On one of Wells’ scouts he and his companions came across a family of Indians in a canoe by the river bank.  The white wood rangers were as ruthless as their red foes, sparing neither sex nor age; and the scouts were cocking rifles when Wells recognized the Indians as being the family into which he had been adopted, and by which he had been treated as a son and brother.  Springing forward he swore immediate death to the first man who fired; and then told his companions who the Indians were.  The scouts at once dropped their weapons, shook hands with the Miamis, and sent them off unharmed.

    Last Scouting Trip before the Battle.

Wells’ last scouting trip was made just before the final battle of the campaign.  As it was the eve of the decisive struggle, Wayne was anxious to get a prisoner.  Wells went off with three companions—­McClellan, a man named Mahaffy, and a man named May.  May, like Wells and Miller, had lived long with the Indians, first as a prisoner, and afterwards as an adopted member of their tribe, but had finally made his escape.  The four scouts succeeded in capturing an Indian man and woman, whom they bound securely.  Instead of returning at once with their captives, the champions, in sheer dare-devil, ferocious love of adventure, determined, as it was already nightfall, to leave the two bound Indians where they could find them again, and go into one of the Indian camps to do some killing.  The camp they selected was but a couple of miles from the British fort.  They were dressed and painted like Indians, and spoke the Indian tongues; so, riding boldly forward, they came right among the warriors who stood grouped around the camp fires.  They were at arm’s-length before their disguise was discovered.  Immediately each of them, choosing his man, fired into an Indian, and then they fled, pursued by a hail of bullets.  May’s horse slipped and fell in the bed of a stream, and he was captured.  The other three, spurring hard and leaning forward in their saddles to avoid the bullets, escaped, though both Wells and McClellan were wounded; and they brought their Indian prisoners into Wayne’s camp that night.  May was recognized by the Indians as their former prisoner; and next day they tied him up, made a mark on his breast for a target, and shot him to death. [Footnote:  McBride collects or reprints a number of narratives dealing with these border heroes; some of them are by contemporaries who took part in their deeds.  Brickell’s narrative corroborates these stories; the differences are such as would naturally be explained by the fact that different observers were writing of the same facts from memory after a lapse of several years.  In their essentials the narratives are undoubtedly trustworthy.  In the Draper collection there are scores of MS. narratives of similar kind, written down from what the pioneers said in their old age; unfortunately it is difficult to sift out the true from the false, unless the stories are corroborated from outside sources; and most of the tales in the Draper MSS. are evidently hopelessly distorted.  Wells’ daring attack on the Indian camp is alluded to in the Bradley MSS.; the journal, under date of August 12th, recites how four white spies went down almost to Lake Erie, captured two Indians, and then attacked the Indians in their tents, three of the spies being wounded.]