"On September 3, 1812, a war party of Native Americans (mostly Shawnee, but possibly including some Delawares and Potawatomis) made a surprise attack on the village, coordinated with attacks on Fort Harrison (near Terre Haute, Indiana) and Fort Wayne the same month. Twenty-four settlers, including fifteen children, were massacred. Two children were kidnapped. Only four of the Indian attackers were killed.
The hostile Indians first struck the cabin of Elias Payne. According to hear-say, Payne's wife and seven children were all killed and scalped; Elias was later found by the Indians in the woods with his brother-in-law Isaac Coffman, and they, too, were killed. Elias Payne had been only wounded, but with no one to tend his wounds, he bled to death. Payne's grave was later destroyed during construction of Interstate 65.[2]
Some settlers managed to escape to the blockhouse of Zebulon Collings, but the Collings family lost many members. Henry Collings was killed and his pregnant wife stabbed to death. Henry Collings's brother, Richard, was serving in the army under General William Henry Harrison, but his wife and seven children were among the dead.There is little documented evidence for most of the accounts offered.[3]
William Collings' actions during the attack have been the subject of conjecture. One account has him killing four Indians single-handedly and then holding off the remainder of the attackers with broken or unloaded rifles. Another version says Collings and his youngest son sneaked out the back of his cabin and hid in a nearby cornfield, until they finally were able to escape to Zebulon Collings's blockhouse.
The wife of John Biggs, a sister of William Collings, heard the war party approach her cabin, and fled with her three children to hide in a thicket. The raiders could tell the cabin had just been evacuated, so they burned it and searched for the family. As one of the Indians approached the thicket, the youngest child began to whimper, and Mrs. Biggs stuffed her shawl into the infant's mouth to keep it from betraying their hiding place. When the raiding party moved on, the Biggs family was able to reach Zebulon Colling's blockhouse, but the infant had died of suffocation…"
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