WILLIAM R. PERKINS 
 LIBRARY 
 
 DUKE UNIVERSITY 
 
TONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
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TEXTBOOK EDITION 
 
 THE CHRONICLES 
 OF AMERICA SERIES 
 ALLEN JOHNSON 
 EDITOR 
 GERHARD R. LOMER 
 
 CHARLES W. JEFFERYS 
 ASSISTANT EDITORS 
 
DANIEL BOONE IN THE CUMBERLAND GAP 
 
 From the painting by C. W. Jefferys 
 
PIONEERS OF THE OLD 
 SOUTHWEST 
 
 A CHRONICLE OF THE 
 DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 
 BY CONSTANCE LINDSAY SKINNER 
 
 | NEW HAVEN: YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 TORONTO: GLASGOW, BROOK & CO. 
 r LONDON: HUMPHREY MILFORD 
 
 | OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 1921 
 
 | 
 | 130978 
 t 
 
Fe at ; : 
 
 Copyright, 1919, by Yale 
 c elie Wine | 
 
 ie 
 
 : ‘ X< pe } hited 
 
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ©: ~~ 
 
 Tuis narrative is founded largely on original 
 sources—on the writings and journals of pioneers 
 and contemporary observers, such as Doddridge 
 and Adair, and on the public documents of the 
 period as printed in the Colonial Records and in 
 the American Archives. But the author is, never- 
 theless, greatly indebted to the researches of other 
 writers, whose works are cited in the Bibliographi- 
 cal Note. The author’s thanks are due, also, to 
 Dr. Archibald Henderson, of the University of 
 North Carolina, for his kindness in reading the 
 proofs of this book for comparison with his own 
 extended collection of unpublished manuscripts 
 relating to the period. 
 
 AEB CL. 
 
 April, 1919. 
 
 130978 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 DANIEL BOONE IN THE CUMBERLAND 
 GAP 
 
 From the painting by C. W. Jefferys. Frontispiece 
 THE SOUTHERN TRANS-APPALACHIAN 
 COUNTRY, 1750-1796 
 
 Map by W. L. G. Joerg, American Geo- 
 graphical Society. Facing page 
 
 Xi 
 
 56 
 
PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 
 
 Tue Ulster Presbyterians, or “‘Scotch-Irish,”’ 
 
 whom history has ascribed the dominant Heh 
 among the pioneer folk of the Old Southwest, 
 began their migrations to America in the latter 
 years of oe call eee he century. It is not known 
 
 with cer reci re_th 
 immi ir race arrived in this country, 
 
 but soon after were to be found in several 
 
 of the colonies. It was not long, indeed, before 
 they were entering in numbers at_the port of 
 chief center of their_activities in New World. 
 
 By 1726 they had established set in sever- 
 al al counties behind Philadelphia. Ten years later 
 
 Seas had begun their great trek southward through 
 1 
 
2 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and on to the 
 Yadkin.Valley of North Carolina) There they met 
 others of their own race — bgld men like them- 
 selves, hungry after land — who were coming in 
 through Charleston and pushing their way up the 
 rivers from the seacoast to the “Back Country,” 
 in search of homes. 
 
 These Ulstermen did not come to the New World 
 as novices in the shaping of society; they had 
 already made history. T[heir_ostensible object.in— 
 
 + ‘America\Was t to obtain land, but, like most external 
 aims, it was secondary { to a deeper purpose. What 
 had sent the Ulstermen to America was a passion 
 
 for enol freedom. They were lusty men, shrewd 
 and courageous, zealous to the d for_an ideal 
 
 d withal so practical to the moment in business 
 {hist itiseon'eameito be commen eae as 
 eet a 
 they could lay their hands onx’ though it is but 
 
 air to them to add th is phrase is current whey- 
 ever Scots dwell. They had contested im Parlia- 
 ment and with arms for their own form of worship 
 and for their civil rights. They were already fron- 
 tiersmen, trained in the hardihood and craft of 
 
 border warfare through years of guerrilla fighting 
 with the Irish Celts. They had pitted and proved 
 
At vetihcdh dahil 
 
 Shu Aeon 
 THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 3 
 
 their strength against a wilderness; they had re- 
 claimed the North of Ireland from desolation. For 
 the time, many of them were educated men; under 
 
 the regulations of the Presbyterian—Church every 
 
 e Presbyterian constituti isciphne. | They 
 were brought up on the Bible and on the writings 
 of their famous pastors, one of whom, as early as 
 1650, had given utterance to the democratic doc- 
 trine that “men are called to the magistracy by the 
 suffrage of the people whom they govern, and for 
 men to assume unto themselves power is mere tyr- 
 anny and unjust abinieiion ds In subscribing to 
 this doctrine and in resisting to the hilt all efforts 
 of successive English kings to interfere in the elec- 
 tion of their pastors, the Scots of Ulster had already 
 declared for democracy. | 
 t was shortly after Ja I_of Scotland be- 
 
 came James l_of.England and while the English 
 
 were founding Jamestown that the Scots had first 
 
 occupied.Uister; but the true origin of the Ulster — 
 _ Plantation lies further back, in the reign of Henry 
 </ VIIT, in the days of the English Reformation. 
 
 ' 
 
 In Henry’s Irish _realx Reformation; though 
 
4 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 proclaimed by royal authority, had never been ac- 
 ‘complished; and Henry’s-more famous daughter, 
 ‘Elizabeth; hed conceived the = =a 
 r ied out by James, of planting colonies.of Brotes- 
 
 d to promote loyalty in that rebellious 
 land. Six counties, comprising half a million acres, 
 formed the Ulster er Plantation.) The great majority 
 
 of the colonists sent thither by James w 
 Lowlanders, but among them were many English 
 
 and a smaller number of Highlanders. ewe three 
 peoples from the island of Britain brought forth, 
 through-intermarriage, the Ulster Scots) 
 
 (fhe reign of Charles J had inaugurated for the 
 Ulstermen_an era. of persecution) Charles practi- 
 cally suppressed the-Presbyterianmreligion in Ire- 
 land. His son, Charles IL, struck at Ireland in 1666- 
 through its cattle trade, by prohibiting the expor- 
 tation of beef to England and Scotland. The Navi- 
 gation Acts, excluding Ireland from direct trade ¢ 
 with the colones, nie === 
 
 ation Acts and_ Test Acts requiring con- 
 hie ormity with the practices of the Church of Eng the practices of the C. of Eng- 
 
 _ Madr ec ai 
 
 It was largely by refugees from 
 
 ne that America in the beginning was re 
 nized.) But religious persecution was only one of the 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 5 
 
 influences which shaped the course and formed the 
 character of the Ulster Scots. In Ulster, whither 
 they had originally been transplanted by James to 
 found a loyal province in the midst of the King’s 
 enemies, they had done their work too well and 
 had waxed too powerful for the comfort of later 
 their religion; but the subse t legislative ac 
 
 which successively ruine olen trade, barred 
 nonconformists from public office, stifled _Ivish 
 commerce, pronounced non-Episcopal rriages 
 irregular, and instituted heavy taxation and high 
 
 rentals for the land their fathers had made produc- 
 SE arate epee siete aes a 
 
 These attacks, aimed through his religious con- 
 science at the sources of his livelihood, made the 
 Ulster Scot perforce what he was — a zealot as a 
 citizen and a zealot _as a merchant_no less than 
 as a Presbyterian. Thanks to his persecutors, he 
 jadeauelipion of everything he undertook and re- 
 garded his civil rights as divine rights. Thus out 
 of persecution emerged a type of man who was 
 
 high-principled_ and w; strong and violent, as 
 
 tenacious of his own ri s he was blind often t 
 
 the rights of others, acquisitive yet self-sacrifici 
 <r Font Or ere ree 
 
 & 
 
6 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 but most of all fearless, confident of his own power, 
 
 oo aac canes 
 determi o,have and to hold. 
 
 Twenty thousand Ulstermen, it is estimated, left 
 Ireland for America in the first three decades of 
 
 the eighteenth’ century) More than six thousand of 
 them are known to have entered Rennsylvania in 
 
 1729 alone, and twenty years later they numbered 
 ~one-quarter of that colony’s population. During 
 the five years preceding the Revolutionary War 
 more than thirty thousand Ulstermen crossed the 
 ocean and arrived in America just in time and 
 
 in just the right frame of mind _to return King 
 ia ae . ° e . 
 George’s compliment in kind, by helping to deprive 
 
 him of his American estates, a domain very ch 
 larger than th . the acres of Ulster. They fully justified 
 the fears of the good bishop who wrote Lord Dart- 
 mouth, Secretary..for the.Colonies, that he trem- 
 bled for the peace of the King’s overseas realm, 
 since these thousands of “phanatical and hungry 
 Republicans”’ had sailed for America. 
 
 The Ulstermen who entered by..Charleston were 
 known to the inhabitants of the tidewater regions 
 as the “Scotch-Irish.”” Those who came from 
 
 the north, tured southward by the offer of cheap 
 
 lands, were called the “‘ Pen ia Irish.”? Both 
 
 were, however, of the same race —a race twice 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 7 
 
 expatriated, first from Scotland and then from Ire- 
 land, and stripped of all that it had won through- 
 out more than a century of persecution. To these 
 exiles the Back Country of North Carolina, with 
 its cheap and even free tracts lying far from the 
 seat of government, must have seemed not only 
 the Land of Promise but the Land of Last Chance. 
 Here they must strike their roots into the sod with 
 such interlocking strength that no cataclysm of 
 tyranny should ever dislodge them — or they must 
 accept the fate dealt out to them by their former 
 persecutors and become a tribe of nomads and 
 serfs. But to these Ulster immigrants such a 
 choice was no choice at all. They knew themselves 
 strong men, who had made the most of opportunity 
 despite almost superhuman obstacles. The drum- 
 ming of their feet along the banks of theShenandoah, 
 or up the rivers from Charleston, and on through 
 the broad sweep of the Yadkin Valley, was a con- 
 quering people’s challenge to the Wilderness which 
 lay sleeping like an unready sentinel at the gates 
 of their Future. 
 
 It is maintained still by many, ho r_often 
 for American Independence, as in the Old Country 
 they _were the first to demand the separation of 
 
an DNA er 
 ry 
 
 8 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 ence is said to have been drawn up and signed in 
 Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, on May 20, 
 1775." However that may be, itis certain that these 
 Mecklenburg Protestants had received special 
 schooling in the doctrine of independence. They 
 
 had in their midst for eight years (1758-66) the 
 >) SB aa ioe : 2 
 Reveren lexander Craighead, a Presbyterian 
 
 pressed ie 3 pemehiet bel 
 Pennsylvania Synod acting on the Governor's pro- 
 test, and so pers ed_in Virginia t h d 
 
 ast fled to the North Carolina Back Country. 
 here, during the remaining years of his life, as 
 
 he sole = and teacher in the seitlements be- 
 
 willing soil in which to sow the seeds of Liberty. 
 
 There was ther branch of the Scottish r 
 which helped to people the Back Country. The 
 Highlanders, whose loyalty to their oath made 
 
 them fight on the King’s side in the Revolutionary 
 ar, have been somewhat looked in history. 
 Tradition, handed down among the transplanted 
 
 tSee Hoyt, The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence; and 
 American Archives, Fourth Series, vol. 11, p. 855. 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 9 
 
 clans — who, for the most part, spoke only Gaelic 
 for a generation and wrote nothing — and latterly 
 recorded by one or two of their descendants, sup- 
 plies us with all we are ngwyable to Je rm of the 
 early coming of the Gaels to Carolma. It would 
 seem that their first immigration to America in 
 small bands took place after the suppression of 
 the Jacobite rising in 1Z15 — when Highlanders fled 
 in numbers also to France — for by 1729 there was 
 a settlement of them on the Cape Fear River. We 
 know, too, that in 1748 it was charged against 
 iel Johnston r_ of North Caroli 
 
 om 1734 to 1752, that he had shown no joy over 
 the King’s “glorious victory of Culloden” and that 
 “he had appointed one William McGregor, who had 
 been in the Rebellion in the year 1715 a Justice of 
 the Peace during the last Rebellion [1745] and was 
 not himself without suspicion of disaffection to His 
 Majesty’s Government.”’ Itis indeed possible that 
 
 Gabriel-Johnston, formerly a professor at - 
 rew’s University, had _hi ways 
 
 stranger to the kilt. He induced large numbers of 
 Highlanders to come to America and probably in- 
 fluenced the second George to moderate his treat- 
 ment of the vanquished Gaels in the Old Country 
 and permit their emigration to the New World. 
 
10 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 In contrast with the Ulstermen, whose secular 
 ideals were dictated by the forms of their Church, 
 these Scots adhered still to the tribal or clan system, 
 although they, too, in the majority, were Presby- 
 terians, with a minority of Roman Catholies and 
 Episcopalians. In the Scotch Highlands they had 
 occupied small holdings on the land under the sway 
 of their chief, or Head of the Clan, to whom they 
 were bound by blood and fealty but to whom they | 
 paid no rentals. The position of the Head of the 
 Clan was hereditary, but no heir was bold enough | 
 to step forward into that position until he had per- 
 formed some deed of worth. They were principally 
 heidérs. thet chia! stock: being thelial 
 black cattle of the Highlands. Their wars with ~ 
 each other were cattle raids. Only in war, how- 
 ever, did the Gael lay hands on his neighbor’s goods. 
 There were no highwaymen and housebreakers 
 in the Highlands. No Highland mansion, cot, or 
 parn was ever locked. Theft and the breaking of 
 an oath, sins against man’s honor, were held in 
 such abhorrence that no one guilty of them could 
 remain among his clansmen in the beloved glens. 
 These Highlanders were a race of tall, robust men, 
 who lived simply and frugally and t_on th 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 11 
 
 other covering from rain and snow than their 
 plaidies. It is reported of the Laird-of Keppoch, 
 who was leading his clan to war in winter time, that 
 his men were divided as to the propriety of follow- 
 ing him further because he rolled a snowball to rest 
 his head upon when he lay down. ‘“‘Now wedespair 
 of victory,”’ they said, “since our leader has become 
 so effeminate he cannot sleep without a pillow 
 
 The “King’s glorious victory of Culloden.’ was 
 followed by a policy of extermination carried on 
 by the orders and under the personal direction of 
 the Duke of Cumberland. When King George at 
 last restrained his son from his orgy of blood, he 
 offered the Gaels their lives and exile to America 
 on condition of their taking the full oath of alle- 
 giance. The majority accepted his terms, for not 
 
 (2°r 
 
 only were their lives forfeit but their crops and 
 cattle had been destroyed and the holdings on 
 which their ancestors had lived for many centuries 
 taken from them. The descriptions of the scenes 
 attending their leave-taking of the hills and glens 
 they loved with such passionate fervor are among 
 the most pathetic in history. Strong men who had 
 met the ravage of a brutal sword without weakening 
 
 1 MacLean, An Historical Account of the Settlement of Scotch High- 
 landers in America. 
 
12 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 abandoned themselves to the agony of sorrow. 
 They kissed the walls of their houses. They flung 
 themselves on the ground and embraced the sod 
 upon which they had walked in freedom. They 
 called their broken farewells to the peaks and lochs 
 of the land they were never again to see; and, as 
 they turned their backs and filed down through the 
 passes, their pipers played the dirge for the dead. 
 
