Page:Historic highways of America (Volume 8).djvu/136

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132
MILITARY ROADS

ments will meet your approval. The road is cut one and a-half miles to a good stream of water and ground to encamp on. Five miles advanced of that is a large creek, which is three feet deep at the place he crossed, but a little below is a ford, . ."

On the fourth of October, with enough provisions to last a few days, without its commander, who was at Fort Washington hurrying on three hundred militia, the army under Butler crossed the Miami River and entered the shadows of the Indian land. We have no definite record of the first days' marches. It would not seem that more than five miles a day were accomplished. The route was in alignment with the Eaton Road between Hamilton and Eaton, Preble County. Four Mile (from Hamilton) Creek—then known as Joseph's Creek—was crossed near the old "Fearnot Mill," and the first encampment was made near what was afterward known as Scott's tanyard on Seven Mile Creek—then called St. Clair's Creek.[1] The line of march was up Seven Mile Creek, west of Eaton, where the creek was forded. "The trace cannot now be

  1. Everts's Atlas of Butler County, Ohio, p. 23.