The Yellow Creek massacre was a killing of several[note 1] Mingo Indians by Virginian settlers on April 30, 1774.

The ramifications of the massacre proved more severe because Mingo leader Logan maintained friendly relationships with Virginian settlers in the region.

Along the Ohio River, two parties led by George Rogers Clark and Michael Cresap met on their way to Kentucky.

In reaction to the rumors of war, they elected Cresap as their military captain, and made plans to hunt for Native Americans.

[2] While near Wheeling Creek, Cresap received a message from John Connolly at Fort Pitt, asking the travellers to remain in the area in case war broke out.

Distrustful of all Native Americans and of representatives from Pennsylvania,[4] the Kentucky-bound group set out the next day to overtake a canoe carrying 3 occupants.

[6] According to Clark, the party decided on 28 April that they would attack a Mingo camp at nearby Yellow Creek.

In a particularly brutal killing, Jacob Greathouse strung Koonay up by the wrists, sliced open her abdomen, removed her unborn baby, and impaled it on a stake.

[14] Within a week of the event, condolences and gifts were offered to the Iroquois, Shawnee, and Delaware nations by McKee, Connolly, and George Croghan.

In part, it read: "Col. Cresap, the last spring, in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not sparing even my women and children.

Jefferson initially named Cresap as the person who murdered Logan's family, but corrected this information in an appendix of his 1800 edition.

[17] In 1798, a neighbor claimed that the Virginian party "appeared to have lost … sentiments of humanity as well as the effects of civilization.