volume of bills, under whose salutary influ- : change was ine\ntable. And what a bless- 
 ence that noble State has ever since been ! ing it would have been to the country to 
 rapidly rising in wealth, comfort, and power. ' have had Ifenri/ Clay President for the suc- 
 His means, too, were friicly contributed in i ceeding four or eight yeai-s, instead of Tyler 
 taking stock ; all of which h.-is since been | and Polk ! We need not dwell upon the 
 bestowed upon a public library in Lexing- 1 facts of history, and the imaginings of such 
 
 a contrast. 
 
 Although Mr. Combs' first and only choice 
 had been defeated in the Convention, and 
 by means which he boldly condemned, still, 
 as his old commander. General Harrison, a 
 
 ton. 
 
 He was not again a candidate until 1845, 
 when he was chosen without the trouble of 
 a canvass, and was at that session elected 
 Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
 
 The next year his name was again presented ' true patriot and an honorable man, had been 
 for the same office by a large majority of j nominated, he determined at once on his 
 the Whigs of the Legislature, but he posi- i cuurse. He felt that he owed a duty to the 
 tively declined to have it used, incismuch as [ Whig party, to the country, to a gallant old 
 there were several highly promising young I soldier, under whose command he had suf- 
 Whigs who desired it, and he was satisfied fered many hardships, and had shed his 
 ■with the honor previously enjoyed. He has ; blood on the field of battle ; and he resolved 
 
 not since been a candidate for any State 
 office. 
 
 Mr. Combs never asked for an executive 
 appointuit-nt of any kind in his hfe, having 
 
 to devote himself to the coming canvass. 
 
 His fii-st public address wiis in Philadel- 
 phia, to an immense multitude, the Monday 
 ni-rht succeeding the nomination. All knew 
 
 an utter disgust to office-seeking, and being his devotion to Henry Clay, and were there- 
 ■wholly averse in feeling to such self abase- 1 fore anxious to hear what he had to say for 
 mont as is generally necessary to obtain | (reneral Harrison, He had numerous clients 
 favor at court. , in the crowd, who had known him for many 
 
 His first demonstration as a politician and | years as an energetic, prompt, and vigilant 
 public speaker on a national scale was at the attorney, but never dreamed that he had 
 Harrisburg Whig Convention, in 1840, when ' once been a soldier. "1 shall never forget 
 Governor Metcalfe and himself were the ' their evident astonishment," says Mr. Combs, 
 delegates for the State at large, from Ken- " when I took up the military life of the hero of 
 tucky. They were ver}' desirous for Mr. Tippecanoe, and spoke of its leading events 
 Clay's nomination ; and it was, in Mr. Combs' :ts familiarly as if they had been the events 
 opinion, by a most unfortunate combination ' of yesterday. I knew that he had been 
 of circumstances and individuals, that his assailed as the cause of the defeat of Win- 
 noininatiun was defeated. His nover-to-be- Chester at Kaisin, and of Dudley at the 
 forgottc^n, self-sacrificing letter to the Con- Rapids ; and my vindication of him from 
 vention, had been handed to Mr. Combs by these two charges was overwhelming and 
 Mr. Areher, of Virginia ; and after General , conclusive. I had been so connected -with 
 Harrison's nomination, he read it to that [ both of these disastrous events, as to render 
 body, with a heart full of sorrow and disap- my testimony irrefutable." 
 pointment. The whole country was taken | From that time until the succeeding No- 
 by surprise, aud a largo poiliou of the Whig i vembcr, he almost gave up his profession ; 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 19 
 
 and frora Now- York to New-Orleans, from 
 Kentucky, through Tennessee and Virginia, 
 to Delaware, was day after day addressing 
 large multitudes. His dress was a simple 
 hunting-shirt and sash, such as General 
 Harrison wore at the battle of Tippecanoe, 
 and when he fii-st saw him afterwards ; such 
 as his father had worn when he helped 
 Daniel Boone to drive the Indians out of 
 Kentucky, and such as the volunteers gene- 
 rally wore when they marched to the fron- 
 tici's during the late war. 
 
