CHAPTER V.
THE MORAVIAN MASSACRE, 1779-1782.
The Moravians.
After the Moravian Indians were led by their missionary pastors to the banks of the Muskingum they dwelt peacefully and unharmed for several years.

In Lord Dunmore's war special care was taken by the white leaders that these Quaker Indians should not be harmed; and their villages of Salem, Gnadenhutten, and Schoenbrunn received no damage whatever.

During the early years of the Revolutionary struggle they were not molested, but dwelt in peace and comfort in their roomy cabins of squared timbers, cleanly and quiet, industriously tilling the soil, abstaining from all strong drink, schooling their children, and keeping the Seventh Day as a day of rest.

They sought to observe strict neutrality, harming neither the Americans nor the Indians, nor yet the allies of the latter, the British and French at Detroit.

They hoped thereby to offend neither side, and to escape unhurt themselves.
But this was wholly impossible.