 Such was the character, such the deep feeling, 
 of the race which entered N: orth Carolina from the 
 coast and pushed up into the wilderness about the 
 headwaters of Cape.Fear River. Tradition indi- 
 cates that these hillsmen sought the interior be- 
 cause the grass and pea vine which overgrew the 
 innercountry stretching towards the mountains pro- 
 vided excellent fodder for the cattle which some of 
 the chiefs are said to have brought with them. 
 These -Gaelic herders, perhaps in negligible num- 
 bers, were in the Yadkin Valley before 1730, pos- 
 sibly even ten yearsearlier. In 1739 Neil MacNeill 
 of Kintyre brought over a shipload of Gaels to 
 rejoin his kinsman, Hector MacNeill, called Bluff 
 Hector from his residence near the blufis at Cross 
 Creek, now Fayetteville. Some of these immigrants 
 went on to the Yadkin, we are told, to unite with 
 others of their clan who had been for some time in 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 13 
 
 that district. The exact time of the first High- 
 lander on the Yadkin cannot be ascertained, as 
 there were no court records and the offices of the 
 land companies were not then open for the sale 
 of these remote regions. But by 1753 there were 
 not less than four thousand Gaels in Cumberland 
 County; where they occupied the chief magisterial 
 posts; and they were already spreading over the 
 lands now comprised within Moore, Anson, Rich- 
 mond, Robeson, Bladen, and Sampson counties. 
 In these counties Gaelic was as commonly heard 
 as English. 
 
 In the years immediately preceding the Revolu- 
 tion and even in 1776 itself they came in increasing 
 numbers. They knew nothing of the smoldering 
 fire just about to break into flames in the country 
 of their choice, but the Royal Goyerner, Josiah 
 Martin, knew that Highland arms would soon be 
 needed by His Majesty. He knew something of 
 Highland honor, too; for he would not let the 
 Gaels proceed after their landing until they had 
 bound themselves by oath to support the.Govern- 
 ment of King George. So it was that the unfor- 
 tunate Highlanders found themselves, according 
 to their strict code of honor, forced to wield arms 
 against the very Americans who had received and 
 
14 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 befriended them — and for the crowned brother 
 
 of a prince whose name is execrated to this day in 
 Highland song and story! 
 
 They were led by Allan MacDenald of Kings- 
 borough; and tradition gives us a stirring picture 
 of Allan’s wife — the famous Flora MacDonald, 
 who in Scotland had protected the Young Pre- 
 tender in his flight—-making an impassioned ad- 
 dress in Gaelic to the Highland soldiers and urging 
 them on to die for honor’s sake. When this High- 
 land force was conquered by the Americans, the 
 large majority willingly bound themselves not to 
 fight further against the American cause and were 
 set at liberty. Many of them felt that, by offering 
 their lives to the swords of the Americans, they 
 had canceled their obligation to King George and 
 were now free to draw their swords again and, 
 this time, in accordance with their sympathies; so 
 they went over to the American side and fought 
 gallantly for independence. 
 
 Although the brave glory of this pioneer age 
 shines so brightly on the Lion-Rampant of Cale- 
 donia, not to Scots alone does that whole glory 
 belong. The second largest racial_stream which 
 
 flowed into the Back-Country of Virginia and 
 
 ¢ 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS | 15 
 
 North Carolina was German. Most of these Ger- 
 mans went down from Pennsylvania and_ wer 
 correct rendering of Pennsylvanische Deutsche. 
 The upper Shenandoah Valley _was_settled_al- 
 —— They were members of 
 ee German Reformed, and) Monption 
 churches. The cause which sent vast numbers of 
 
 this sturdy ~ i Ces ee es 
 gious persecution. By statute and by sword the 
 Roman Catholic powers of Austria sought to wipe 
 out the Salzburg Lutherans and the Moravian fol- 
 lowers of John Huss. In that region of the Rhine 
 
 country known in those days as the German Pal- 
 atinate, now a part of Bavaria, Protestants were 
 being massacred by the troops of Louis of France, 
 then engaged in the War of the Spanish Succes- 
 sion (1701-13) and in the zealous effort to extir- 
 pate heretics from the soil of Europe. In 1708, by 
 proclamation, Good Queen Anne offered protec; 
 tion to the persecuted Palatines and invited 1 
 
 to her dominions. Twelve thousand of them went 
 to England, where they were warmly received by 
 the English. But it was no slight task to settle 
 twelve thousand immigrants of an alien speech in 
 
16 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 England and enable them to become independent 
 problem lay in the Western World. The Germans 
 needed homes and the Queen’s overseas dominions 
 “necdedeolonibts. gy Wor settled at fist along 
 the Hu nd eventually many of them took 
 u in the fertile valley of the Mohawk. 
 or fifty years or more German and Austrian - 
 (ated. In Pennsyl- 
 vania their influx averaged about fifteen hundred 
 a year, and that colony became the distributing 
 center for the German race in America. By 17 
 iill is_li an estab- 
 ied the frst white settlement in De Vallegalis 
 
 ginia In 1732 Joist Heydt went south from York, 
 
 Femavivetia, aid ett} ou se agg 
 or near the site of the present city of Winchester. 
 
 The life of Count.Zinzendorf, called “‘the Apos- 
 tle,’’ one of the leaders of the Moravian immi- 
 grants, glows like a star out of those dark and 
 troublous times. Of high birth and gentle nurture, 
 he forsook whatever of ease his station promised 
 him and fitted himself for evangelical work. In 
 1741 he visited the Wyoming Valley to bring his 
 religion to the Delawares and Shawanoes. He was 
 not of those picturesque Captains of of the Lord who 
 
 ") ll ah ’ A 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 17 
 
 bore their muskets on their shoulders when they 
 went forth to preach. Armored only with the 
 shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the 
 sword of the spirit, his feet ““shod with the prepara- 
 tion of the gospel of peace,’ he went out into the 
 country of these bloodthirsty tribes and told them 
 that he had come to them in their darkness to 
 teach the love of the Christ which lighteth the 
 world. The Indians received him _suspieiously. 
 One day Sacre ai eciTanialine once eee 
 Delawares drew near to slay him and were about 
 to strike when they saw two deadly snakes crawl 
 in from the opposite side of the tent, move directly 
 towards the Apostle, and pass harmlessly over his 
 
 a body. Thereaft arded him _as under 
 spiritual protection. Indeed so widespread was 
 
 his good fame among the tribes that for some years 
 
 all Moravian settle ng the borders were 
 
 unmolested. Painted savages passed through on 
 
 their way to war with enemy bands or to raid the 
 border, but for the sake of one consecrated spirit, 
 whom they had seen death avoid, they spared 
 the lives and goods of his fellow saps When_ 
 Zinzendorf departed a year 
 
 on David Zeisberger, w who lived the love he 
 
 / for over over fifty years and converted many savage years and conver 
 
y 
 
 18 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Zeisberger was taken before the Governor and 
 army heads at Philadelphia, who had only too good 
 reason to be suspicious of priestly counsels in the 
 tents of Shem: but he was able to impress white 
 men no less than simple savages with the nobility 
 of the doctrine he had learned from the Apostle. 
 
 In 1751 the Moravian Brotherhood. ‘purchased 
 one Findzed thousand acres in North Carolina 
 trom Lord. Granville! Bishop Spangenburg was 
 commissioned to survey this large acreage, which 
 was situated in the present county of Forsyth east 
 of the Yadkin, and_which~is_historically listed as 
 the Wachovia Tract. In 1753, twelve Brethren 
 left the Moravian settlements of Bethlehem and 
 Nazareth, in Pennsylvania, and journeyed south- 
 
 ward to begin the founding of a colony on their new 
 land. Brother Adam Grube,..one of the twelve, 
 kept a diary of the events of this expedition.* 
 Honor to whom honor is due. We have paid it, 
 in some measure, to the primitive Gaels of the High- 
 lands for their warrior strength and their fealty, 
 and to the enlightened Scots of Ulster for their en- 
 terprise and for their sacrifice unto blood that 
 free conscience and just laws might promote the 
 
 « This diary is printed in full in Travels in the American Colonies. 
 edited by N. D. Mereness. 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 19 
 
 progress and safeguard the intercourse of their 
 kind. Now let us take up for a moment Brother 
 Grube’s Journal even as we welcome, perhaps the 
 more gratefully, the mild light of evening after the 
 flooding sun, or as our hearts, when too strongly 
 stirred by the deeds of men, turn for rest to the 
 serene faith and the naive speech of little children. 
 
 The twelve, we learn, were under the leadership 
 of one of their number, Brother | Gottlob... Their 
 earliest alarms on the march were not caused, as 
 we might expect, by anticipations of the painted 
 Cherokee, but by encounters with the strenuous 
 “Trish.” One of these came and laid himself to 
 sleep beside the Brethren’s camp fire on their first 
 night out, after they had sung their evening hymn 
 and eleven had stretched themselves on the earth 
 for slumber, while Brother Gottlob, their leader, 
 hanging his hammock between two trees, ascend- 
 ed — not only in spirit —a little higher than his 
 charges, and “rested well in it.””. Though the alarm- 
 ing Irishman did not disturb them, the Brethren’s 
 doubts of that race continued, for Brother Grube 
 wrote on the 14th of October: ‘‘ About four in the 
 morning we set up our tent, going four miles 
 beyond Car! Isles [Carlisle, seventeen miles south- 
 west of Harrisburg] so as not to be too near the 
 
20 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Irish Presbyterians. After breakfast the Brethren 
 shaved and then we rested under our tent. j 
 People who were staying at the Tavern came to see 
 what kind of folk we were. . . . Br Gottlob held 
 vening service and then we lay down around 
 our cheerful fire, and Br Gottlob in his hammock.” 
 the settlers and wayfarers of that time. On one 
 day the Brethren bought “‘some hay from a Swiss,” 
 later ‘“‘some kraut from a German which tasted 
 very good to us”’; and presently “an Englishman 
 came by and drank a cup of tea with us and was 
 very grateful for it.”” Frequently the little band 
 paused while some of the Brethren went off to the 
 farms along the route to help “‘cut hay.” These 
 kindly acts were usually repaid with éilts of food 
 } or produce. 
 One day while on the march they halted at a 
 avern and farm in Shenandeah Valley kept by a 
 
 man whose name Brother Grube wrote down as 
 | *‘Severe.”’ Since we know that Brother Grube’s 
 | spelling of names other than German requires 
 / editing, we venture to hazard a guess that the 
 name he attempted to set down as it sounded to 
 him was Sevier. And we wonder if, in his brief 
 sojourn, he saw a lad of eight years, slim, tall, and 
 
 foie D st 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 21 
 blond, with daring-and mischievous blue eyes. and 
 cain curve ofthe pn that these hae 
 tin the hearts of beth-sexes when he -should_be-a_ 
 
 _man_and reach out_with swift-hands_and_reckless 
 will for his ires. If he saw this lad, he beheld 
 John Sevier, later to become. one.of.the.most-pie-... 
 turesque and beloved | heroes « of the Old Southwest. 
 
 Hardships abounded on the Brethren’s journey, 
 but faith and the Christian’s joy, which no man 
 taketh from him, met and surmounted them. 
 “Three and a half miles beyond, the road forked. 
 . We took the right hand road but found no 
 water for ten miles. It grew late and we had to 
 drive five miles into the night to find a stopping- 
 place.”’ Two of the Brethren went ahead “‘to seek 
 out the road”’ through the darkened wilderness. 
 There were rough hills in the way; and, the horses 
 being exhausted, “Brethren had to help push.” 
 But, in due season, ‘““Br Nathanael held evening 
 prayer and then we slept in the care of Jesus,” 
 with Brother Gottlob as usual in his hammock. 
 Three days later the record runs: “‘Toward even- 
 ing we saw Jeams River, the road to it ran down 
 so very steep a hill that we fastened a small tree 
 to the back of our wagon, locked the wheels, and 
 the Brethren held back by the tree with all their 
 
 ‘ 
 
22 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 might.”” Even then the wagon went down so fast 
 that most of the Brethren lost their footing and 
 rolled and tumbled pell-mell. But Faith makes 
 little of such mishaps: ““No harm was done and we 
 thanked the Lord that he had so graciously pro- 
 tected us, for it looked dangerous and we thought 
 at times that it could not possibly be done with- 
 out accident but we got down safely ... we 
 were all very tired and sleepy and let the angels 
 be cur guard during the night.” Rains fell in 
 torrents, making streams almost impassable and 
 drenching the little band to the skin. The ham- 
 mock was empty one night, for they had to spend 
 the dark hours trench-digging about their tent to 
 keep it from being washed away. Two days later 
 (the 10th of November) the weather cleared and 
 ““we spent most of the day drying our blankets and 
 mending and darning our stockings.” They also 
 bought supplies from settlers who, as Brother 
 Grube observed without irony, 
 
 are glad we have to remain here so long and that it 
 means money for them. In the afternoon we held a 
 little Lovefeast and rested our souls in the loving sacri- 
 fice of Jesus, wishing for beloved Brethren in Bethlehem 
 and that they and we might live ever close to Him. . . . 
 
