If
all went well, the voyage from Pittsburgh to Cincinnati could be
completed in six or eight days; but delays might easily extend
the period to a month.
One grave danger has not been mentioned--the Indians. From the
moment when the slow-moving flatboat passed beyond the protection
of a white settlement, it was liable to be fired on, by day or by
night, by redskins; and the better-built boats were so
constructed as to be at least partially bullet-proof. Sometimes
extra timber was used to give safety; sometimes the cargo was
specially placed with that aim in view. The Indians rarely went
beyond the water's edge. Their favorite ruse was to cause captive
or renegade whites to run along the bank imploring to be saved.
When a boat had been decoyed to shore, and perhaps a landing had
been made, the savages would pour a murderous fire on the
voyagers. This practice became so common that pioneer boats
"shunned the whites who hailed them from the shores as they would
have shunned the Indians," and as a consequence many whites
escaping from the Indians in the interior were refused succor and
left to die.
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