 The Whig press everywhere teemed with 
 the highest-wrought eulogies of his speeches, 
 and its applause might have turned the head 
 of a man prompted by less high and holy 
 feelings than those which influenced him. 
 As it was, they seem only to have stimu- 
 lated him to still higher eftbrts. He spoke 
 on the battlements of Yorktown on the an- 
 niversary of the surrender of Cornwallis, 
 with Seargent, and Uphara, and Wise ; at 
 Lynchburg, a few days afterwards, with 
 Rives, and Leigh, and Preston ; at Rich- 
 mond on three several nights, the last time 
 to some thousand ladies. Thousands of liv- 
 ing witnesses still remain to attest the effects 
 of his addresses ; while the files of the Rich- 
 mond Whig of that day, then edited by the 
 talented and lamented Plea.sants, bear testi- 
 mony to the character and effect of these 
 appeals. 
 
 The election over, and General Harrison 
 President, General Combs asked for nothing, 
 and nothing was offered to him, while hun- 
 dreds, who had rendered comparatively but 
 little service, were clamorous for reward, and 
 some of them received high offices. The 
 real champion of the conflict — he whose 
 morniiiir bufjle had often roused a thousand 
 men to arms, and who never weaned, day 
 or nio-ht, in doinjx his dutv till the victorv 
 ■was won — was torgotten in the hour oi 
 triumph, while othere stepped forward and 
 enjoyed the fruits of the victory. 
 
 If Peter the Hermit felt the inspiration of 
 his holy cause when preaching a crusade 
 against the infidels in possession of Jerusa- 
 lem, so did Mr. Combs in his against the 
 corruptions and usurpations of power in the 
 city of Washington. All selfishness was 
 absorbed in his burning desire to drive the 
 Goths from the Capitol ; and he valued more 
 highly the outpourings of public approbation 
 which eveiy where greeted his effort?, than 
 he would have done any official position 
 
 which could have been offered him. The 
 noble-hearted Whigs of little Delaware pre- 
 sented him with a most substantial evidence 
 of their confidence and gratitude, Ijy the pre- 
 s.-ntation of a magnificent piece of plate, with 
 the following inscription : — 
 
 " To General Leslie Combs, of Kentucky, from 
 a number of liis Democratic Whi;^ friends of New- 
 castle county, Delaware, in testimony of their high 
 regard for him as a patriot and soldier in the North- 
 western compaign of 1812 and '13, whilst yet a 
 youth, and as the able and eloquent vindicator of 
 iii.s old General, the hero of Tippecjinoc and the 
 Thames, in the political campaign of 18-10."' 
 
 Four yeai-s afterwards, when the fanner 
 of Ashland received the nomination of the 
 P>altimorc Convention, he again took the 
 field, although he knew that he would 
 thereby lose a large portion of his remain- 
 inf clients and Vmsiness, which had become 
 more important to him from pecuniary em- 
 barrassment, induced by large investments 
 in the Texan War Debt' After canvassing 
 a large portion of Kentucky, previous to the 
 August election, he directed himself, during 
 the months of September, October, and No- 
 vember, to Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New- 
 York. 
 
 He made a rapid pa.ssage through Vir- 
 ginia, fiom Abingdon, by way of Lynchburg, 
 Richmond, and Yorktown, to Norfolk, arous- 
 ing the Whigs every where, and urging the 
 Democrats to stand by their noblest son, 
 towering as he did in fame and public ser- 
 vices as high above his competitor as the 
 peaks of the AUeghanies above the mole-hills 
 at their base. V>\\i all in vain. They were 
 wedded to their idol, modern progressive 
 Democracy. 
 
 What to them were justice, truth, grati- 
 tude, fraternal or maternal love ? Henry 
 Clav was to be immolated under the re- 
 morseless car of this modern Juggernaut; 
 and who so proper as his own mother to use 
 the sacrificial knife ? It was done. 
 
 Mr. Combs appealed to Pennsylvania and 
 New- York to stand by and sustain the great 
 father of the American system, the steadfast 
 friend of human labor in all its forms, against 
 the false traitors and pretended fri-nds, who 
 would certainly prostrate our rising manu- 
 factures and mechanical pursuits ; but they 
 would not heed him. They, too, cried out, 
 "Ciucify him, crucify him!" and he was 
 crucified. Oh, what a reckoning they have 
 
20 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 yet to settle for this outrageous wrong to 
 America's great statesman ! 
 
