Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 August 1892 — Almost a Miracle. [ARTICLE]

Almost a Miracle.

On the day of the Wyoming massacre in 1778, when more than threo hundred persons—men, women and children, were butchered by the Indians, Amos Stafford, a youth of nineteen years, had what might almost be called a miraculous escape. According to the account given by Mr. Stone in his “Reminiscences of Saratoga,” young Stafford was one of a reserve of riflemen. Shortly before the engairement ended the third man from him in the line fell, then the second, then the man next to him. His own turn would come next. By this time, however, he had perceived that these fatal shots were preceded by a puff of smoke from behind a certain log, An. sJ.iicfian was picking off the reserve. Amos kept his eye upon the spot. Presently a head appeared above the log. Instantly a bullet sped thither, and danger from that quarter was at an end. Soon the order was given to retreat. Stafford waited to reload, and then ran to an adjacent wheat field, where he hoped to lie concealed till dark; but the Indians stumbled upon him, and he was forced to jump up and run. As he ran he glanced over his shoulder. An Indian was upon his heels, with tomahawk lifted. Amos ran—he could do nothing else—and pretty soon came to a brush fence. He cleared it at a bound, faced about, and as his pursuer mounted it he shot him dead. Then he threw his musket into the rushes and plunged into the river. A shower of bullets followed him, but he dived, and on coming up struck out for the opposite shore. Thence he ran behind a ridge and jumped into a marshy spring. An Indian, passed near him, but he suspected nothing. Young Stafford remained thereover night, hearing meanwhile the cries and shrieks of the garrison of Forty Fort, whom the Indians were massacring. The next two nights he passed in a hollow tree. The woods were alive with savages. Once two or three sat upon the log in which Amos was lying. He heard the bullets rattle in their pouches. They even looked into the hollow, but a spider—so Stafford says—had spun a web over the entrance, and of course the Inflfans took that as proof that nobody vvas hidden inside. Three days and nights he lay concealed, without food, and worse yet, without clothing—for he had stripped while swimming the river—till nature could stand it no longer. He crawled out of his den, and determined to give himself up to the first persons he should meet. These happened to be a party of Tories. “God bless you, Amos!” said one of them. “How came you here in this condition?” They gave him food and clothing, and on the second night he escaped. The next morning he reached the American camp, to which he brought the first news of the defeat and massacre at Wyoming.