Tuesday, August 2, 2016

Antoine Bondy In Fort Wayne


Antoine, the son of Joseph Duarte Bondy and Marie Josette Gamelin and also my daughter's 6th great grand uncle.


From the Valley of the upper Maumee River, with historical account of Allen County and the city of Fort Wayne, Indiana (also here):


At this time [after the massacre at Chicago] there was a trader residing near Fort Wayne, of French extraction, Antoine Bondie [Bondy]. He was about fifty years of age, and had lived among the Indians from the time he was twelve years old. He was an extraordinary character. At one time he would appear to be brave and generous, at another meanly selfish.

The hostile Pottawatomies, desirous of saving him from the destruction which they contemplated for the garrison [Fort Wayne], sent Metea...to inform him of their intentions and his danger.



Source


The morning after Metea had made this revelation, Bondie, accompanied by Charles Peltier, a French interpreter, went to the agent very early, and with many injunctions of secrecy, informed him of it all.

 On the 5th of August, Major Stickney [the agent] was prostrated by severe illness, from which he did not become convalescent for twelve days. He was then conveyed from the agency house to the fort for safety. It was now very plain that the statement of Bondie was no fiction. He, with his Indian family, moved into the fort.




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