 Of the many scenes of deep excitement 
 through which the subject of our notice 
 passed during this ever-memorable cam- 
 paign, we shall refer but to one of prominent 
 intorust. It occurred at New-Uaven, Con- 
 necticut. Mr. Combs had been invited to 
 bo present at a great Whig gathering at 
 that renowned city, and accordingly went 
 there at the appointed time. The principal 
 streets were most magnificently decorated 
 with flags and bannei-s, bearing mottoes of 
 appropriate significance. The crowd was j 
 innumerable, and moved by the highest en- 
 thusiasm. Senator Berrien, of Georgia, first 
 addressed them, followed by Mr. "\Vhite, of 
 New- York, from a broad platform, covered 
 by the most venerable and distinguished 
 sons of the pilgrim fathers. "Indeed," says 
 Mr. Combs, in allusion to this occasion, 
 " when I looked around me, I felt as if I 
 were in the midst of that daring; band of 
 holy men who had crossed the broad Atlan- 
 tic in quest of civil and religious liberty." 
 Instead of speaking from the stand, a light 
 wagon was placed for him to stand in, near 
 the centre of the crowd, so as to be better 
 heard. lie spoke about two hours. At the 
 commencement, he had asserted his belief 
 in an overruling Provideuce in all things ; 
 that there was ever present " a Divinity that 
 shapes our ends, rough-hew them as we 
 will ; " that lie who \i?& the orphan's 
 father and the widow's husband had, in 
 early life, taken an orphan boy in the slashes 
 of Hanover, and led him on, step by step, 
 from one great deed to another, till now, 
 when his history should be written, and jus- 
 tice done him, he would occupy a pinnacle of 
 glory high as Chimborazo's loftiest peak, 
 with Mount Olympus piled upon it. Like 
 an eagle high in air, shot at by the poisoned 
 shafts of cakunny on every side, he still 
 flies higher, and with prouder pinion, 
 towards his mountain eyrie. " Look at 
 him!" exclaimed the speaker, as he threw 
 his hands upwards, and involuntarily the 
 eyes of the multitude followed his gesture. 
 Such a shout :is instantly rent the skies w;vs 
 scarce ever heard before, or such a waving 
 of handkerchiefs seen Jis was exhibited by the 
 thousand ladies who were present. Casting 
 his eyes upwards, he beheld an American 
 eagle some few hundred feet distant, grace- 
 fully flying toward the east. Uis own feel- 
 
 ings were highly excited. He folded his 
 arms, and, looking at it for a moment, ex- 
 claimed, in a thrilling tone of voice, '' I have 
 told you, fellow-citizens, that there were no 
 accidents on earth or in heaven, and I liail 
 this as a happy omen. Fly on, and still fly 
 higher, proud bird of my countiy's banner ; 
 and long may you continue to ornameDt the 
 flag which waves over the land of the free 
 and home of the brave I" No one present 
 will ever forget the scene. 
 
 As the Whigs of httle Delaware mani- 
 fested their gratitude to him by the presen- 
 tation of a magnificent piece of plate in 
 1840, so also did those of the Empire State 
 in 1844, with the following simple, but 
 touching inscription : — 
 
 " From the WLigs of Kings county, New-York, 
 to General Leslie Combs, of Kentucky, the friend 
 of Henry Clav. 
 
 "November, 1844. 
 
 "Si Pcrjrama dextris, 
 "Defendi possent etiam hue dofensa fuissent" 
 
 The defeat of Henry Clay, and the election 
 of James K. Polk, produced a profound sen- 
 sation throunrhout America : and when the 
 vile duplicity and falsehood of the Demo- 
 cratic party in Peimsylvania is remembered, 
 where every sUuidard was emblazoned with 
 "Polk, Dallas, and the TariflT of 1842;" 
 while every where in the North it was un- 
 blushingly asserted that Polk was a better 
 protective tariff' man than Henry Clay, at the 
 same time that he was supported in the 
 South as an advocate of free trade ; it can- 
 not be wondered at that both he and Dallas 
 afterwards betrayed the North, and the ruin- 
 ous Tariff" Act of 1846 was passed, which has 
 already prostrated some of our most import- 
 ant manufactures. Indeed, but for the op- 
 portune discovery of ihe rich gold-mines of 
 California, we should, ere this, have had 
 another commercial crash such as desolated 
 the country in 1837-8 ; for it is indisputably 
 true that the balance of trade for the hist 
 year has been so much against us that it 
 lias required the shipment of over sixty mil- 
 lions of the precious meUil, as well as large 
 ; amounts of United States and States stocks, 
 to make up the deficit. 
 
 General Combs w;is the last man to leave 
 this great battle-field; for, on the very day 
 j of the election in New-York, he passed from 
 Albany to New- York city, and at every land- 
 in^fof tiie steamer stimulated the crowd, who 
 were anxiously expecting the election news 
 
General Leslie Combs. 
 