 Nov. 16. We rose early to ford the river. The bank 
 was so steep that we hung a tree behind the wagon, 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 23 
 
 fastening it in such a way that we could quickly release 
 
 l¢ when the wagon reached the water. The current was 
 very swift and the lead horses were carried down a bit 
 with it. The water just missed running into the wagon 
 but we came safely to the other bank, which however 
 we could not climb but had to take half the things out 
 of the wagon, tie ropes to the axle on which we could 
 pull, help our horses which were quite stiff, and so we 
 brought our ark again to dry land. 
 
 On -the evening of the 17th of November the 
 twelve. arrived safely on their land on the “Etkin” 
 Yadkin), having been six weeks on the march. 
 They found with joy that, as ever, the Lord had 
 provided for them. This time the gift was a de- 
 serted cabin, “large enough that we could all lie 
 down around the walls. We at once made prep- 
 aration for a little Lovefeast and rejoiced heartily 
 with one another.” 
 
 In the deserted log cabin, which, to their faith, 
 seemed as one of those mansions “‘not built with 
 
 hands” and descended miraculously from the hea- 
 / -vens, the held their Lovefeast 1 olves 
 : entacostal hour the tongue of fire descended-upon 
 __ Brother Gottlob, so that he made a new song unto 
 
 the Lord. Who shall venture to say it is not better 
 worth preserving than many aclassic? © 
 
24 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 We hold arrival Lovefeast here 
 In Carolina land, 
 A company of Brethren true, 
 A little Pilgrim-Band, 
 Called by the Lord to be of those 
 Who through the whole world go, 
 To bear Him witness everywhere 
 And nought but Jesus know. 
 
 Then, we are told, the Brethren lay down to rest 
 and “‘ Br Gottlob hung his hammock above our heads” 
 —as was most fitting on this of all nights; for is 
 not the Poet’s place always just a little nearer to 
 _the stars? 
 
 he pioneers did in groups. 
 There were families who-set-offalone. One of these 
 
 now claims our attention, for there was a lad in this 
 family whose name and deeds were to sound like 
 a ballad of romance from out the dusty pages of 
 history. This this family’ s name was Boone. 
 
 Neither ‘Scots nor Germans can elatiti Daniel 
 * Boone; he_wasin blood a blend of English and . 
 Welsh; in character wholly English. His grand- 
 father George Boone was born in 1666 in the ham- 
 let of Stoak, near Exeter in Devonshire —Gearge 
 
 Boone was a weaver by trade and-a-Quaker by 
 religion. In England in his time the Quakers were 
 22 Sap 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 25 
 
 oppressed, and George Boone therefore sought. in- 
 formation of William Penn, his coreligionist, re- 
 garding the colony which Penn bad established in 
 America. In 1712 he sent his three elder children, 
 
 George, Sarah, and Squire, to spy out the land. 
 
 Sarah and Squire remained in P ia, while 
 their brother return ith glowing re- 
 
 ports. On August 17,1717, George Boone, his wife, 
 and the rest of his children journeyed to Bristeland 
 
 sailed for-Philadelphia;-arriving there on the 10th 
 _ of October. Tne Boones wont frstto,Abiusion, ny 
 
 : > 
 
 : . Laterthey moved 
 
 _tothenorthwestern frontier Iauislend Noni Miaka 
 
 a Welsh community which, a few years previously, 
 had turned.Quaker.| Sarah Boone married a Ger- 
 
 man named Jacob Stover, who had settled in Oley 
 Township, Berks County. In 1718 George Boone 
 
 took up four hundred acres in Oley, or, t : 
 lived in his lo i i when he died 
 
 | the age of seventy-eight. He left eight children, 
 | fifty-two grandchildren, ae 
 
 dren, seventy descendants in al descendants in all — English, Ger- 
 man, idl Genkchtrish and Scotch-Irish blended into o 
 
 family of Americans.* 
 a end 
 
 tR. G. Thwaites, Daniel Boone, p. 5. 
 
26 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 A aes the Wel a family of 
 
 . In 1720 Squire Boone married Sarah 
 tear (gn years Jatee iho bbtadaeaineeta 
 Qley-on Owatisi Creek, eight miles southeast of the 
 
 Boone was.born, the fourth so d sixth child o 
 
 uire and Sarah Morgan Boone, Daniel Boone 
 therefore was a son of the frontier. In his child- 
 
 hood he became familiar with hunters and with 
 Indians, for even the red men came often in 
 friendly fashion to his grandfather’s house. Squire 
 Boone enlarged his farm by thrift. He continued 
 at his trade of weaving and kept five or six looms 
 going, making homespun cloth for the market and 
 his neighbors. 
 
 Daniel’s father owned grazing grounds several 
 miles north of the homestead and each season he 
 sent his stock to the range. Sarah Boone and her 
 little Daniel drove the cows. From early spring 
 till late autumn, mother and son lived in a rustic 
 cabin alone on the frontier. A rude dairy house 
 stood over a cool spring, and here Sarah Boone 
 made her butter and cheese. Daniel, aged ten at 
 this time, watched the herds; at sunset he drove 
 them to the cabin for milking, and locked them in 
 
 the cowpens at night. 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS Q7 
 
 He was not allowed firearms at that age,so_he 
 shaped for himself a weapon that ser imn-well, 
 ae roots clei So 
 ee miseathe in (thé launching of this primitive 
 
 spear that he easily brought down birds and small 
 gamet When he reached his twelfth year, his father 
 bought him a rifle; and he soon became a crack 
 shot. A year later we find him setting off on the 
 autumn hunt — after driving the cattle in for the 
 winter — with all the keenness and courage of a 
 man twice his thirteen years. His rifle enabled 
 him to return with meat for the family and skins 
 to be traded in Philadelphia. When he was four-_ 
 teen his brother Sam married Sarah Day, an in- 
 telligent_young Quakeress who tock a_ special 
 
 interest in her young brother-in-law and taught 
 Ine tthoTadifients of three Ris.” 
 
 The Boones were prosperous and happy in Oley. 
 and it may be wondered why they left their farms 
 set their facestowards the Unknown. It is recorded 
 
 that, thou Boones were Quakers, the re 
 a high mettle and were not infr t 
 
 with by the Meeting. ‘Two of Squire Boone’s chil- 
 
 dren married “ worldlings ’”’ — non-Quakers —and 
 eee Ne 
 
28 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 ere in ‘di * by the Society. 
 In defiance of his sect, which strove to make him 
 sever all connection with his unruly offspring, 
 
 Squire Boone refused to shut his doors on the 
 son and the daughter who h i 1 
 
 Quakerdom. The Society-of Friends-thereupon ex- 
 elled him. This occurred apparently during the 
 
 winter of 1748-49. In t i 50 we see 
 a CE 
 
 the whole Boone family (save two sons) with their 
 
 wives and _ chil eir household goods and 
 
 their stock, on the great highway, bound for a land 
 
 where the hot heart and the belligerent spirit shall 
 not be held amiss. 
 » Southward through the Shenandoah goes the 
 
 Boone caravan. The women and children usually 
 sit in the wagons. The men march ahead or along- 
 side, keeping a keen eye open for Indian or other 
 
 enemy in the wild, their_rifles under arm or over 
 the shoulder. who has done with 
 Quakerdom and is leading’ all that he holds dear 
 
 out to larger horizons, } 
 
 ahead of the line, as we 
 picture him, ready to’ meet first whatever danger 
 le is a strong wiry man of 
 rather small stature, with dy complexio: 
 
 hair, and gray eyes. Somewhere in the line, to- 
 gether, we think, are the mother and son who have 
 
 may assail his tribe! 
 
THE TREAD OF PIONEERS 29 
 herded cattle and companioned each other through 
 
 | long months in the cabin on the frontier. We do 
 
 not think of this woman as riding in the wagon, 
 “yahe may have done so, but prefer to picture 
 
 her>?Wi er robust body, her black hair, and 
 
 _ her black eyes — with the sudden Welsh snap in 
 
 the i turdily as any of her sons. 
 
 If Daniel be beside her, what does she see when 
 she looks at him? A lad well set up but not over- 
 tall for his sixteen years, perhaps — for “‘eye-wit- 
 nesses’”’ differ in their estimates of Daniel Boone’s 
 height — or possibly taller than he looks, because 
 his figure has the forest hunter’s natural slant for- 
 ward and the droop of the neck of one who must 
 
 ee. sometimes in order to tread silently. 
 Hil BO ond whic shows nie 
 
 face — which would be fair but for its tan — and in 
 the English -cut_of feature, the straw-colored eye- 
 brows, and the blue eyes. But his Welsh mother’s 
 legacy is seen in the black hair that hangs long and 
 loose in the hunter’s fashion to his shoulders. We 
 can think of Daniel Boone only as exhilarated by 
 this plunge into the Wild. He sees ahead — the 
 days of his great explorations and warfare, the dis- 
 covery of Kentucky? Not atall. This is a boy of 
 sixteen in love with his rifle. He looks ahead to 
 
ee od 
 tS <e 
 
 30 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 vistas of forest filled with deer and to skies clouded 
 with flocks of wild turkeys. In that dream there 
 is happiness enough for Daniel Boone. Indeed, for 
 himself, even in later life, he asked little, if any, 
 more. He trudges on blithely, whistling. 
 
CHAPTER II os 
 
 FOLKWAYS fg 
 
 os migrations into the inland valleys of 
 
 _ frontier. Thus the beginnings of the 
 
 westward movement disclose to us a feature char- 
 acteristic also of the later migrations which flung 
 the frontier over the Appalachians, across the Mis- 
 sissippi, and finally to the shores of ; of the Pacific. 
 The pi pioneers, instead of moving westward by s slow 
 degrees, subduing the wilderness as they went, 
 overleaped great spaces and planted themselves be- 
 yond, out of contact with the life they had left 
 behind. Thus separated by hundreds of miles of 
 intervening wilderness from the more civilized 
 communities, the conquerors of the first American 
 “West,” prototypes of the conquerors of suc- 
 ceeding “ Wests,” inevitably struck out their own 
 ways of life and developed their own customs. It 
 
 would be difficult, indeed, to find anywhere a more 
 31 
 
32 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 remarkablecontrastin contemporary folkways than 
 that presented by the two great community groups 
 of the South — the inland or piedmont settlements, 
 called the Back Country, and the lowland-tewns 
 and_plantations along the seaboard. 
 
 The older society of the seaboard towns, as 
 events were soon to prove, was not less indepen- 
 dent in its ideals than the frontier society of the 
 Back Country; but it was aristocratic in tone and 
 feeling. Its leaders were the landed gentry — men 
 of elegance, and not far behind their European 
 contemporaries in the culture of the day. They 
 were rich, without effort, both from their planta- 
 tions, where black slaves.and indentured servants 
 labored, and from their coastwise and overseas 
 trade. Their battles with forest and red man were 
 long past. They had leisure for diversions such as 
 the chase, the breeding and racing of thoroughbred 
 horses, the dance, high play with dice and card, cock- 
 fighting, the gallantry of love, and the skill of the 
 rapier. Law and politics drew their soberer minds. 
 4. Very different were the conditions which con- 
 fronted the pioneers in the first American “‘ West.” 
 There every jewel of promise was ringed round 
 with hostility. The cheap land the pioneer had 
 purchased at a nominal price, or the free land 
 
FOLKWAYS | 33 
 
 he had taken by “tomahawk claim” — that is by 
 cutting his name into the bark of a deadened tree, 
 usually beside a spring — supported a forest of tall 
 trunks and interlacing leafage. The long grass and 
 weeds which covered the ground in a wealth of 
 natural pasturage harbored the poisonous cop- 
 perhead and the rattlesnake and, being shaded 
 by the overhead foliage, they held the heavy dews 
 and bred swarms of mosquitoes, gnats, and big 
 flies which tortured both men and cattle. To pro- 
 tect the cattle and horses from the attacks of 
 these pests the settlers were obliged to build large 
 “smudges ’”’ — fires of green timber — against the 
 wind. The animals soon learned to back up into 
 
 EEE eee 
 _ the dense smoke and to move from one grazing — 
 spot to another-as_the wind changed. But useful 
 
 as were the green timber fires that rolled their 
 smoke on the wind to save the stock, they were at 
 the same time a menace to the pioneer, for they 
 proclaimed to roving bands _of Cherokees, that a 
 further encroachment on their territory had been 
 made by their most hated enemies—the men 
 who felled the hunter’s forest. Many an outpost 
 pioneer who had made the long hard journey by 
 sea and land from the old world of persecution to 
 this new country of freedom, dropped from the 
 
 3 
 
34 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 red man’s shot ere he had hewn the threshold 
 of his home, leaving his wife and children to the 
 unrecorded mercy of his slayer. 
 
 Those more fortunate pioneers who: settled in 
 groups won the first heat in the battle with the 
 wilderness through massed effort under wariness. 
 They made their clearings in the forest, built their 
 cabins and stockades, and planted their cornfields, 
 while lookouts kept watch and rifles were stacked 
 within easy reach. Every special task, such as a 
 “‘raising,”’ as cabin building was called, was under- 
 taken by the community chiefly because the Indian . 
 danger necessitated swift building and made group 
 action imperative. But the stanch heart is ever 
 the glad heart. Nothing in this frontier history 
 impresses us more than the joy of the pioneer at his 
 labors. His determined optimism turned danger’s 
 dictation into an occasion for jollity. On the 
 appointed day for the “raising,” the neighbors 
 would come, riding or afoot, to the newcomer’s 
 holding — the men with their rifles and axes, the 
 women with their pots and kettles. Every child 
 toddled along, too, helping to carry the wooden 
 dishes and spoons. These free givers of labor had 
 something of the Oriental’s notion of the sacred 
 ratification of friendship by a feast. 
 
