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The chronological dilemma of Blue Jacket
By Brian
J. Evans From the beginning the numbers didn't add up. For many historians, some of the most outstanding evidence that famous Shawnee War Chief Blue Jacket and Marmaduke Van Swearingen were not the same person, comes from their separate birth dates. Although little has been documented in the life of Blue Jacket and his exact birth date is still uncertain, it is commonly believed that he was born in the early 1740s, but some historians now believe it could have been several years earlier than that. According to a statement written by Thomas Jefferson Larsh in 1877; Blue Jacket and Marmaduke Van Swearingen were the same person. In his letter, he claimed Marmaduke Van Swearingen was captured by Shawnee Indians at the age of 17, during the Revolutionary War. However, Joseph Swearingen's Bible indicates Marmaduke, his uncle, was born on Jan. 2, 1763. The birth dates of John Swearingen's children, which include Marmaduke, Charles and Van, are supported by other sources such as tombstones, estate records and a Revolutionary War pension declaration, Texas historian Louise F. Johnson wrote. As other documents infer, the war chief Blue Jacket was a much older man. In A Journal of Two Visits Made to Some Nations of Indians on The West Side of the River Ohio, in the Years 1772 and 1773, the missionary David Jones remembered a trader by the name of John Irwine who told him about a "Blue Jacket's Town" on the Scioto River in 1773 and referred to Blue Jacket as "an Indian of that name residing there." "I concluded Blue Jacket was probably born about the early 1740s, but material unearthed originally by Robert Van Trees, an assiduous local historian from Fairborn, suggests he may have been even older," historian and author Dr. John Sugden of England commented. Whatever his exact birth date was, there were references to an Indian named Blue Jacket long before Marmaduke Swearingen's birth. "In my view, this alone destroys the Larsh story," Dr. Sugden added. There are references to Blue Jacket among the papers of the Ohio Company in the 1750s. In one, for example, Blue Jacket is listed as one of "the Indians trusted out by David Hendricks," Dr. Sugden noted. Also in Kenneth P. Bailey's The Ohio Company Papers, 1753-1817, published in 1947, Blue Jacket is on the list of traders on page 50. There are mentions of Blue Jacket and his relations by the traders during the 1750s. The name of Blue Jacket appears on the lists on pages 56, 57, 112 and 157. This shows Blue Jacket was already a leading hunter and trader by the early 1750s. So, unless there was another man named Blue Jacket at the time, the chief was much older than previously thought. The papers also indicate white traders gave him more credit than many other prominent Shawnees like Cornstalk and Molunthy. These white traders extended credit to Indians identified in the papers only as relatives of Blue Jacket, which indicates he was a favored man. Therefore, a man by the name of Blue Jacket was well established among traders long before Marmaduke Swearingen was even born. If the story of Marmaduke Swearingen's capture was true, Blue Jacket would have been 11 years old when he fought in the Battle of Point Pleasant in 1774. Two years prior to that, when Blue Jacket married the white captive Margaret Moore and fathered his first child, Joseph, Marmaduke Swearingen was only 9 years old. By the time Blue Jacket had a town named after him, according to John Irwine's statements, Marmaduke Swearingen was only 10 years old. Further evidence points to the possibility that Marmaduke Swearingen wasn't even captured prior to 1772. When his father died in 1784, Marmaduke Swearingen was named as a beneficiary in his father's will. Many argue he had to have been home for his father to do so. In the notes of the late Ray Crane, a long-time columnist for the Urbana Citizen, he mentions a friend of the Swearingen family, Cato Hardin, who returned from the War of 1812 saying he thought he saw "Duke" Swearingen with the Indians near Sandusky. But, there was no mention of him being a chief or that he was Chief Blue Jacket. Prior to that account, Blue Jacket reportedly died sometime between 1808-10, in his village along the west bank of the Detroit River, where he spent the autumn years of his life watching river traffic from his cabin. From a written account of Oliver Spencer's captivity in 1792-1793, he reported seeing two of Blue Jacket's sons with him in Defiance. If he were Marmaduke Swearingen, he would have been 30 years old, descendent Carlyle Hinshaw noted. Blue Jacket's son, James at that time was about 24 years old. With these two separate birth dates, and a minimum 20 year age gap between them, many have come to doubt the famous story of a white captive becoming a famous Shawnee war chief. While genealogist and author Richard Pangburn of Kentucky doesn't altogether discredit the story of Marmaduke Swearingen's alleged captivity, he wonders what did happen to the young man. He questions the sparse documentation from the life of Blue Jacket and asks, "was there more than one man with the name Blue Jacket at the time?" He believes so. "As John Sugden says of the various men named Cornstalk, once a name became famous, it was adopted by many," commented Mr. Pangburn. "When a warrior died, an adopted (child) was often given his name." Mr. Pangburn claims there are many firsthand captivity narratives which allude to the practice of bestowing upon whites the names of famous fallen warriors. He says he cites them in his upcoming Indian Blood series in which he raises the question "Could this have happened to Larsh's relative?" While that has yet to be answered, Mr. Pangburn makes a strong case that more than one man named Blue Jacket lived about that time. Tomorrow's article will examine how people referred to Blue Jacket and his children while they were alive.
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