 21 
 
 from Oliio, urging them to poll every vote 
 in their power for Henry Clay, for that every 
 thing depended on the Empire State. 
 
 Such afterwards proved to be the case ; 
 and, but for the gross frauds in the city of 
 New- York, Polk would have been defeated, 
 and the great cause of American labor glo- 
 riously triumphant. The Empire Club did 
 the dark deed, which lias since produced 
 such wide-spread ruin and distress in some 
 of our manufacturing districts, especially in 
 Pennsylvania. 
 
 A man of less sanguine temperament, or 
 one more calculating in his friendshij), and 
 less truly devoted to Henry Clay in all his 
 fortunes than General Combs, might have 
 been led away by the loud shouting and 
 deep enthusiasm naturally excited by the 
 brilliant victories of the hero of Buena Vista, 
 when the grateful hearts of millions of true ^ 
 Whigs in America throbbed with joy at the 
 suggestion of his name in connection with 
 the Presidential office. Even in Kentucky, 
 multitudes of Mr. Clay's constant supporters 
 and some of his oldest friends avowed them- 
 selves in favor of General Taylor, as the 
 most available candidate ; and some men 
 denounced Mr. Clay as seltish and ambitious ; 
 but General Combs never hesitated, never ! 
 faltered. 1 
 
 " Faithful found among the faithless ; | 
 
 Faithful onlj be amid innumerable false." ; 
 
 " Unmoved, unshaken, imseduced, unterrified." j 
 
 And so he continued till the last moment in 
 Philadelphia, when the National Whig Con- 
 vention decided in favor of General Taylor. 
 Fatigue, loss of rest, anxiety of mind, had 
 by this time prostrated General Combs on a ; 
 sick-bed ; yet, when Independence Square j 
 was in the evening filled by tens of thou- 
 sands of anxious Whites, mainlv the devoted , 
 friends of Henry Clay, it was deemed most 
 important to have an address made by Gen- 
 eral Combs, the long-tried and ever-faithful 
 friend of that illustrious man. It was a 
 severe trial for him to encounter ; yet, when 
 lifted to the stand, he pronounced that brief 
 and most thrilling address, which was at the 
 time listened to in breathless silence, and 
 given on the lightning's wings to the utmost 
 cornel's of the United States. But no re- 
 port of it could do justice to the impressive 
 manner and evidently deep emotions of the 
 speaker, while he seemed to feel that he was 
 giving up for ever the hope of his whole hfe 
 
 to see Henri/ Clay President of the United 
 States. 
 
 Considering the success of the Whig 
 cause as above all other considerations, he 
 pui-sued the same course in 1848 tli:it he 
 had done in 1840. From Maine to Indiana 
 his voice was every where heard in private 
 circles and in public assemblages of the peo- 
 ple, urging all to unite in the support of 
 General Taylor; and hundreds of thousands 
 yet live to testify to the power and eflfect of 
 his speeches. 
 
 Neither General Harrison nor General 
 Taylor ever forgot (we will not say forgave) 
 his unalterable attachment and adherence to 
 Mr. Clay ; and although he did more for 
 each after his nomination than any other 
 one man in America did, they acted towards 
 him as if they only remembered his opposi- 
 tion to their nomination by the Whig party. 
 They never evinced the slightest gratitude 
 for his efficient and disinterested advocacy 
 of their claim before the people. But that 
 may be allowed to pass. Mr. Combs had 
 his own self-approbation, and the high con- 
 fidence of the great Whig ['arty, and they 
 were infinitely more valuable than court 
 favor and official patronage. 
 
 We come now to Mr. Combs' last politi- 
 cal campaign ; and shall treat it briefly. His 
 competitor was allied by blood and marriage 
 to several numerous wealthy and influential 
 Whig families in the district ; had been 
 himself a Whig in early life ; was the pre- 
 sent pride and hope of the Democracy; and 
 thus concentrated all their support. General 
 Combs had no such extra aid or sympathy 
 in the canvass. The mass of the Whigs 
 believed he was invincible, and that therefore 
 they need make no effort. In a long pro- 
 fessional career he had made some personal 
 enemies amoncr the Whifjs, who took this 
 occasion to gratify personal vengeance at the 
 sacrifice of political principle. Some hun- 
 dreds of the first class did not go to the 
 polls. A few of the latter were active and 
 violent against him, and he was defeated. 
 But he died on the plateau of the battle- 
 field, in the front rank of the Whig army, 
 with the Whig banner around him as his 
 winding-sheet. He susUiined the Union, 
 the Compromise, the cause of American la- 
 bor and internal improvements, as presented 
 by Millard Fillmore; and he would rather 
 thus have fallen than have achieved victo- 
 ry by any sacrifice of principle or personal 
 