FOLKWAYS 35 
 
 The dimensio a cabin were si 
 twenty feet. The timber for the building, having 
 been already cut, lay at hand — logs of hickory, 
 oak, young pine, walnut, or persimmon. To make 
 the foundations, the men seized four of the thickest 
 logs, laid them in place, and notched and grooved 
 and hammered them into as close a clinch as if they 
 had grown so. The wood must grip by its own 
 substance alone to hold up the pioneer’s dwelling, 
 for there was not an iron nail to be had in the whole 
 of the Back Country. Logs laid upon the founda- 
 tion logs and notched into each other at the four 
 corners formed the walls; and, when these stood 
 at seven feet, the builders laid parallel timbers 
 and puncheons to make both flooring and ceiling. 
 The ridgepole of the roof was supported by two 
 crotched trees and the roofing was made of logs 
 and wooden slabs. The crevices of the walls were 
 packed close with red clay and moss. Lastly, 
 spaces for a door and windows were cut out. The 
 door was made thick and heavy to withstand the 
 Indian’srush. And the windowpanes? They were 
 of paper ted wit : or bear’s gr / 
 
 When the sun stood overhead, the women would 
 give the welcome call of “Dinner!” Their morn- 
 ing had not been less busy than the men’s. They 
 
36 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 had baked corn cakes on hot stones, roasted bear 
 or pork, or broiled venison steaks; and — above 
 all and first of all — they had concocted the great 
 “stew pie” without which a raising could hardly 
 take place. This was a disputatious mixture of 
 
 deer, hog, and bear — animals which, in life, would 
 surely have companioned each other as ill! It was 
 made in sufficient quantity to last over for supper 
 when the day’s labor was done. At supper the men 
 took their ease on the ground, but with their rifles 
 always in reach. If the cabin just raised by their 
 efforts stood in the Yadkin, within sight of the 
 great mountains the pioneers were one day to 
 cross, perhaps a sudden bird note warning from 
 the lookout, hidden in the brush, would bring the 
 builders with a leap to their feet. It might be only 
 a hunting band of friendly Catawbas that passed, 
 or a lone Cherokee who knew that this was not his 
 hour. If the latter, we can, in imagination, see 
 him look once at the new house on his hunting 
 pasture, slacken rein for a moment in front of the 
 group of families, lift his hand in sign of peace, and 
 silently go his way hillward. As he vanishes into 
 the shadows, the crimson sun, sinking into the un- 
 known wilderness beyond the mountains, pours 
 its last glow on the roof of the cabin and on the 
 
FOLKWAYS 37 
 
 group near its walls. With unfelt fingers, subtly, 
 it puts the red touch of the West im the faces of the 
 men — who have just declared, through the build- 
 ing of a cabin, that here is Journey’s End and their 
 abiding place. 
 
 a ee 
 pioneers as well bor da i i e 
 
 fruits ; re were flower-picking excur- 
 sions in the warm spring days. Early in April 
 the service berry bush gleamed ° starrily along the 
 watercourses, its hardy white blooms defying win- 
 ter’s lingering look. This bush—or tree, indeed, 
 since it is not afraid to rear its slender trunk 
 as high as cherry or crab apple — might well be 
 considered emblematic of the frontier spirit in 
 those regions where the white silence covers the 
 earth for several months and shuts the lonely 
 homesteader in upon himself. From the pioneer 
 time of the Old-Southwest to the last frontier of 
 the Far North today, the service. Spr oS 
 alike by white men and Indians; and the red men 
 have woven about it some of their prettiest legends. 
 When June had ripened the tree’s blue-black ber- 
 ries, the Back Country folk went out in parties 
 
 to gather them. Though the service berry was a 
 2 cr RK 
 
 = aa 
 
38 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 food staple_on the frontier and its gathering a 
 matter of household olk made their 
 berry-pieking jaunt a gala occasion, The women 
 and children with pots and baskets — the young 
 girls vying with each other, under the eyes of the 
 youths, as to who could strip boughs the fastest — 
 plucked gayly while the men, rifles in hand, kept 
 guard. For these happy summer days_were also 
 the red -iaiscalpig Tae eee 
 the chatter of the picnickers might be interrupted 
 by the chilling war whoop. When that sound was 
 heard, the berry pickers raced for the fort. _The 
 wild fruits — strawberries, service berries, cherries, 
 plums, crab apples — were, however, too necessary 
 a part of the pioneer’s meager diet to be left un- 
 plucked out of fear of an Indian attack. Another 
 day would see the same group out again. The 
 children would keep closer to their mothers, no 
 doubt; and the laughter of the young girls would be ' 
 more subdued, even if their coquetry lacked noth- 
 ing of its former effectiveness. Early marriages 
 were the rule in the Back Country and betrothals 
 were frequently plighted at these berry pickings. 
 As we consider the descriptions of the frontiers- 
 man left for us by travelers of his own day, we are 
 not more interested in his battles with wilderness 
 
FOLKWAYS 39 
 
 and Indian than in the visible effects of both wil- 
 derness and Indian upon him. His countenance 
 and bearing still show the European, but the Euro- 
 pean greatly altered by savage contact. The red 
 peril, indeed, influenced every side of frontier life. 
 The bands of women and children at the harvest- 
 ings, the log rollings, and the house raisings, were 
 not there merely to lighten the men’s work by their 
 laughter and love-making. It was not safe for 
 them to remain in the cabins, for, to the Indian, 
 the cabin thus boldly thrust upon his immemorial 
 hunting grounds was only a secondary evil; the 
 greater evil was the white man’s family, bespeak- 
 ing the increase of the dreaded palefaces. The 
 Indian peril trained the pioneers to alertness, 
 shaped them as warriors and hunters, suggested 
 the fashion of their dress, knit their families into 
 clans and the clans into a tribe wherein all were 
 of one spirit in the protection of each and all and a 
 unit of hate against their common enemy. 
 
 Too often the fields which the pioneer planted 
 with corn were harvested by the Indian with fire. 
 The hardest privations suffered by farmersand stock 
 were due to the settlers having to flee to the forts, 
 leaving to Indian devastation the crops on which 
 their sustenance mainly depended. Sometimes. 
 
40 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 fortunately, the warning came in time for the fron- 
 tiersman to collect his goods and chattels in his 
 wagon and to round up his live stock and drive 
 them safely into the common fortified enclosure. At 
 others, the tap of the “‘express’’ — as the herald of 
 Indian danger was called — at night on the win- 
 dowpane and the low word whispered hastily, ere 
 the ‘“‘express”’ ran on to the next abode, meant 
 that the Indians had surprised the outlying cabins 
 of the settlement. 
 
 The forts were built as centrally as possible in 
 thescattered settlements. They consisted of cabins, 
 blockhouses, and stockades. A range of cabins 
 often formed one side of a fort. The walls on the 
 outside were ten or twelve feet high with roofs 
 sloping inward. The blockhouses built at the an- 
 gles of the fort projected two feet or so beyond 
 the outer walls of the cabins and stockades, and 
 were fitted with portholes for the watchers and 
 the marksmen. The entrance to the fort was a 
 large folding gate of thick slabs. It was always on 
 the side nearest the spring. The whole structure 
 of the fort was bullet-proof and was erected with- 
 out an iron nail or spike. In the border wars these 
 forts withstood all attacks. The savages, having 
 proved that they could not storm them, generally 
 
FOLKWAYS 41 
 
 laid siege and waited for thirst to compel a sortie. 
 But the crafty besieger was as often outwitted by 
 the equally cunning defender. Some daring soul, 
 with silent feet and perhaps with naked body 
 painted in Indian fashion, would drop from the 
 wall under cover of the night, pass among the 
 foemen to the spring, and return to the fort 
 with water. 
 
 Into the pioneer’s phrase-making the Indian 
 influence penetrated so that he named seasons 
 for his foe. So thoroughly has the term “Indian 
 Summer,” now to us redolent of charm, become 
 disassociated from its origins that it gives us a 
 shock to be reminded that to these Back Country 
 folk the balmy days following on the cold snap 
 meant the season when the red men would come 
 back for a last murderous raid on the settlements 
 before winter should seal up the land. The 
 ““Powwowing Days” were the mellow days in the 
 latter part of February, when the red men in 
 council made their medicine and learned of their 
 redder gods whether or no they should take the 
 warpath when the sap pulsed the trees into leaf. 
 Even the children at their play acknowledged the 
 red-skinned schoolmaster, for their chief games 
 were a training in his woodcraft and in the use of 
 
42 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 his weapons. Tomahawk-throwing was a favorite 
 ,Sport_because of its gruesome practical purposes. 
 
 The boys must learn to gauge the tomahawk’s 
 revolutions by the distance of the throw so as to 
 bury the blade in its objective. (Swiftrunning and 
 high jumping through the brush and fallen timber 
 were sports that taught agility in — The 
 boys learned to shoot accurately the long tifles of 
 their time, with a log or a forked stick for a rest, 
 and a moss pad under the barrel to keep it from 
 jerking and spoiling the aim. They wrestled with 
 each other, mastered the tricks of throwing an 
 opponent, and learned the scalp hold instead of the 
 toe hold. It | was part of their education tomi- 
 tate the noises of every bird and beast of the forest. 
 So they learned to lure the turkey within range, or 
 by the bleat of a fawn to bring her dam to the rifle. 
 A well-simulated wolf’s howl would call forth a 
 response and so inform the lone hunter of the 
 vicinity of the pack. This forest speech was not 
 only the language of diplomacy in the hunting 
 season; it was the borderer’s secret code in war. 
 Stray Indians put themselves in touch again with 
 - the band by turkey calls in the daytime and by 
 owl or wolf notes at night. The frontiersmen used 
 the same means to trick the Indian band into 
 
FOLKWAYS 43 
 
 betraying the place of its ambuscade, or to lure the 
 strays, unwitting, within reach of the knife. 
 
 In that age, before the forests had given place to 
 farms and cities and when the sun had but slight 
 acquaintance with the sod, the summers were cool 
 and the winters long and cold in the Back Country. 
 Sometimes in September severe frosts destroyed 
 the corn. The first light powdering called “‘hunt- 
 ing snows” fell in October, and then the men of the 
 Back Country set out on the chase. Their object 
 was meat — buffalo, deer, elk, bear — for the win- 
 ter larder, and skins to send out in the spring by 
 pack-horses to the coast in trade for iron, steel, 
 and salt. The rainfall in North Carolina was much 
 heavier than in Virginia and, from autumn into 
 early winter, the Yadkin forests were sheeted with 
 rain; but wet weather, so far from deterring the 
 hunter, aided him to the kill. In blowing rain, he 
 knew he would find the deer herding in the shel- 
 tered places on the hillsides. In windless rain, he 
 knew that his quarry ranged the open woods and 
 the high places. The fair play of the pioneer held 
 it a great disgrace to kill a deer in winter when the 
 heavy frost had crusted the deep snow. On the 
 crust men and wolves could travel with ease, but 
 the deer’s sharp hoofs pierced through and made 
 
44 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 him defenseless. Wolves and dogs destroyed great 
 quantities of deer caught in this way; and men 
 who shot deer under these conditions weré con- 
 sidered no huntsmen. There was, indeed, a practi- 
 cal side to this chivalry of the chase, for meat and 
 pelt were both poor at this season; but the true 
 hunter also obeyed the finer tenet of his code, for 
 he would go to the rescue of deer caught in the 
 crusts — and he killed many a wolf sliding over the 
 ice to an easy meal. 
 
 The community moral code of the frontier was 
 brief and rigorous. What it lacked of the “where- 
 as” and “inasmuch” of legal ink it made up in 
 sound hickory. In fact, when we review the activi- 
 ties of this solid yet elastic wood in the moral, 
 social, and economic phases of Back Country life, 
 we are moved to wonder if the pioneers would have 
 been the same race of men had they been nurtured 
 beneath a less strenuous and adaptable vegetation! 
 The hickory gave the frontiersman wood for all 
 implements and furnishings where the demand 
 was equally for lightness, strength, and elastic- 
 ity. It provided his straight logs for building, his 
 block mortars — hollowed by fire and stone — for 
 corn-grinding, his solid plain furniture, his axles, 
 rifle butts, ax handles, and so forth. It supplied 
 ae 
 
 y 
 ex 
 
FOLKWAYS 45 
 
 his magic wand for the searching out of iniquity 
 in the junior members of his household, and his 
 most cogent argument, as a citizen, in convincing 
 the slothful, the blasphemous, or the dishonest 
 adult whose errors disturbed communal harmony. 
 Its nuts | fed_his hogs. Before he raised stock, the 
 unripe hickory nuts, crushed for their white liquid, 
 supplied him with butter for his corn bread and 
 helped out his store of bear’s fat. Both the name 
 and the knowledge of the uses of this tree came 
 to the earliest pioneers through contact with the 
 red man, whose hunting bow and fishing spear and 
 the hobbles for his horses were fashioned of the 
 “pohickory”’ tree. The Indian women first made 
 pohickory butter, and the wise old men of the 
 Cherokee towns, so we are told, first applied the 
 pohickory rod to the vanity of youth! 
 
 A glance at the interior of a log cabin in the 
 Back Country of Virginia or North Carolina would 
 show, i in primitive design, what is, perhaps, after 
 all the perfect home — a place where the personal 
 life and the work life are united and where nothing 
 futile finds space. Every object in the cabin was 
 practical and had been made by hand on the spot 
 to answer a need. Besides the chairs hewn from 
 hickory blocks, there were others made of slabs 
 
+ 
 
 46 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 set on three legs. A large slab or two with four legs 
 served as a movable table;-the permanent table 
 was built against the wall, its outer edge held up 
 by two sticks. The low bed was built into, the wall 
 in the same way and softened for slumber by a 
 mattress of pine needles, chaff, ordried moss. In the 
 best light from the greased paper windowpanes 
 
 stood the spinning wheel and loom, on which the ve 
 
 housewife made cloth for the family’s garments. 
 Over the fireplace or beside the doorway, and sus- 
 pended usually on stags’ antlers, hung the fire- 
 arms and the yellow powderhorns, the latter often 
 carved in Indian fashion with scenes of the hunt 
 or war. On a shelf or on pegs were the wooden 
 spoons, plates, bowls, and noggins. Also near the 
 fireplace, which was made of large flat stones with 
 a mud-plastered log chimney, stood the grinding 
 block for making hominy. If it were an evening 
 in early spring, the men of the household would be 
 tanning and dressing deerskins to be sent out with 
 the trade caravan, while the women sewed, made 
 moccasins or mended them, in the light of pine 
 knots or candles of bear’s grease. The larger chil- 
 dren might be weaving cradles for the babies, In- 
 dian fashion, out of hickory twigs; and there would 
 surely be a sound of whetting steel, for scalping 
 
FOLKWAYS AT 
 
 knives and tomahawks must be kept keen-tem- 
 pered now that the days have come when the red 
 gods whisper their chant of war through the young 
 leafage. 
 
