spreading the news and calling for people to collect at his house “to defend themselves against the Indians.” As he “was making fast the windows, in case any attempt should be made upon them,” the son of his neighbor John Roberts approached with more desperate news. An Indian “with a bow and a great number of arrows” was stationed outside his father’s house, poised to attack. The boy asked Winter for help. Winter grabbed his gun, loaded it with a bullet and swan shot, and enlisted his brother John and father-in-law, Morgan Herbert.13
As the crew ran over a small bridge that led to Roberts’s house, they “saw an Indian man, some women, and some girls sitting on a wood pile.” They also saw John Roberts standing in his doorway with a rifle cocked on his shoulder. As Walter, who was leading the charge, came within twenty-five yards, the Indian man stood and, Winter later swore, put an arrow “to the string of the bow.” Winter raised his rifle and pulled the trigger, releasing the bullet and swan shot. The shot sprayed the man’s chest, throwing him on his back. Walter then commanded the others to shoot.14
Chaos ensued. Following Walter’s lead, John Winter fired, hitting one of the women. The two young girls bolted, seeking safety in the woods. Walter and John ran to the woodpile. While John, in the words of his brother, “knocked another of the Indian woman’s brains out” with the butt of his gun, Walter grabbed the bow and arrow and pursued the children. He shot at one and, although the record is not clear, appears to have struck and injured her. John pursued the girls too and caught the other one, beat her with his gun, and left her for dead in the woods. As Walter returned to Roberts’s house with his captive in tow, he saw the Indian man “staggering” into a nearby swamp. The other Indian woman, who had apparently survived the initial assault, now had an axe wound in her head, a deathblow dealt by John Roberts.15
The next day the Winter brothers, Morgan Herbert, and “sundry others” ventured to the Indians’ cabin nearby, a sign that these settlers were familiar with, perhaps even knew, their victims. There they found the girl John had left in the woods. She was alone in her family’s home, frightened, and “much hurt about the head and face.” They sent her to Walter Winter’s house to join her sister. The crew then returned to the scene of the carnage. After burying the two dead women in a shallow grave, they brought their two young prisoners to George Boone, a mill owner and the local justice of the peace. They expected he would applaud their actions. They even hoped that the justice of the peace would reward them for their war prizes. Shocked at what he heard and saw, Boone took custody of the girls for their protection. He apparently let the Winters go, however, likely because he did not have the proper warrants to arrest them. He did rush out dispatches to the other justices of the peace to warn them that there could be retaliatory attacks. One of these justices, Samuel Nutt, sent an express to Patrick Gordon that alerted him to the murders and asked him to delay his return to Philadelphia.16
Fear turned into outright panic as word of the murder spread throughout the communities. Most expected “the Indians will fall down upon us very suddenly,” causing all but twenty men to flee the area around Boone’s district. Boone stayed, however, and with the twenty remaining turned his mill into a fort. Stocked with a thousand bushels of wheat and flour, they “resolved to defend ourselves to the last extremity.” Boone, writing to Gordon the day after the murders, promised that they would “not quit our habitation if we can have any succor from you.” He asked the governor to send “arms and ammunition … in order to defend our fronteers” and, perhaps more important, “send some messengers to the Indians” in a last-ditch effort to prevent the expected invasion. Boone believed the situation desperate. Failure to defend these “fronteers,” these zones now vulnerable to a feared invasion, Boone added, would leave the colony “desolate and destroyed.”17
Boone’s reference to this territory becoming a “fronteer” revealed once again the significance of the word to colonists. Boone and others who lived on perceived “fronteers” began to imagine their place in the polity in a new way and, as a result, began to expect their government, especially the governor who was the captain-general of the colony, to provide them with “succor.” These demands only became stronger and more desperate as the perception of being on a frontier solidified.
Moreover, in 1728, these imagined frontiers had a profound effect on unifying settlers in this crisis zone out of a shared sense of danger. Many historians have treated the ethnically diverse population of Pennsylvania as segregated, divided along lines of ethnicity, religion, and custom. Certainly, there were ethnic and other antagonisms within Pennsylvania, but these enmities fueled few, if any, acts of violence. The shared fear of invasion that these “frontier inhabitants” felt, however, brought them together. The spark that sent the Welshman Walter Winter on his murderous rampage came when he heard from a German man that Indians had killed “sundry Dutchmen.” Gordon had witnessed this unity upon his arrival. The petition for help he received from the people of Colebrookdale had signatures of men from many different ethnicities, with none other than John Roberts’s name at the top. In times of crisis, the all-encompassing “Indians” formed a coherent enemy that helped mute whatever ethnic tensions may have existed in times of peace. Indeed, the ease with which information flowed throughout the settlements and the shared support that followed shows how colonists regularly forged crosscultural ties. The foundation of fear that cemented their bond also escalated tensions between colonists and Indians during the frontier crisis of 1728, ultimately ending with a small but powerful group of “frontier inhabitants” killing a group of Indians indiscriminately.18
“Might Lawfully Kill Any Indian Whom They Could Find”
Before the Winters’ attack, many worried the colony was on the brink of full-scale war. Now some believed war inevitable. It fell to Patrick Gordon to change that. Gordon, as the proprietor’s representative and the captain-general charged with military matters and Indian relations, had to hew a fine line. He understood the stakes. Like most others in the region, he feared that “this piece of barbarity might stirr up the Indians to revenge it on our inhabitants in these parts.” The solution, he knew, was for the government to play a forceful role in implementing its policies and establishing its authority. Success, Gordon hoped, would keep the peace. In order to do so, he would have to use all of the implied powers the governor had.19
First, as the chief magistrate, he issued a hue and cry instructing all sheriffs, coroners, constables, and others to search “with horse and with foot” for the Winter brothers. That same day, word came that the manhunt had already ended in Philadelphia County. Andrew Hamilton and Edward Farmer, both justices of the peace, had apprehended the Winter brothers and Morgan Herbert in western Philadelphia County.20
Gordon and some justices of the peace interviewed the men, hoping to learn what had led them to murder. The Winters’ explanations revealed the dangerous logic used by people who believed they lived on a frontier, especially one formed against Native Americans. When the Winters defended their actions, they evoked the rules of war. They argued that after hearing of Indians murdering “some white men,” they felt that they “might lawfully kill any Indian whom they could find.” Indeed, they believed that they should have received a reward for their actions, as if they had captured an enemy. Officials showed no sympathy and confined the men. On May 15, Farmer and Hamilton sent the men under heavy guard to Chester County’s jail for trial. They also issued an arrest warrant for John Roberts.21
Gordon next shifted his role to chief diplomat and performed damage control with the colony’s Native allies. He ordered the coroner to dig up the bodies of the murdered Indians and give them “a decent burial.” He also provided the relatives of the slain with four valuable cloth blankets, called strouds, to lay upon the graves, in recognition of Indian custom, and gave strouds to the two surviving girls. He also found a resident willing to care for the girls’ wounds. These acts, he hoped, would show the respect the colony held for their Indian allies and their customs.22
Gordon also took the proactive step of sending messages to leaders of
