Naming Logan

Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico
Edited by Frederick Webb Hodge
Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, 1910

Part 2, page 624:

Spemicalawba ('High Horn,' from spûmûk, 'high'; the common spelling of the name). A Shawnee chief, known to the whites as Captain James Logan. His mother was Tecumtha's (Tecumseh's) sister. When a boy, in 1786, he was captured by Gen. Logan, of Kentucky, while the latter was on an expedition against the Ohio tribes. The general took the boy into his own family, sent him to school, gave him his own name, and then sent him back to his tribe. The result was that Logan thenceforth was the firm friend of the whites. He afterward married an Indian woman, who, like himself, had been taken under similar conditions and resided with the family of Col. Hardin, of Kentucky, for several years. He endeavored unsuccessfully to dissuade Tecumtha from hostilities, and in the War of 1812 enlisted on the side of the Americans, doing good service as a scout and spy in the Ohio region. His good faith having been called into question on one occasion when his party had retreated before a superior force, he determined to prove his loyalty, and setting out with two Indian companions down the Maumee r., encountered near the rapids the British Captain Elliot with 5 Indians, who claimed Logan's party as prisoners. Watching an opportunity, Logan's men attacked the others, killing Elliot and two of his Indians, but with the dangerous wounding of Logan and one of his men. Taking their enemies' horses, they made their way to the camp of the American General Winchester, where Logan died two days after, Nov. 24, 1812. He was buried with the honors due his rank and received warm eulogies from Gen. Winchester and Maj. Hardin. In person he is described as of fine physique, with features expressive of courage, intelligence, good humor, and sincerity. His usual residence was at the Shawnee town of Wapakoreta, Ohio. Logansport, Ind., takes its name from him. His name occurs also as Spamagelabe.

(J. M. [Mr. James Mooney of the Bureau of American Ethnology] )

Part 1, page 772:

Logan, John (?) (native name Tah-gah-jute, lit. 'his eyelashes stick out or above,' as if looking through or over something, and so could well mean 'spying.'—Hewitt). A noted Indian chief, born at Shamokin, Pa., about 1725. His father, called by the English Shikellamy and by the Moravians Shikellemus, according to Crantz (Hist. of the Brethren, 269, 1780), was a white man, taken prisoner in Canada and reared among the Indians, and was later made chief of all or a part of the Indians residing at Shamokin. He is usually spoken of as a Cayuga chief, while others call him a Mingo, the common term in the colonial period for those Iroquois living beyond their proper boundaries. Bartrain says that he was a Frenchman born in Montreal, but as a prisoner was adopted by the Oneida. The same authority further states that his son (presumably Tah-gah-jute) took the name Logan from his friend James Logan, who was secretary and for a time acting governor of Pennsylvania. He lived a number of years near Reedsville, Pa., supporting himself and family by hunting and the sale of dressed skins. Later, about 1770, he removed to the Ohio and was living at the mouth of Beaver cr. when visited by Heckewelder in 1772; and in 1774, about the time of the Dunmore war, he resided at Old Chillicothe, now Westfall, on the w. bank of Sciota r., Pickaway co., Ohio. In 1774 a number of Indians, including some of Logan's relatives, were brutally massacred at the mouth of Yellow cr. by settlers on the Ohio, in retaliation, it was claimed, for the murder of white emigrants, and for a time Michael Cresap was supposed to be the leader in this massacre. There has been much controversy as to the facts in this case. A careful study of the evidence given by Jefferson in the appendix to his Notes on Virginia, by J. J. Jacob in his Biographical Sketch of the Life of Michael Cresap, and by Brantz Mayer in his Tah-gah-jute, leads to the conclusion that the massacre of the Indians was by Greathouse and a party of white settlers, and that Cresap was not present; that Logan's sister, and possibly some other relative, were killed; that his wife was not murdered, and that he had no children. It seems evident, however, that Logan was brought in some way to believe that Cresap led the attack. For several months Logan made war on the border settlements, perpetrating fearful barbarities upon men, women, and children. In the celebrated speech attributed to him he boasts of these murders. This supposed speech was probably only a memorandum written down from his statement and afterward read before the treaty meeting at Chillicothe, at which Logan was not present. His intemperate habits, begun about the timeof his removal to the Ohio, grew upon him, and after the return of peace compelled him to forbear the use of the tomahawk he became an abandoned sot. On his return from a trip to Detroit in 1780 he was killed by his nephew, apparently in a quarrel. His wife, who was a Shawnee woman, survived him, but no children resulted from their union. A monument to Logan stands in Fort Hill cemetery, Auburn, N. Y.

(C. T. [Cyrus Thomas of the Bureau of American Ethnology])