 ~The Back Country folk, as they came from sev- 
 eral countries, generally settled in national groups, 
 each preserving its own speech and its own re- 
 ligion, each approaching frontier life through its 
 own native temperament. And the frontier met 
 each and all alike, with the same need and the 
 same menace, and molded them after one general 
 pattern. If the cabin stood im a typical Virginian 
 settlement where the folk were of English stock, 
 it may be that the dulcimer and some old love song 
 of the homeland enlivened the work — or perhaps 
 chairs were pushed back and young people danced 
 the country dances of the homeland and the Vir- 
 ginia Reel, for these Virginian English were merry 
 folk, and their religion did not frown upon the 
 dance. Ina cabin on the Shenandoah or the upper 
 Yadkin the German tongue clicked away over the 
 evening dish of kraut or sounded more sedately in 
 a Lutheran hymn; while from some herder’s hut 
 on the lower Yadkin the wild note of the bagpipes 
 or of the ancient four-stringed harp mingled with 
 the Gaelic speech. 
 
48 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Among the homes in the Shenandoah where old 
 England’s ways prevailed, none was gayer than 
 the tavern kept by the man whom the good Mora- 
 vian Brother called “Severe.” There perhaps the 
 feasting celebrated the nuptials of John Sevier, 
 who was barely past his seventeenth birthday when 
 in moccasined feet on the puncheon flooring, was a 
 ceremonial to usher into Back Country life the new 
 municipality John had just organized, for John at 
 nineteen had taken his. earliest step towards his 
 larger career, which we shall follow.later on, as 
 the architect of the first little governments beyond 
 the mountains. 
 
 In the Boone home on the Yadkin, we may guess 
 that the talk was solely of the hunt, unless young 
 Daniel had already become possessed of his first 
 compass and was studying its ways. On such an 
 evening, while the red afterglow lingered, he might 
 be mending a passing trader’s firearms by the fires 
 of the primitive forge his father had set up near 
 the trading path running from Hillsborough to the 
 Catawba towns. /It was said by the local nim- 
 rods that none could doctor a sick rifle better than 
 young Daniel Boone, already the master huntsman 
 of them all And perhaps some trader’s tale, told 
 
FOLKWAYS. 49 
 
 when the caravan halted for the night, kindled 
 the youth’s first desire to penetrate the mountain- 
 guarded wilderness, for the tales of these Roma- 
 nies of commerce were as the very badge of 
 their free-masonry, and entry money at the doors 
 of strangers. 
 
 Out on the border’s edge, heedless of the shadow 
 of the mountains looming between the newly built 
 cabin and that western land where they and their 
 kind were to write the fame of the Ulster Scot in a 
 shining script that time cannot dull, there might 
 sit a group of stern-faced men, all deep in discussion 
 of some point of spiritual doctrine or of the tem- 
 poral rights of men. Yet, in every cabin, what- 
 ever the national differences, the setting was the 
 same Thespirit of the frontier was modeling out 
 of old clay a new Adam to answer the needs of a 
 new earth. 
 
 It would be far less than just to leave the Back 
 Country folk without further reference to the de- 
 voted labors of their clergy. In the earliest days 
 the settlers were cut off from their church systems; 
 the pious had to maintain their piety unaided, ex- 
 cept in the rare cases where a pastor accompanied 
 a group of settlers of his denomination into the 
 
 wilds. One of the first ministers who fared into 
 é i 
 
eS eT ape eee 
 
 50 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the Back Country to remind the Ulster Presby- 
 terians of their spiritual duties.was_the. Reverend 
 Hugh McAden of Philadelphia. He made long 
 itineraries under the greatest hardships, in con- 
 stant danger from Indians and wild beasts, carry- 
 ing the counsel of godliness to the far seattered 
 flock. Among the Highland settlements the Rev- 
 erend..James..Campbell for thirty years traveled 
 about, preaching each Sunday at some gathering 
 point a sermon in both English and Gaelic. A 
 little later, in the Yadkin Valley, after Craighead’s 
 day there arose a small schoo) of Presbyterian 
 ministers whose zeal and fearlessness in the 
 cause of religion and of just government had an 
 influence on the frontiersmen that can hardly be 
 overestimated. 
 
 But, in the beginning, the pioneer encountered 
 the savagery of border life, grappled with it, and 
 reacted to it without guidance from other men- 
 tor than his own instincts. His need was still the 
 primal threefold need — family, sustenance, and 
 safe sleep when the day’s work was done. We who 
 look back with thoughtful eyes upon the frontiers- 
 man — all links of contact with his racial past 
 severed, at grips with destruction in the contenting 
 of his needs— see something more, something 
 
FOLKWAYS 51 
 larger, than he saw in the log cabin raised by his 
 hands, its structure held together solely by his 
 close grooving and fitting of its own strength. 
 Though the walls he built for himself have gone 
 with his own dust back to the earth, the symbol he 
 erected for us stands. 
 
aS ar 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 THE TRADER 
 
 ’ Tue trader was the first pathfinder. His caravans 
 began the change of purpose that was to come to 
 the Indian warrior’s route, turning it slowly into 
 the beaten track of communication and commerce. 
 The settlers, the rangers, the surveyors, went west- 
 ward over the trails which he had blazed for them 
 years before. Their enduring works are com- 
 memorated in the cities and farms which today lie 
 along every ancient border line; but of their fore- 
 runner’s hazardous Indian trade nothing remains. 
 Let us therefore pay a moment’s homage here to 
 the trader, who first — to borrow a phrase from 
 Indian speech — made white for peace the red 
 trails of war. 
 
 He was the first cattleman of the Old Southwest. 
 Fifty years before John_Findlay,* one of this class 
 of pioneers, led Daniel Boone through Cumberland 
 
 The name is spelled in various ways: Findlay, Finlay, Findley. 
 52 
 
THE TRADER 53 
 
 Gap, the trader’s bands of horses roamed the west- 
 ern slopes of the Appalachian Mountains and his 
 cattle grazed among the deer on the green banks 
 of the old Cherokee (Tennessee) River. He was 
 the pioneer settler beyond the high hills; for he 
 built, in the center of the Indian towns, the first 
 white man’s cabin — with its larger annex, the trad- 
 ing house — and dwelt there during the greater part 
 of the year. He was America’s first magnate of 
 international commerce. His furs — for which he 
 paid in guns, knives, ammunition, vermilion paint, 
 mirrors, and cloth — lined kings’ mantles, and hatted 
 the Lords of Trade as they strode to their council 
 chamber in London to discuss his business and to 
 pass those regulations which might have serious- 
 ly hampered him but for his resourcefulness in 
 circumventing them! 
 
 He was the first frontier warrior, for he either 
 fought off or fell before small parties of hostile In- 
 dians who, in the interest of the Spanish or French, 
 raided his pack-horse caravans on the march. Often, 
 too, side by side with the red brothers of his adop- 
 tion, he fought in the intertribal wars. His was the 
 first educative and civilizing influence in the Indian 
 towns. He endeavored to cure the Indians of their 
 favorite midsummer madness, war, by inducing 
 
Mar Awe 
 
 54 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 them to raise stock and poultry and improve their 
 corn, squash, and pea gardens. It is not necessary 
 to impute to him philanthropic motives. He was 
 a practical man and he saw that war hurt his trade: 
 it endangered his summer caravans and hampered 
 the autumn hunt for deerskins. 
 
 In the earliest days of the eighteenth century, 
 when the colonists of Virginia and the Carolinas 
 were only a handful, it was the trader who de- 
 feated each suecessive attempt of French and Span- 
 ish agents to weld the tribes into a confederacy for 
 the annihilation of the English settlements. The 
 English trader did his share to prevent what is now 
 the United States from becoming a part of a Latin 
 empire and to save it for a race having the Anglo- 
 Saxon ideal and.speaking the English tongue. 
 
 The colonial records of the period contain items 
 which, taken singly, make small impression on the 
 casual reader but which, listed together, throw a 
 strong light on the past and bring that mercenary 
 figure, the trader, into so bold a relief that the 
 design verges on the heroic. If we wonder, for 
 instance, why the Scotch Highlanders who set- 
 tled in the wilds at the headwaters of the Cape 
 Fear River, about 1729, and were later followed 
 by Welsh and Huguenots, met with no opposition 
 
 / 
 
THE TRADER 55 
 
 from the Indians, the mystery is solved when we 
 discover, almost by accident, a few printed lines 
 which record that, in 1700, the hostile natives on 
 the Cape Fear were subdued to the English and 
 brought into friendly alliance with them by Colo- 
 nel William Bull, a trader. We read further and 
 learn that the Spaniards i in Florida had long en- 
 deavored to unite the tribes in Spanish and French 
 territory against the English and that the influ- 
 ence of traders prevented the consummation. The 
 Spaniards, in 1702, had prepared to invade English 
 territory with nine hundred Indians. ‘The plot was 
 discovered by Creek Indians and disclosed to their 
 friends, the traders, who immediately gathered 
 together five hundred warriors, marched swiftly 
 to meet the invaders, and utterly routed them. 
 Again, when the Indians, incited by the Spanish 
 at St. Augustine, rose against the English in 1715, 
 and the Yamasi Massaere occurred in South Caro- 
 lina, it was due to the traders that some of the 
 settlements at least were not wholly unprepared to 
 defend themselves. 
 
 The early English trader was generally an in- 
 telligent man; sometimes educated, nearly always 
 fearless and resourceful. He knew the one sure 
 basis on which men of alien blood and far separated 
 
nee 
 56 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 stages of moral and intellectual development can | 
 meet in understanding — namely, the truth of the 
 spoken word. He recognized honor as the bond of 
 trade and the warp and woof of human intercourse. 
 The uncorrupted savage also had his plain inter- — 
 pretation of the true word in the mouths of men, 
 and a name for it. He called it the “Old Beloved 
 Speech’’; and he gave his confidence to the man 
 who spoke this speech even in the close barter 
 for furs. 
 
 We shall find it worth while to refer to the map 
 of America as it was in the early days of the colo- 
 nial fur trade, about the beginning of the eigh- 
 ’ teenth century. A narrow strip of loosely strung 
 English settlements stretched from the north bor- 
 der of New England to the Florida line. North 
 Florida was Spanish territory. On the far distant 
 southwestern borders of the English colonies were 
 the southern possessions of France. The French 
 sphere of influence extended up the Mississippi, 
 and thence by way of rivers and the Great Lakes 
 to its base in Canada on the borders of New Eng- 
 land and New York. In South Carolina dwelt the 
 Yamasi tribe of about three thousand warriors, 
 their chief towns only sixty or eighty miles distant 
 from the Spanish town of St. Augustine. On the 
 
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THE TRADER 57 
 
 west, about the same distance northeast of New 
 Orleans, in what is now Alabama and Georgia, lay 
 the Creek nation. There French garrisons | held Mo- 
 bile and Fort Alabama. The Creeks at this time 
 numbered over four thousand warriors. The lands 
 of the Choctaws, a tribe of even larger fighting 
 strength, began two hundred miles north of New 
 Orleans and extended along the Mississippi. A 
 hundred and sixty miles northeast of the Choc- 
 taw towns were the Chickasaws, the bravest and 
 most successful warriors of all the tribes south of 
 the Iroquois. The Cherokees, in part seated within 
 the Carolinas, on the upper courses of the Savannah 
 River, mustered over six thousand men at arms. 
 East of them were the Catawba towns. North of 
 them were the Shawanoes and Delawares, in easy 
 communication with the tribes of Canada. Still 
 farther north, along the Mohawk and other rivers 
 joining with the Hudson and Lake Ontario stood 
 the “long houses” of the fiercest and most war- 
 like of all the savages, the Troquois or Six Nation: Nations. 
 The Indians along the English borders out- 
 numbered the colonists perhaps ten to one. If the 
 Spanish and the French had succeeded in the con- 
 spiracy to unite on their side all the tribes, a red 
 billow of tomahawk wielders would have engulfed 
 
58 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 and extinguished the English settlements. The 
 _ French, it is true, made allies of the Shawanoes, 
 - the Delawares, the Choctaws, and a strong fac- 
 \ tion of the Creeks; and they finally won over 
 | the Cherokees after courting them for more than 
 twenty years. But the Creeks in part, the power- 
 ful Chickasaws, and the Iroquois Confederacy, 
 or Six Nations, remained loyal to the English. In 
 both North and South it was the influence of the 
 traders—that.kept.these—red_iribes_on the Eng- 
 lish_side. The Iroquois were held loyal by Sir 
 , William Johnson and his deputy, George Croghan, 
 the “King of Traders.” The Chickasaws fol- 
 Nowed their ‘““best-beloved”’ trader, James Adair; 
 and among the Creeks another inadeel ‘Lachlan_ 
 McGillivray, wielded a potent influence. 
 Laechlan—_McGillivray was a Highlander. He 
 landed in Charleston in 1735 at the age of sixteen 
 and presently joined a trader’s caravan as pack- 
 horse boy. A few years later he married a woman 
 of the Creeks. On many occasions he defeated 
 French and Spanish plots with the Creeks for 
 the extermination of the colonists in Georgia and 
 South Carolina. His action in the final war with 
 the French (1760), when the Indian terror was 
 raging, is typical. News came that four thousand 
 
THE TRADER 59 
 
 Creek warriors, reinforced by French Choctaws, 
 were about to fall on the southern settlements. 
 At the risk of their lives, McGillivray and another 
 trader named Galphin hurried from.Charleston 
 to their trading house on the Georgiafrontier 
 Thither they invited several hundred Creek war- 
 riors, feasted and housed them for several days, 
 and finally won them from their purpose. Mc- 
 Gillivray had a brilliant son, Alexander, who about 
 this time became a chief in his mother’s nation — 
 perhaps on this very occasion, as it was an Indian 
 custom, in making a brotherhood pact, to send a 
 son to dwell in the brother’s house. We shall meet 
 that son again as the Chief of the Creeks and the 
 terrible scourge of Georgia and Tennessee in the 
 dark days of the Revolutionary War. 
 
