William Wells (soldier)

Wells was born at Jacobs Creek, Pennsylvania, in about 1770. He was the son of Samuel Wells, a captain in the Virginia militia during the American Revolutionary War. The family moved to Louisville, Kentucky, in 1779 and settled on Beargrass Creek when William was nine. Shortly after, his mother died. In 1782, a group of Miami warriors ambushed settlers who were evacuating Squire Boone's Station; Wells' father was killed in a second ambush the following day. Young Wells then went to live with the family of William Pope. Two years later, in 1784, he and three other boys were captured by an Eel River Miami and Delaware raiding party and taken to a location in what is now Indiana. Wells was 13 years old at the time. Wells was adopted by a chief named Gaviahate ("Porcupine") and raised in the village of Kenapakomoko (Snakefish Town) on the Eel River, six miles north of present-day Logansport, Indiana. Wells' Miami name was "Apekonit" (carrot), possibly in reference to his red hair. He seems to have adapted well to Miami life and even accompanied war parties. He may also have been involved in decoying flatboats along the Ohio River. Wells was located and visited by his brother Cary around 1788 or 1789. He visited his family in Louisville but remained with the Miami, perhaps because he had married a Wea woman and had a child. In 1791, his wife and daughter were captured in a raid by General James Wilkinson and taken to Cincinnati. Meanwhile, under the command of the great Miami war chief Little Turtle, Wells led a group of Miami sharpshooters at St. Clair's defeat in 1791, which marked Native Americans' biggest victory against the U. S. Army. The following year, Wells returned to Louisville. While in Louisville, his brother Sam encouraged him to travel to Cincinnati to meet with Rufus Putnam. Putnam then hired Wells to assist in negotiating a treaty with the Native Americans in Vincennes who were holding hostages. The negotiations ultimately led to the release of the captives. Putnam also hired Wells to spy on the confederated Indian councils in 1792 and 1793 along the Maumee River in northwest Ohio. While his first wife was held captive in Cincinnati, Wells married Little Turtle's daughter Wanagapeth ("Sweet Breeze"), with whom he had four children. The children of Wells and Wanagapeth were Anne, wife of Dr. William Turner of Fort Wayne; Mary, wife of James Wolcott; Rebecca, wife of James Hackley of Fort Wayne; Jane Turner, wife of John H. Griggs; and William Wayne Wells, a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. On 11 September 1793, Wells arrived at Fort Jefferson with news of the Grand Council's failure, blaming Alexander McKee and Simon Girty for the outcome. He also delivered a dire warning that a force of over 1500 warriors was ready to attack Fort Jefferson and the Legion of the United States, then camped near Fort Washington. Wells became the equivalent of a captain in the Legion of the United States, acting as an interpreter and the head of an elite group of spies. He agreed to obey the orders of "Mad Anthony" Wayne "as far as practicable." Wells led the First Sub-Legion to the battleground of St. Clair's Defeat (which he had fought in) and located several abandoned U.S. cannons that the Native Americans had buried. General Wayne ordered the Legion to bury the bones found and then build Fort Recovery on the battle site. Wells's scouts led the way when Wayne's legion marched toward the Maumee in the summer of 1794. When Native American forces under Blue Jacket attacked Fort Recovery on 30 June 1794, Wells warned of the danger. Afterward, he led a scouting mission that discovered British officers who had brought cannonballs and powder, not knowing that the United States had already recovered the buried cannons. Wells was wounded a few days before the Battle of Fallen Timbers when, on a dare, he led his group of spies into a camp of 15 Delaware warriors and struck up a casual conversation. The spies fled when they were finally discovered, but Wells was shot in the hand and received fractures to his wrist. He still was able to give Wayne crucial advice about when to attack, which helped secure the victory. The following year, he was an interpreter for the Wabash group (Miami, Eel River, Wea, Piankeshaw, Kickapoo, and Kaskaskia) at the Treaty of Greenville, in which the Native American confederation ceded most of Ohio. As interpreter, he stood between his father-in-law Little Turtle, the only chief to vigorously resist the terms imposed, and Wayne, Wells's commander-in-chief. Little Turtle, the last to sign the treaty, requested that Wells be sent as an Indian agent to the Miami stronghold of Kekionga, now under American control and renamed Fort Wayne. ==William Wells, U.S. Indian Agent==