t twenty miles west of the
present city of Lafayette, and about two and one-half miles from the
present site of Oxford, at a place known in later years as "Indian
Hill." It was well known to Gurdon S. Hubbard, who visited it in the
early part of the last century and had an interesting talk with the
Kickapoos there about the battle of Tippecanoe. Jesse S. Birch, of
Oxford, an accurate local historian, has preserved an interesting
account of this village as seen by the early settlers in the years from
1830 to 1840. The Kickapoos had, at that time, moved on to other places,
but bands of the Potawatomi were still on the ground. "Pits," says
Birch, "in which the Indians stored their corn, were to be seen until a
few years ago. The burying grounds were about half a mile northwest of
the village and only a short distance west of the Stembel gravel pit.
The Potawatomi were peaceful, John Wattles, who describes their winter
habitations, visited them often in his boyhood days. Pits, the sides of
which were lined with furs, were dug four or five feet deep, and their
tents, with holes at the top to permit the escape of smoke, were put
over them. By keeping a fire on the ground in the center of the pit,
they lived in comparative comfort, so far as heat and Indian luxuries
were concerned, during the coldest weather. There are evidences of white
men having camped near this village. Isaac W. Lewis found an English
sovereign while at play on his father's farm, but a short distance from
the site of the village. In the early 30's, his father and eldest
brother, while plowing, found several pieces of English money." The
glittering coins of "the great father," had easily found their way into
savage hands.

But Wilkinson was not destined to strike this main Kickapoo town. He
encamped the first night six miles from Kenapacomaqua, and the next day
he marched west and then northwest passing between what are now the
points of Royal Center and Logansport, and "launched into the boundless
prairies of the west with the intention to pursue that course until I
could strike a road which leads from the Potawatomi of Lake Michigan
immediately to the town I sought." Here for eight hours he floundered
about in an endless succession of sloughs and swamps, wearing out his
horses and exhausting his men. "A chain of thin groves extending in the
direction of the Wabash at this time presented to my left." Wilkinson
now extricated himself from the swamps and gai