Gasper Butcher

• Reference: FamilySearch Family Tree - SmartCopy: Oct 15 2020, 22:56:40 UTC

Gasper, son of George V. and Maria E. Kippert Metzger-Butcher. Husband of Catherine Butcher. Gasper was a trapper & Indian fighter. He also was a member of George Rogers Clark's Illinois Campgain. (Soon after the war of the Revolution began, one of the daring spirits of Kentucky, Colonel (afterwards General) George Rogers Clark, formed a plan for an enterprise against the Illinois settlements and the capture of the forts on the Mississippi River. He obtained an order for the undertaking from Patrick Henry, Governor of Virginia, and set out for Kaskaskia on the 12th of February, 1778, with only four companies of soldiers.

The wilderness between the Ohio river and the French villages was traversed with considerable difficulty; but after an arduous march, his little band reached Kaskaskia, which they surrounded. Feigning great sternness, he ordered the inhabitants to remain within doors, posted guards in the streets, and during the night caused his troops to patrol the town with the most hideous outcries and Indian yells.

By these means the simple inhabitants were deceived, the fort and town taken without bloodshed, and the British garrison made prisoners of war. Cahokia surrendered on the approach of a detachment of Clark's men without firing a gun, and the whole of Illinois was thus easily and quickly annexed to the American Republic. This was the first war between civilized nations which had been carried into this State. Col. Clarke left garrisons at the captured posts, and departed to seek new conquests elsewhere.* Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Dec 26 2023, 7:02:32 UTC