22 
 
 General Leslie Combs. 
 
 independence. Those who fly from the bat- 
 tle-deld, and those who hide in the ravines 
 and ditches while the balls are flying thick- 
 est, are disgraced by defeat, and not the 
 leader who bravely fights and falls in the 
 combat. Among the many high and hon- 
 orable names recorded in his support are 
 those of Henry Claij and J. J. Crittenden. 
 Mr. Combs has do complaints to make 
 ao-ainst those who failed to do their duty. 
 He feels that his is still obvious : to hold on 
 to Whig principles only the more firmly be- 
 cause tJie timid and treacherous abandon 
 them. 
 
 lie has ever preached and endeavored to 
 practise the philosophy that the world was 
 intended by its Creator to be governed, not 
 by force and violence, but by love and truth — 
 love, embracing all benevolence of thought 
 and act, and truth in deed as well as in word. 
 To his rigid observance of these two great 
 moral landmarks may be attributed the 
 remarkable eftect of his public speeches. 
 lie never berated or denounced bitterly his 
 opponents. He lectured them, criticized 
 them, and endeavoured to refute their argu- 
 ments in good temper ; and he never uttered 
 a word on the stump which he did not be- 
 lieve to be true, nor expressed a sentiment 
 which he did not most sincerely entertain. 
 
 When he commenced life, he set himself 
 to work first to attain pecuniary independence 
 by his own labor, and, second, to do all the 
 good he could to all around him. His first 
 production, which went to the press more than 
 thirty years ago, was an argument and appeal 
 in favor of a lunatic asylum in Kentucky. 
 There was not one then west of the moun- 
 tains, and only three or four in America. 
 A few humane men in Lexington took up 
 the subject, and the result wa'^ the com- 
 mencement of the present magnificent estab- 
 lishment, which has ever since been dispens- 
 ing its blessings in the State. 
 
 At a later date, he aided the public library 
 by a large donation, considering his limited 
 means ; stimulated the establishment of pub- 
 lic Ave-schools, and afi-male orphan asylum ; 
 all of which lU'e now conferring inestimable 
 benefits ui)on the community. Not a church 
 has been erected in Lexington, Trutestant or 
 Catholic, for whites or blacks, to which he 
 did nut contribute his mite. In 1833, he 
 passed through the severest ordeal of his life. 
 WluMi the Asiatic cholera first made it^ ap- 
 pearance on this continent, (in Canada, wo 
 
 believe,) scattering death in its path and all 
 around, an almost univei-sal panic seized 
 upon the jiublic mind. The alarm seemed 
 to increase according to the distance from 
 the scene of its first desolation, and pervaded 
 to a great extent the communitv of General 
 Combs' residence as well as others, although 
 the medical faculty there assured the people 
 that they were in no danger; that their po- 
 sition was so elevated and healthful, that if it 
 should even " rain pestilence upon them, it 
 would run oft'." The consternation of the 
 community may be easily imagined, when, 
 in June, 1833, that mysterious disease burst 
 forth in all its fury in their midst, sparing 
 neither age nor sex ; old men .and children, 
 master and slave, seeming alike subject to 
 its sudden and t'atal visitation. Its first 
 known demonstration was in General Combs' 
 own family, upon the person of a favorite 
 servant, who died in a few houi-s ; thence 
 it spread among his immediate neighbors. 
 Thousands fled to the mountains, leaving 
 their liouses deserted or in care of their 
 slaves, who, being thus abandoned, became 
 more alarmed, and consequently more liable 
 to the fell disease. Many thought it conta- 
 gious, and would not even visit their relatives 
 and dearest friends. A high duty seemed 
 to devolve upon Mr. Combs. With a calm 
 and determined front he met it, and went 
 to work to study the disease, endeavor to 
 arrest its progress, and relieve its subjects. 
 He never stopped, except for brief periods of 
 rest, day or night, for more than thirty days, 
 devoting himself wholly to the sick and suf- 
 fering ; rich and poor, black and white, bond 
 and free, friend and foe, alike received his ser- 
 vices, sometimes in the most menial and dis- 
 gustful offices at their bedsides. It may be 
 justly claimed for him that he was the insfru- 
 iren't of hope, of relief, of prolonged life to 
 many. He had a full sweep of vengeance 
 upon his enemies — he had a few such — and 
 upon his political persecutoi-s, by helping 
 them when they could not help themselves, 
 and felt Jis if they were abandoned by every 
 friend on earth. " It was a glorious triumph," 
 is the language of Mr. Combs. " 1 would 
 not now exchange it for a \nctory on the 
 battle-field, or the highest political promo- 
 tion — so help me God T' 
 
 The entire population of Lexington was 
 almost decimated in a month. Mr. Combs 
 had met the I'litish and the Indians in hos- 
 tile array ; had been wounded, and a prison- 
 
 i.ofC, 
 
General Leslie Comhs. 
 