 The bold deeds of the early traders, if all were to 
 be told, would require a book as long as the huge 
 volume written by James Adair, the “English 
 Chickasaw.” Adair was an Englishman who en- 
 tered the Indian trade in 1735 and launched upon 
 the long and dangerous trail from_Charleston 
 to the upper towns of the ‘Cherokees, situated in 
 
 _—_—_——— 
 
 the present Monroe County, Tennessee. Thus he 
 
 was one of the earliest pioneers of the Qld South- 
 west; and he was Tennessee’s first author. “I 
 _—_ ~~ 
 
as (J ae aoe ee 
 
 Wf 
 
 60 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 am well acquainted,’’ he says, “with near two 
 thousand miles of the American continent” — a 
 statement which gives one some idea of an early 
 trader’s enterprise, hardihood, and peril. Adair’s 
 ‘two thousand miles”’ were twisting Indian trails 
 and paths he slashed out for himself through un- 
 inhabited wilds, for when not engaged in trade. 
 hunting, literature, or war, it pleased him to make 
 solitary trips of exploration. These seem to have 
 led him chiefly northward through the Appalachi- 
 ans, of which he must have been one of the first 
 white explorers. 
 
 A many-sided man was James Adair — cultured, 
 for his style suffers not by comparison with other 
 writers of his day, no stranger to Latin and Greek. 
 and not ignorant of Hebrew, which he studied to 
 assist him in setting forth his ethnological theory 
 that the American Indians were the descendants 
 of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Before we dismiss 
 his theory with a smile, let us remember that he 
 had not at his disposal the data now available 
 which reveal points of likeness in custom, lan- 
 guage formation, and symbolism among almost 
 all primitive peoples. The formidable title-page 
 of his book in itself suggests an author keenly ob- 
 servant, accurate as to detail, and possessed of a 
 
THE TRADER 61 
 
 versatile and substantial mind. Most of the pages 
 were written in the towns of the Chickasaws, with 
 whom he lived “‘as a friend and brother,” but from 
 whose “natural jealousy” and “prying disposition” 
 he was obliged to conceal his papers. “Never,” 
 he assures us, “was a literary work begun and 
 carried on with more disadvantages!” 
 
 Despite these disabilities the author wrote a 
 book of absorbing interest. His intimate sym- 
 pathetic pictures_of Indian life as it was before the 
 tribes had been conquered are richly valuable to 
 the lover of native lore and to the student of the 
 history of white settlement. The author believes, 
 as he must, in the supremacy of his own race, but 
 he nevertheless presents the Indians’ side of the 
 argument as no man could who had not made 
 himself one of them. He thereby adds interest 
 to those fierce struggles which took place along 
 the border; for he shows us the red warrior not as 
 a mere brute with a tomahawk but as a human 
 creature with an ideal of his own, albeit an ideal 
 that must give place to a better. Even in view of 
 the red man’s hideous methods of battle and in- 
 human treatment of captives, we cannot ponder un- 
 moved Adair’s description of his preparations for 
 war — the fasting, the abstention from all family 
 
62 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 intercourse, and the purification rites and prayers 
 for three days in the house set apart, while the 
 women, who might not come close to their men in 
 this fateful hour, stood throughout the night till 
 dawn chanting before the door. Another poetic 
 touch the author gives us, from the Cherokee — or 
 Cheerake as he spells it — explaining that the root, 
 chee-ra, means fire. A Cherokee never extinguished 
 fire save on the occasion of a death, when he thrust 
 a burning torch into the water and said, Neetah in- 
 tahah — “‘the days appointed him were finished.” 
 The warrior slain in battle was held to have been 
 balanced by death and it was said of him that “he 
 was weighed on the path and madelight.”” Adair 
 writes that the Cherokees, until corrupted by French 
 agents and by the later class of traders who poured 
 rum among them like water, were honest, industri- 
 ous, and friendly. They were ready to meet the 
 white man with their customary phrase of good will: 
 “T shall firmly shake hands with your speech.” 
 He was intimately associated with this tribe from 
 1735 to 1744, when he diverted his activities to 
 the Chickasaws. 
 
 It was from the Cherokees’ chief town, Great 
 Telliko, in the Appalachians, that Adair explored 
 the mountains. He describes the pass through the 
 
THE TRADER 63 
 
 chain which was used by the Indians and which, 
 from his outline of it, was probably the Cumber- 
 land Gap. Herelates many incidents of the strug- 
 gle with the French — manifestations even in this 
 _ remote wilderness of the vast conflict that was be- 
 ing waged for the New World by two imperial 
 nations of the Old. 
 
 Adair undertook, at the solicitation of Gover- 
 nor Glen of South Carolina, the dangerous task of 
 opening up trade with the Choctaws, a tribe -mus- 
 tering upwards of five thousand warriors who were 
 wholly im the Frenehnierest. Their country lay 
 in what is now the State of Mississippi along the 
 great river, some seven hundred miles west and 
 southwest of Charleston. After passing the friendly 
 Creek towns the trail led on for 150 miles through 
 what was practically the enemy’s country. Adair, 
 owing to what he likes to term his “usual good 
 fortune,” reached the Choctaw country safely and 
 by his adroitness and substantial presents won the 
 friendship of the influential chief, Red Shoe, whom 
 he found in a receptive mood, owing to a French 
 agent’s breach of hospitality involving Red Shoe’s 
 favorite wife. Adair thus created a large pro- 
 English faction among the Choctaws, and his suc- 
 cess seriously impaired French prestige with all 
 
64 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the southwestern tribes. Several times French 
 Choctaws bribed to murder him, waylaid Adair on 
 the trail— twice when he was alone—only to be 
 baffled by the imperturbable self-possession and 
 alert wit which never failed him in emergencies. 
 Winning a Choctaw trade cost Adair, besides at- 
 tacks on his life, £2200, for which he was never re- 
 imbursed, notwithstanding Governor Glen’s agree- 
 ment with him. And, on his return to Charleston, 
 while the Governor was detaining him “on one 
 pretext or another,”’ he found that a new expedi- 
 tion, which the Governor was favoring for reasons 
 of his own, had set out to capture his Chickasaw, 
 trade and gather in “‘the expected great crop of 
 deerskins and beaver . . . before I could possi- 
 bly return to the Chikkasah Country.”’ Nothing 
 daunted, however, the hardy trader set out alone. 
 In the severity of winter, frost, snow, hail and heavy 
 rains succeed each other in these climes, so that I partly 
 rode and partly swam to the Chikkasah country; for not 
 expecting to stay long below [in Charleston] I took no 
 leathern canoe. Many of the broad, deep creeks . . . 
 had now overflowed their banks, ran at a rapid rate and 
 were unpassable to any but desperate people: . . . the 
 rivers and swamps were dreadful by rafts of timber 
 driving down the former and the great fallen trees 
 
 floating in the latter... . Being forced to wade deep 
 through cane swamps or woody thickets, it proved very 
 
THE TRADER 65 
 
 troublesome to keep my firearms dry on which, as a 
 second means, my life depended. 
 
 Nevertheless Adair defeated the Governor’s at- 
 tempt to steal his trade, and later on published 
 the whole story in the Charleston press and sent 
 in a statement of his claims to the Assembly, 
 with frank observations on His Excellency him- 
 self. We gather that his bold disregard of High 
 Personages set all Charleston in an uproar! 
 
 Adair is tantalizingly modest about his own 
 deeds. He devotes pages to prove that an Indian 
 rite agrees with the Book of Leviticus but only a 
 paragraph to an exploit of courage and endurance 
 such as that ride and swim for the Indian trade. 
 We have to read between the lines to find the man; 
 but he well repays the search. Briefly, cidentally, 
 he mentions that on one trip he was captured by 
 _ the French, who were so 
 
 well acquainted with the great damages I had done to 
 them and feared others I might occasion, as to confine 
 me aclose prisoner . . . in the Alebahma garrison. They 
 were fully resolved to have sent me down to Mobile or 
 New Orleans as a capital criminal to be hanged . . . 
 but I doubted not of being able to extricate myself some way 
 or other. They appointed double centries over me for 
 some days before I was to be sent down in the French 
 King’s large boat. They were strongly charged against 
 
66 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 laying down their weapons or suffering any hostile thing 
 to be in the place where I was kept, as they deemed me 
 capable of any mischief. . . . About.an hour before we 
 
 were to set off by water I eecnred from them by land. 
 I took through the middle of the low land covered. 
 with briers at full speed. I heard the French clatter- 
 ing on horseback along the path . . . and the howling 
 savages pursuing ..., but my usual good fortune 
 enabled me to leave them far enough behind. . . . 
 
 One feels that a few of the pages given up to Leviti- 
 cus might well have been devoted to a detailed 
 account of this escape from “double centries”’ and 
 a fortified garrison, and the plunge through the 
 tangled wilds, by a man without gun or knife or 
 supplies, and who for days dared not show himself 
 upon the trail. 
 
 There is too much of “my usual good fortune” 
 in Adair’s narrative; such luck as his argues for 
 extraordinary resources in the man. Sometimes 
 we discover only through one phrase on a page 
 that he must himself have been the hero of an 
 event he relates in the third person. This seems to 
 be the case in the affair of Priber, which was the 
 worst of those “‘damages”’ Adair did to the French. 
 Priber was “‘a gentleman of curious and specula- 
 tive temper ’’ sent_by the French in 1736 to Great 
 Telliko to win the Cherokees ‘to ‘their interest. 
 
THE TRADER 67 
 
 At-this time Adair was trading with the Chero- 
 kees. He relates that Priber, 
 
 more effectually to answer the design of his commission 
 .. . ate, drank, slept, danced, dressed, and painted him- 
 self with the Indians, so that it was not easy todistinguish 
 him from the natives, — he married also with them, and 
 being endued with a strong understanding and retentive 
 memory he soon learned their dialect, and by gradual 
 advances impressed them with a very ill opinion of the 
 English, representing them as fraudulent, avaritious and 
 encroaching people; he at the same time inflated the 
 artless savages with a prodigious high opinion of their 
 own importance in the Ameriean scale of power. . . . 
 Having thusinfectedthem . . . he easily formed them 
 into a nominal republican government — crowned their 
 old Archi-magus emperor after a pleasing new savage 
 form, and invented a variety of high-sounding titles 
 ' for all the members of his imperial majesty’s red court. 
 
 Priber cemented the Cherokee_empire ““by slow 
 but sure degrees to the very great danger of 
 our southern colonies.’’ His position was that of 
 Secretary of State and as such, with a studiedly 
 " provocative arrogance, he carried on correspond- 
 ence with the British authorities. The colonial 
 Government seems, on this occasion, to have 
 listened to the traders and to have realized that 
 Priber was a danger, for soldiers were sent to take 
 him prisoner. The Cherokees, however, had so 
 
 * 
 
68 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 firmly “‘shaked hands” with their Secretary’s ad- 
 mired discourse that they threatened to take the 
 warpath if their beloved man were annoyed, and 
 the soldiers went home without him — to the great 
 hurt of English prestige. The Cherokee empire 
 had now endured for five years and was about to 
 rise “into a far greater state of puissance by the 
 acquisition of the Muskohge, Chocktaw and the 
 Western Mississippi Indians,”’ when fortunately for 
 the history of British colonization in America, “an 
 accident befell the Secretary.” 
 
 It is in connection with this “‘accident” that the 
 reader suspects the modest but resourceful Adair 
 of conniving with Fate. Since the military had 
 failed and the Government dared not again employ 
 force, other means must be found; the trader pro- 
 videdthem. The Secretary with his Cherokee body- 
 guard journeyed south on his mission to the Creeks. 
 Secure, as he supposed, he lodged overnight in an 
 Indian town. But there a company of English 
 traders took him into custody, along with his bundle 
 of manuscripts presumably intended for the French 
 commandant at Fort Alabama, and handed him 
 over to the Governor of Georgia, who imprisoned 
 him and kept him out of mischief till he died. 
 
 As a Briton, Adair contributed to Priber’s fate; 
 
THE TRADER 69 
 
 and as such he approves it. Asa scholar with philo- 
 sophical and ethnological leanings, however, he de- 
 plores it, and hopes that Priber’s valuable manu- 
 scripts may ‘‘escape the despoiling hands of military 
 power.” Priber had spent his leisure in compiling 
 a Cherokee dictionary; Adair’s occupation, while 
 domiciled in his winter house in Great Telliko, was 
 the writing of his Indian Appendix to the Penta- 
 teuch. As became brothers in science, they had ex- 
 changed notes, so we gather from Adair’s references 
 to conversations and correspondence. Adair’s diffi- 
 culties as an author, however, had been increased 
 by a treacherous lapse from professional etiquette 
 on the part of the Secretary: “He told them [the 
 Indians] that in the very same manner as he was 
 their great Secretary, I was the devil’s clerk, or an 
 accursed one who marked on paper the bad speech 
 of the evil ones of darkness.” On his own part 
 Adair admits that his object in this correspondence 
 was to trap the Secretary into something more seri- 
 ous than literary errata. That is, he admits it by im- 
 plication; he says the Secretary “feared” it. During 
 the years of their duel, Adair apparently knew 
 that the scholarly compiler of the Cherokee dic- 
 tionary was secretly inciting members of this par- 
 ticular Lost Tribe to tomahawk the discoverer of 
 
-r 
 
 70 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 their biblical origin; and Priber, it would seem, 
 knew that he knew! 
 
 Adair shows, inferentially, that land encroach- 
 ment was not the sole cause of those Indian wars 
 with which we shall deal in a later chapter. The 
 earliest causes were the instigations of the French 
 and the rewards which they offered for English 
 scalps. But equally provocative of Indian ran- 
 cor were the acts of sometimes merely stupid, 
 sometimes dishonest, officials; the worst of these, 
 Adair considered, was the cheapening of the trade 
 through the granting of general licenses. 
 
 Formerly each trader had a license for two [Indian] towns. 
 . . . At my first setting out among them, a number of 
 traders . . . journeyed through our various nations in 
 different companies and were generally men of worth; of 
 course they would have a living price for their goods, 
 which they carried on horseback to the remote Indian 
 countries at very great expences. . . . [The Indians] 
 were kept under proper restraint, were easy in their 
 minds and peaceable on account of the plain, honest 
 lessons daily inculcated on them . . . but according to 
 the present unwise plan, two and even three Arablike 
 peddlars sculk about in one of those villages . . . who 
 are generally the dregs and off-scourings of our climes 
 . . . by inebriating the Indians with their nominally 
 prohibited and poisoning spirits, they purchase the 
 necessaries of life at four and five hundred per cent 
 
THE TRADER 71 
 
 cheaper than the orderly traders. . . . Instead of show- 
 ing good examples of moral conduct, beside the other 
 part of life, they instruct the unknowing and imitat- 
 ing savages in many diabolical lessons of obscenity 
 and blasphemy. 
 
