n goaded by memories of evil, or when swayed by swift,
fitful gusts of fury, the uncontrolled violence of their passions led
them to commit deeds whose inhuman barbarity almost equalled, though it
could never surpass, that shown by the Indians themselves.[29]

But Logan's people did not profit by Cresap's change of heart. On the
last day of April a small party of men, women, and children, including
almost all of Logan's kin, left his camp and crossed the river to visit
Greathouse, as had been their custom; for he made a trade of selling rum
to the savages, though Cresap had notified him to stop. The whole party
were plied with liquor, and became helplessly drunk, in which condition
Greathouse and his associated criminals fell on and massacred them, nine
souls in all.[30] It was an inhuman and revolting deed, which should
consign the names of the perpetrators to eternal infamy.

At once the frontier was in a blaze, and the Indians girded themselves
for revenge. The Mingos sent out runners to the other tribes, telling of
the butchery, and calling on all the red men to join together for
immediate and bloody vengeance.[31] They confused the two massacres,
attributing both to Cresap, whom they well knew as a warrior;[32] and
their women for long afterwards scared the children into silence by
threatening them with Cresap's name as with that of a monster.[33] They
had indeed been brutally wronged; yet it must be remembered that they
themselves were the first aggressors. They had causelessly murdered and
robbed many whites, and now their sins had recoiled on the heads of the
innocent of their own race. The conflict could not in any event have
been delayed long; the frontiersmen were too deeply and too justly
irritated. These particular massacres, however discreditable to those
taking part in them, were the occasions, not the causes, of the war; and
though they cast a dark shade on the conduct of the whites, they do not
relieve the red men from the charge of having committed earlier, more
cruel, and quite as wanton outrages.

Conolly, an irritable but irresolute man, was appalled by the storm he
had helped raise. He meanly disclaimed all responsibility for Cresap's
action,[34] and deposed him from his command of rangers; to which,
however, he was soon restored by Lord Dunmore. Both the earl and his
lieutenant, however, united in censuring severely Greathouse's deed.[35]
Conolly, throughout May, held a series of councils with th