 23 
 
 er, subjected to every savage barbarity ; but 
 he had never before found such a foe as the 
 cholera of 1833, so liorrid, relentless and 
 terrific, in act and aspect. Ilis escape from 
 it, exposed as he was, seemed almost mira- 
 culous ; for he was not touched till near the 
 close of the season of the epidemic, and then 
 not very viulently. His health is still per- 
 fect, and he retains all the vigor and elasti- 
 city of early manhood. 
 
 In all the relations of life, General Combs 
 has discharged the obligations growing out 
 of those relations with scrupulous fidelity. 
 Enterprising and public-spirited, he has ever 
 been among the foremost in promoting any 
 scheme having fur its object the public good, 
 and has liberally used his means in contri- 
 buting to every project calculated to advance 
 the public prosperity. As a member of the 
 Legislature of Kentucky, and Chairman of 
 the Committee of Internal Improvements 
 in 1833, he strenuously advocated a system 
 of internal improvements, which, by his in- 
 fluence, was partially adopted, and which 
 has done much towards placing the State in 
 its present high position. A& a private citi- 
 zen, within the last few years he has devoted 
 himself to the work of arousing the public 
 mind to the importance of railroad commu- 
 nication ; and by his addresses, and through 
 the press, has done more, perhaps, than any 
 other man, in awakening the people of Ken- 
 tucky to the necessity of prompt and vigor- 
 ous action in this behalf. The result is seen 
 in the various lines of road projected and 
 now under progress, and by which the entire 
 State will, in the course of a few years, be 
 traversed. Such indeed has been his cha- 
 racteristic energy and zeal in matters of this 
 sort, that when any thing wiis to be done, he 
 was looked to, to take the lead. 
 
 lie has ever been, emphatically, the poor 
 man's fiiend ; and never was an appeal made 
 to him in vain in behalf of sutlerino- human- 
 ity. During one of his tours in the Presi- 
 dential camj)aign of 1844, he chanced to 
 stop at a country church in Virginia, and 
 
 hoard the pastor deliver his farewell sermon, 
 in the coui'se of which some remarks were 
 made in reference to the pecuniary embar- 
 rassment which forced the separation of this 
 old shepherd from his flock. Upon tlie 
 return of (ieneral Combs home, ho imme- 
 diately enclosed a sum of money to this old 
 minister, whom for the fii-st and last time he 
 saw but for a few miimtes on that Sabbath, 
 and to whom he was an entire stranirer. 
 Accident made the writer of this acquainted 
 with this circumstance, a knowledge of 
 which Ikxs hitherto been confined to the 
 parties to it and himself. A fovorite plan 
 of benevolence with General Combs has been 
 to assist in bringing forward poor young 
 men of talent, assisting them in their studies, 
 recommending them to public favor, and 
 aiding them in getting a start in their pro- 
 fession ; and more than one h;is had reason 
 to thank the good fortune that threw them 
 in his way. 
 
 In 1833, while the cholera was raging 
 with extreme violence in Lexington, one of 
 its first victims was a bitter pereonal enemy ; 
 and yet, while fear drove others from his 
 bedside. General Combs nursed him with all 
 the care and tenderness of a devoted friend. 
 The annual election for members of the 
 General Assembly came on a short time after 
 the pestilence had subsided, and the citizens 
 of Lexington and Fayette county testified 
 their gratitude for his humane exertions by 
 bestowing upon him their unsolicited suf- 
 frages, and electing him a member of the 
 Legislature. 
 
 The w^riter of this has had opportunities 
 which few have enjoyed of studying tho- 
 roughly the character of the subject of this 
 sketch, and it aflbrds him the highest grati- 
 fication to bear testimony to his unbending 
 integrity, his firmness of purpose in main- 
 taining the right at every hazard, his manly 
 independence, his benevolence of disposition, 
 and, in short, all those high qualities which 
 make up the true man — the noblest work of 
 God. 
 
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