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BIOGRAPHIES
Source:
CENTENNIAL HISTORY
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Troy, Piqua and Miami County, Ohio
And Representative Citizens.
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Edited and Compiled By
Thomas C. Harbaugh
Casstown, Ohio
Literary Journalist, Secretary of Maryland association of Ohio.
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"History is Philosophy Teaching by Examples."
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Published by
Richmond-Arnold Publishing Co.
Chicago.
1909
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WILLIAM GAHAGAN, soldier
hero and pioneer of Montgomery and Miami Counties. Of
this historical character we have received the following
account through one of his descendants:
Of good Scotch-Irish stock he had been reared under
Presbyterian influences in Western Pennsylvania, and when
nineteen years old came down the river to join Wayne's
army, in which he served with distinction through the war.
In the spring of 1794 we find him with Benjamin
Van Cleve in charge of a portion of a fleet of
twelve boats under Captain Hugh Wilson,
commissary of an expedition under escort of a detachment of
troops carrying provisions and supplies from Cincinnati to
Fort Massac. Young Gahagan, a dashing
fellow, fearless and possessing a level head that carried
him through every emergency, was bearer of duplicate
despatches from General Wayne to Fort
Washington to be forwarded to authorities in Washington
City. While passing from Fort Loramie down the Miami,
his horse was disabled by a shot from a lurking foe, who,
seeing that he had not killed Gahagan, fled
precipitately. Gahagan, mindful of his
responsibility as a messenger, made the rest of the journey
on foot, eighty-five miles, to Cincinnati; for which service
he received the highest commendation on his return to the
army. With the same rifle that he carried on that
lonely, perilous journey, he fought in the ranks to final
victory under Wayne on the Maumee, and it ever rested
in a conspicuous place in his cabin at Dayton, and for forty
years was a war relic in his home near Troy.
Upon honorable discharge from the army at the close of
the war Mr. Gahagan took service with former
comrades Van Cleve and Mercer, as hunter for the corps of
surveyors under Captain John Dunlap,
running township and range lines between the Miami and Mad
Rivers, and later in the field work west of the Miami, from
Fort Hamilton to Fort Recovery. In the spring of 1796
he came with the Thompson, Van Cleve and
McClure families, sharing privations and perils
that bound them in close friendship for life.
Source: Centennial History - Troy, Piqua and Miami
Co., Ohio - Publ. 1909 - Page 632 |
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