 In these statements, contemporary records bear 
 him out. There is no sadder reading than the 
 many pleas addressed by the Indian chiefs to vari- 
 ous officials to stop-the importation of-hquor-into ~ 
 their country, alleging the debauchment of their 
 young men and warning the white man, with whom 
 they desired to be friends, that in an Indian drink 
 and blood lust quickly combined. 
 
 Adair’s book was published-in—London in 1775. 
 He wrote it to be read by Englishmen as well as 
 Americans; and some of his reflections on liberty, 
 justice, and Anglo-Saxon unity would not sound un- 
 worthily today. His sympathies were with “the 
 principles of our Magna Charta Americana”; but 
 he thought ‘the threatened division of the Eng- 
 lish-speaking peoples the greatest evil that could 
 befall civilization. His voluminous work discloses 
 a man not only of wide mental outlook but a prac- 
 tical man with a sense of commercial values. Yet, 
 instead of making a career for himself among his 
 own caste, he made his home for over thirty years 
 
72 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 in the Chickasaw towns; and it is plain that, with 
 the exception of some of his older brother traders, 
 he preferred the Chickasaw to any other society. 
 The complete explanation of such men as Adair 
 we need not expect to find stated anywhere — not 
 even in and between the lines of his book. The 
 conventionalist would seek it in moral obliquity; 
 the radical, in a temperament that is irked by the 
 superficialities that comprise so large a part of 
 conventional standards. The reason for his being 
 what he was is almost the only thing Adair did not 
 analyze in his book. Perhaps, to him, it was self- 
 evident. We may let it be so to us, and see it most 
 clearly presented in a picture composed from some 
 of his brief sketches: A land of grass and green 
 shade inset with bright waters, where deer and 
 domestic cattle herded together along the banks; 
 a circling group of houses, their white-clayed walls 
 sparkling under the sun’s rays, and, within and 
 without, the movement of “a friendly and saga- 
 cious people,” who “‘kindly treated and watch- 
 fully guarded” their white brother in peace and 
 war, and who conversed daily with him in the 
 Old Beloved Speech learned first of Nature. “Like 
 towers in cities beyond the common size of those 
 of the Indians” rose the winter and summer houses 
 
THE TRADER 73 
 
 _and.the-huge-trading house which the tribe had 
 built. for their best beloved friend in the town’s 
 “center, because there he would be safest from at- 
 tack. On the rafters hung the smoked and bar- 
 becued delicacies taken in the hunt and prepared 
 for him by his red servants, who were also his com- 
 rades at home and on the dangerous trail. “Be- 
 loved old women” kept an eye on his small sons, 
 put to drowse on panther skins so that they might 
 grow up brave warriors. Nothing was there of 
 artifice or pretense, only “the needful things to 
 make a reasonable life happy.” All was as primi- 
 tive, naive, and contented as the woman whose 
 outline is given once in a few strokes, proudly and 
 gayly penciled: “I have the pleasure of writing 
 this by the side of a Chikkasah female, as great a 
 princess as ever lived among the ancient Peruvians 
 or Mexicans, and she bids me be sure not to mark 
 the paper wrong after the manner of most of the 
 traders; otherwise it will spoil the making good 
 bread or homony!” 
 
 His final chapter is the last news of James Adair, 
 type of the earliest trader. Did his bold attacks 
 on corrupt officials and rum peddlers — made pub- 
 licly before Assemblies and in -print — raise for 
 him a dense cloud of enmity that dropped oblivion 
 
/ 
 
 74 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 on his memory? Perhaps. But, in truth, his own 
 book is all the history of him we need. It is the 
 record of a man. He lived a full life and served 
 his day; and it matters not that a mist envelops 
 the place where unafraid he met the Last Enemy, 
 was ‘‘ weighed on the path and made light.” 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 
 
 | Tue great pile of ge aoe peaks was not 
 _ the only barrier which held back the settler with 
 his plough and his rifle from following the trader’s 
 tinkling carayans into the valleys beyond. Over 
 the hills OR The 
 frontiersman had already felt their enmity through 
 the.torch and tomahawk of their savage allies. 
 By his own strength alone he could not cope with 
 the power entrenched beyond the hills; so he halted. 
 But that power, by its unachievable desire to be 
 overlord of two hemispheres, was itself to precipitate 
 events which would open the westward road. 
 
 The recurring hour in the cycle of history, when 
 the issue of Autocracy against Democracy cleaves 
 the world, struck for the men of the eighteenth 
 century as the second half of that century dawned. 
 In our own day, happily, that issue has been 
 
 perceived by the rank and file of the people. In 
 15 
 
76 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 those darker days, as France and England grap- 
 pled in that conflict of systems which culminated 
 in the Seven Years’ War, the fundamental prin- 
 ciples at stake were clear to only a handful of 
 thinking men. 
 
 But abstractions, whether clear or obscure, do 
 not cause ambassadors to demand their passports. 
 The declaration of war awaits the overt act. Be- 
 hold, then, how great a matter is kindled by a little 
 fire! The casus.belli between France and England 
 in theSeven Years’ War — the war which humbled 
 France in Europe and lost her India and Canada — 
 
 had to do with a_smallteg-fort built by a few Vir- 
 ginians in 1754 at the Fo orks ‘s of the Ohio-River and 
 
 wrested from them in the § same year by a company 
 of Frenchmen from Canada. bin 
 
 The French claimed the valley of the Qhio.as their 
 territory;.the English claimed it as theirs. The dis- 
 pute was of long standing. ‘The French claim was 
 based on discovery; the English claim, on the sea- 
 to-sea_charters of Virginia and other colonies and 
 on treaties withthe Six?Nations. The French 
 refused to“admit the right of the Six Nations 
 to dispose of the territory. The English were 
 inclined to maintain the validity of their treaties 
 with the Indians. Especially was Virginia so 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 77 
 
 inclined, for a large share of the Ohio lay within her 
 chartered domain. 
 
 The quarrel had entered its acute phase in 1749, 
 when both the rival claimants took action to assert 
 
 their sovereignty. The Governor of Canada sent 
 an enyoy, éloron inwvi ith soldiers, to 
 
 take formal possession of the Ohio for the King of 
 
 ait a 
 
 France. In the same year the English organized, 
 tion of the same country; and summoned Chris- 
 topher Gist, explorer, trader, and guide, from his 
 home on the Y adkin and dispatched him to survey 
 the land. | 
 
 Then appeared on the scene that extraordinary 
 man, Robert Dinwiddie, Lieutenant Governor of 
 Virginia, erstwhile citizen of Glasgow. His “corre- 
 spondence from Virginia during his seven ‘years’ 
 tenure of office (1751-58) depicts the man with a 
 vividness surpassing paint. He was as honest as 
 the day — as honest as he was fearless and fussy. 
 But he had no patience; he wanted things done 
 and done at once, and his way was the way to do 
 them. People who did not think as he thought 
 didn’t think at all. On this drastic premise he 
 went to work. There was of course continuous 
 
 friction betw: i the House of Burgesses. 
 
78 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Dinwiddie had all a Scot’s native talent for sar- 
 casm. His letters, his addresses, perhaps in par- 
 ticular his addresses to the House, bristled with 
 satirical thrusts at his opponents. If he had spelled 
 out in full all the words he was so eager to write, 
 he would have been obliged to lessen his output; 
 so he used a shorthand system of his own, peculiar 
 enough to be remarkable even though abbrevia- 
 tions were the rule in that day. Even the dignity 
 of Kings he sacrificed to speed, and we find “His 
 Majesty” abbreviated to ““H M’y”’; yet a smaller 
 luminary known as “His Honor” fares better, 
 losing only the last letter — “‘His Hono.” “Ho.” 
 stands for “house” and “‘yt” for “that,” “what,” 
 “it,” and “anything else,” as convenient. Many 
 of his letters wind up with “I am ve’y much 
 fatig’d.”” We know that he must have been! 
 
 It was a formidable task that confronted Din- 
 widdie — inthe ee Chris- 
 topher Gist returned in 175], having surveyed the 
 valley for the Ohio Company as far as the Scioto 
 and Miami rivers, and in the following year the 
 survey was ratified by the Indians. The Com- 
 pany’s men were busy blazing trails through the 
 territory and building fortified posts. But the 
 French dominated the territory. They had built 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 79 
 
 and occupied with troops Fort Le Beeuf on French 
 Creek, a stream flowing into_the Allegheny. We 
 may imagine Dinwiddie’s rage at this violation of 
 British soil by French soldiers and how he must 
 have sputtered to the young George Washington, 
 when he summoned that officer and made him the 
 bearer of a letter to the French commander at 
 Fort Le Bocuf, 1 to demand that French troops be 
 at once withdrawn from the Ohio. 
 
 Washington made the journey to Fort Le Beeuf_ 
 in December, 1753, but the mission of course 
 proved fruitless. Dinwiddie then wrote to London 
 urging that a force be sent over to help the colo- 
 nies maintain their rights and, under orders from 
 the Crown, suggested by himself, he wrote to the 
 governors of all the other colonies to join with Vir- 
 ginia in raising troops to settle the ownership of 
 the disputed territory. From Governor Dobbs 
 of North Carolina he received an immediate re- 
 sponse. By means of logic, sarcasm, and the entire 
 force of his prerogatives, Dinwiddie secured from 
 his own balking Assembly £10,000 with which to 
 raise troops. From Maryland he obtained nothing. 
 
 There were three prominent Marylanders in the 
 
 Ohio Company, but — or because of this — the 
 Maryland Assembly voted-down the-measure for 
 
"6 4 
 | Bei” 
 
 80 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 a military appropriation. On June 18, 1754, Din- 
 widdie wrote, with unusually full spelling for him: 
 
 I am perswaded had His Majesty’s Com’ds to the other 
 Colonies been duely obey’d, and the necessary Assist- 
 ance given by them, the Fr. wou’d have long ago have 
 been oblig’d entirely to have evacuated their usurp’d 
 Possession of the King’s Lands, instead of w’ch they 
 are daily becoming more formidable, whilst every Gov’t 
 except No. Caro. has amus’d me with Expectations 
 that have proved fruitless, and at length refuse to give 
 any Supply, unless in such a manner as must render it 
 ineffectual. 
 
 This saddened mood with its deliberate penman- 
 ship did not last long. Presently Dinwiddie was 
 making a Round Robin of himself in another series 
 of letters to Governors, Councilors, and Assembly- 
 men, frantically beseeching them for “H. M’y’s 
 hono.”’ and their own, and, if not, for ““post’r’ty,” 
 to rise against the cruel French whose Indians were 
 harrying the borders again and “Basely, like Vir- 
 min, stealing and carrying off the helpless infant” 
 —as nice a simile, by the way, as any Sheridan 
 ever put into the mouth of Mrs. Malaprop. 
 Dinwiddie saw his desires thwarted on every 
 hand by the selfish spirit of localism and jealousy 
 which was more rife in America in those days than 
 itis today. Though the phrase “capitalistic war” 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 81 
 
 had not yet been coined, the great issues of English 
 civilization on this continent were befogged, for the 
 majority in the colonies, by the trivial fact that 
 the shareholders in the Ohio Company stood to win 
 by a vigorous prosecution of the war and to lose if 
 it were not prosecuted at all. The irascible Gover- 
 nor, however, proceeded with such men and means 
 as he could obtain. 
 
 And now in the summer of 1754 came the “overt 
 act” which precipitated the inevitable war. The 
 key to the valley of the Ohio.was.the tongue of — 
 land at the Forks, where the Allegheny and the 
 Monongahela join their waters in the Beautiful 
 
 iver. This site — today Pittsburgh — if occu- 
 pied and held by eiihertnation? would give that 
 nation the command of the Ohio. Occupied it was 
 for a brief hour by a small party.of Virginians, un- 
 der Captain William Trent; but no sooner had they 
 erected on the spot a crude fort than the French 
 descended upon them. What happened then all 
 the world knows: how the French built on the cap- 
 tured site their great Fort Duquesne; how George 
 Washington with an armed force, sent by Din- 
 widdie to recapture the place, encountered French 
 and Indians at Great Meadows and _buil t 
 Necessity, which he was compelled to surrender; 
 
 6 
 
82 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 how in the next year (1755) General Braddock ar- 
 
 rived from across the sea and set out to take Fort. 
 Duquesne, only to meet on the way the disaster 
 called “‘Braddock’s Defeat’; and how, before 
 another year had passed, the Seven] Years’ War 
 was raging in Europe, and England was allied 
 with the enemies of France. — 
 
 From the midst of the debacle of Braddock’s 
 defeat rises the figure of the young Washington. 
 Twenty-three he was then, tall and spare and hard- 
 bodied from a life spent largely in the open. When 
 Braddock fell, this Washington appeared. Reck- 
 less of the enemy’s bullets, which spanged about 
 him and pierced his clothes, he dashed up and down 
 the lines in an effort to rally the panic-stricken 
 redcoats. He was too late to save the day, but 
 not to save a remnant of the army and bring out 
 his own Virginians in good order. Whether among 
 the stay-at-homes and voters of credits there were 
 some who would have ascribed Washington’s con- 
 duct on that day to the fact that his brothers 
 were large shareholders in the Ohio Company and 
 that Fort Duquesne was their personal property or 
 *‘ private interest,” history does not say. We may 
 suppose so. 
 
 North Carolina, the one colony which had not 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 83 
 
 “‘amus’d”’ the Governor of Virginia “with Expec- 
 tations that proved fruitless,”’ had voted £12,000 
 for the war and had raised two companies of troops. 
 One of these, under Edward Brice Dobbs;- son of 
 Governor Dobbs, marched with Braddock; and in 
 that company as wagoner went Daniel Boone, 
 then in his twenty-second year. Of Boone’s part 
 in Braddock’s campaign nothing more is recorded 
 
 _save that on the march he made friends with John 
 
 Findlay, the trader, his future guide into Ken-. 
 tucky; and that, on the day of the defeat, when his 
 wagons were surrounded, he escaped by slashing 
 the harness, leaping on the back of one of his horses, 
 and dashing into the forest. 
 
 Meanwhile the southern tribes along the border 
 were comparatively quiet. That they well knew 
 a colossal struggle between the two white races 
 was pending and were predisposed to ally them- 
 selves with the stronger is not to be doubted. 
 French influence had long been sifting through 
 the formidable Cherokee nation, which still, how- 
 ever, held true in the main to its treaties with the 
 English. It was the policy of the Governors of 
 Virginia and North Carolina to induce the Chero- 
 kees to enter strongly into the war as allies of the 
 
84 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 English. Their efforts came to nothing chiefly be- 
 cause of the purely local and suieidal Indian .poliey 
 of Governor-Glen.of-Seuth-Garoelina. There had 
 been some dispute between Glen and Dinwiddie 
 as to the right of Virginia to trade with the Chero- 
 kees; and Glen had sent to the tribes letters cal- 
 culated to sow distrust of all other aspirants for 
 Indian favor, even promising that certain settlers 
 in the Back Country of North Carolina should be 
 removed and their holdings restored to the Indians. 
 These letters caused great indignation in North 
 Carolina, when they came to light, and had the 
 worst possible effect upon Indian relations. The 
 Indians now inclined their ear to the French who, 
 though fewer than the English, were at least united 
 in purpose. 
 
 Governor Glen took this inauspicious moment to 
 hold high festival with the Cherokees. It was the 
 last year of his administration and apparently he 
 hoped to win promotion to some higher post by 
 showing his achievements for the fur trade and in 
 the matter of new land acquired. He plied the 
 Cherokees with drink and induced them to make 
 formal submission and to cede all their lands to the 
 Crown. When the chiefs recovered their sobriety, 
 they were filled with rage at what had been done, 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 85 
 
 and they remembered how the French had told 
 them that the English intended to make slaves of 
 
 ll the Indians and to steal their lands. The situa- 
 tion was complicated by another incident. Sev- 
 eral Cherokee warriors returning from the Ohio, 
 whither they had gone to fight for the British, were 
 
 ain by frontiersmen. The tribe, in accordance 
 with existing agreements, applied to Virginia for 
 redress — but received none. 
 
 There was thus plenty of powder for an explosion. 
 Governor.Lyttleton, Glen’s successor, at last flung 
 the torch into the magazine. He seized, as hos- 
 tages, a number of friendly chiefs who were coming 
 to Charleston to offer tokens of good will and 
 forced them to march under guard on a military 
 tour which the Governor was making (1759) with 
 intent to overawe the savages. When this expedi- 
 tion reached Prince George, on the upper waters 
 of the Savannah, the Indian hostages were con- 
 fined within the fort; and | the Governor, satisfied 
 with the result of his maneuver departed s south or 
 Charleston. Then followed a tragedy. Some In- 
 dian friends of the imprisoned chiefs attacked the 
 fort, and the commander, a popular young officer, 
 was treacherously killed during a parley. The in- 
 furiated frontiersmen within the fort fell upon the 
 
86 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 hostages and slew them all — twenty-six chiefs — 
 and the Indian war was on. 
 
 If all were to be told of the struggle which fol- 
 lowed in the Back Country, the story could not be 
 contained in this book. Many brave and resourceful 
 men went out against the savages. We can afford 
 - a ele oa: at one of them. © Hugh Wad- 
 ie anes fighters i in that war, He was a young 
 Ulsterman from County Down, a born soldier, with 
 a special genius for fighting Indians, although he did 
 not grow up on the border, for he arrived in North 
 Carolina in 1753, at the age of nineteen. He was 
 appointed by Governor Dobbs to command the 
 second company which North Carolina had raised 
 for the war, a force of 450 rangers to protect the bor- 
 der counties; and he presently became the most con- 
 spicuous military figure in the colony. As to his 
 personality, we have only a few meager details, with 
 a portrait that suggests plainly enough those quali- 
 ties of boldness and craft which characterized his 
 tactics. Governor Dobbs appears to have had a spe- 
 cial love towards Hugh, whose family he had known 
 in Ireland, for an undercurrent of almost fatherly 
 pride is to be found in the old Governor’s reports to 
 the Assembly concerning Waddell’s exploits. 
 
THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 87 
 
 The terror raged for nearly three years. Cabins 
 and fields were burned, and women and children 
 were slaughtered or dragged away captives. Not 
 only did immigration cease but many hardy settlers 
 fled from the country. At length, after horrors 
 indescribable and great toll of life, the Cherokees 
 gave up the struggle. heir towns were invaded 
 and laid waste by imperial and colonial troops, and 
 they could do nothing but make peace. In 1761 
 they signed a treaty with the English to hold 
 ‘while rivers flow and grasses grow and sun and 
 moon endure.”’ 
 
 In the previous year (1760) the imperial war 
 had run its course in America. New France lay 
 prostrate, and the English were supreme not only 
 on the Ohio but on the St. Lawrence and the 
 Great Lakes. Louisbourg, Quebec, Montreal, Os- 
 wego, Niagara, Duquesne, Detroit — all. were in 
 English hands. 
 
 (Hugh Waddell and his rangers, besides serving 
 with distinction in the Indian war, had taken 
 part in the capture of Fort Duquesne! This feat 
 had been accomplished in 1 1758 by an expedition 
 under General Forbes. The troops made a terri- 
 ble march over a new route, cutting a road as they 
 
88 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 went. It was November when they approached 
 their objective. The wastes of snow and their 
 diminished supplies caused such depression among 
 the men that the officers called a halt to discuss 
 whether or not to proceed toward Fort Duquesne, 
 where they believed the French to be concentrated 
 inforce. Extravagant sums in guineas were named 
 as suitable reward for any man who would stalk 
 and catch a French Indian and learn from him the 
 real conditions inside the fort. The honor, if not 
 the guineas, fell to John Rogers, one of Waddell’s 
 rangers. From the Indian it was learned that the 
 French had already gone, leaving behind only a 
 few of their number. As the English drew near, 
 they found that the garrison had blown up the 
 magazine, set fire to the fort, and made off. 
 
 Thus, while New France was already tottering, 
 but nearly two years before the final capitulation at 
 
 Qhio Company, — masters.of the Forks ofthe 
 
 Ghio. This time they were there to stay. Where 
 
 the walls of Fort Duquesne had crumbled in the fire 
 
 Fort_Pitt was_to_rise, proudly bearing the name 
 
 of England’s Great_Commoner who had directed 
 TTS Ci, ; 
 
 English arms to victory on three continents. 
 With France expelled and the Indians deprived 
 
\ 
 
 THE PASSING OF THE FRENCH PERIL 89 
 
 of their white allies, the westward path lay open 
 to the pioneers, even though the red man himself 
 would rise again and again in vain endeavor to bar 
 the way. So a new era begins, the era of explora- 
 tion for definite purpose, the era of commonwealth 
 building. In entering on it, we part with the ear- 
 liest pioneer — the trader, who first opened the 
 road for both the lone home seeker and the great 
 land company. He dwindles now to the mere 
 barterer and so — save for a few chance glimpses 
 — slips out of sight, for his brave days as Imperial 
 Scout are done. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 BOONE, THE WANDERER 
 
 Wuart thoughts filled Daniel Boone’s mind as he 
 was returning from Braddock’s disastrous cam- 
 paign in 1755 we may oak conjecture. Perhaps 
 he was planning a career of ‘soldiering, for i in later 
 years he was to distinguish “himself as 2 frontier 
 commander in both defense and attack. Or it may 
 
 be that his heart was full ‘of f thé wondrous tales told 
 him by the trader, John-Findlay, of that Hunter’s 
 Canaan, Kentucky, where buffalo and deer roamed 
 
 in thousands. Perhaps he meant to set out ere long 
 in search of the great adventure of his dreams, de- 
 spite the terrible dangers of trail making across 
 the zones of war into the unknown. 
 
 However that may be, Boone straightway fol- 
 lowed neither of these possible plans on his return 
 to the Yadkin but halted for a different adventure. 
 There, a rifle shot’s distance from his threshold, 
 
 was offered him the oldest and sweetest of all 
 90 
 
BOONE, THE a= 91 
 
 hazards to the daring. He was twenty -two, strong, 
 and comely and a whole man; and therefore he 
 was in no mind to refuse what life held out to him 
 in the person of Rebecca Bryan. Rebecca was 
 the daughter of Joseph Bryan, who had come to the 
 Yadkin | from. Pennsylvania some time before the 
 Boones: and she was in her seventeenth year. 
 
 Writers of an earlier and more sentimental 
 period than ours have endeavored to supply, from 
 the saccharine stores of their fancy, the romantic 
 episodes connected with Boone’s wooing which his- 
 tory has omitted to record. Hence the tale that 
 the young hunter, walking abroad in the spring 
 gloaming, saw Mistress Rebecca’s large dark eyes 
 shining in the dusk of the forest, mistook them fora 
 deer’s eyes and shot ~ his aim on this occasion 
 fortunately being bad!) But if Boone’s rifle was 
 missing its mark at ten paces, Cupid’s dart was 
 speeding home. So runs the story concocted a hun- 
 dred years later by some gentle scribe ignorant alike 
 of game seasons, the habits of hunters, and the way 
 of a man with a maid in a primitive world. 
 
 Daniel and Rebecca were married in the spring 
 of 1756. Squire Boone, in his capacity as justice 
 of the peace, tied the knot; and in a small cabin 
 built upon his spacious lands the young couple 
 
92 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 set up housekeeping. Here Daniel’s first two sons 
 were born. In the third year of his marriage, when 
 the second child was a babe in arms, Daniel re- 
 moved with his wife and their young and precious 
 family to Calpener: County in eastern Virginia, for 
 the border was going through its darkest days of 
 the French and Indian War. During the next two 
 or three years we find him in Virginia engaged 
 as a wagoner, hauling tobacco in season; but back 
 on the border with his rifle, after the harvest, 
 aiding in defense against the Indians. In 1759 he 
 purchased from his father alot on Sugar Tree Creek, 
 atributary of Dutchman’s C Creek (Dayie County, 
 North. Carolina) 2 and built th thereon a cabin for him- 
 self. The date when he brought his wife and chil- 
 dren to live in their new abode on the border is 
 not recorded. It was probably some time after 
 the close of the Indian War. Of Boone himself 
 during these years we have but scant informa- 
 tion. We hear of him again in Virginia and also as 
 a member of the pack-horse caravan which brought 
 into the Back Country the various necessaries for 
 the settlers. We know, too, that in the fall of 1760 
 he was on a lone hunting trip in th the mountains 
 west of the Yadkin; for until a few. years ago 
 there might be. seen, still standing on the banks 
 
BOONE, THE WANDERER 93 
 
 of Boone’s Creek (a small tributary of the-Wa- 
 tauga) in-eastern Tennessee, a tree bearing the leg- 
 end, “D Boon cilled A BAR on this tree 1760.” 
 Boone was always fond of carving his exploits 
 on trees, and his wanderings have been traced 
 largely by his arboreal publications. In the next 
 year (1761) he went with Waddell’s rangers when 
 they marched with the army to_the final-subjuga-. 
 tion of the Cherokee. 
 
 That Boone and his family were back on the 
 border in the new cabin shortly after the end of the 
 war, we gather from the fact that in 1764 he took 
 his little son James, aged seven, on one of his long 
 hunting excursions. From this time dates the in- 
 timate comradeship of father and son through all 
 the perils of the wilderness, a comradeship to come 
 to its tragic end ten years later when, as we shall 
 see, the seventeen-year-old lad fell under the red 
 man’s_temahawk.as his father was leading the 
 
 first settlers towards Kentucky. In the cold nights 
 of i sGoarcmp a. T Daniel and James lay under 
 
 the frosty stars, the father kept the boy warm snug- 
 gled to his breast under the broad flap of his hunting 
 shirt. Sometimes the two were away from home for 
 months together, and Daniel declared little James 
 to be as good a woodsmap as his father. 
 
94 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Meanwhile fascinating accounts of the new land 
 of Florida, ceded to Britain by..the.Dreaty..of-Paris 
 in.1763, had leaked into the Back Country; and in 
 the winter of 1765 Boone set off southward on 
 horseback with seven companions. mes 
 Grant; with whose army Bagne had fought in 1761, 
 had been appointed Governor of the new colony 
 and was offering generous inducements to settlers. 
 The party traveled along the borders of South 
 Carolina_and Georgia. No doubt they made the 
 greater part of their way over the old Traders’ 
 Trace, the “whitened”? warpath; and they suf- 
 fered severe hardships. Game became scarcer as 
 they proceeded. Once they were nigh to perishing 
 of starvation and were saved from that fate only 
 through chance meeting with a band of Indians who, | 
 seeing their plight, made camp. and shared their 
 food with them — according to the Indian code in 
 time of peace. 
 
 Boone's party explored 1 Florida from St. Augus- 
 
 tine to Pensacola, a ‘and nd_Daniel be became sufficiently © 
 enamored.-of_the- tropical south to p u rchase th et 
 land and_a_ house. His wife, however, was unwill- ; 
 ing to go to Florida, and she was not long in con- 
 vincing the hunter that he would soon tire of a 
 gameless country. A gameless country! Perhaps 
 
BOONE, THE WANDERER 95 
 
 this was the very thought which turned the wan- 
 derer’s desires again towards the land of Kentucky.* 
 The silencing of the enemy’s whisper in the Chero- 
 _ kee camps had opened the border forests once more 
 
 to the nomadic rifleman. Boone was not alonein the 
 
 desire to seek out what lay beyond. His brother-in- 
 
 law, John Stewart, and a nephew by marriage, Ben-. 
 
 jamin Cutbirth, or Cutbird, with two other young 
 ’ men, John Baker and James Ward, in 1766 crossed 
 _ the Appalachian Mo ins, probably by stumbling 
 upon the Indian trail winding from base to summit 
 and from peak to base again over this part of the 
 great hill barrier. They eventually reached the Mis- 
 sissippi River and, having taken a good quantity of 
 peltry on the way, they launched upon the stream 
 
 ; 
 
 Se =o — —_ 
 
 and came in time to New Orleans, where they made 
 enn 
 _ a satisfactory trade of their furs. 
 
 Boone was fired anew by descriptions of this 
 successful feat; in which two of his kmsmen had 
 _ participated. He could no longer be held back. 
 
 He must find the magic door that led through the 
 
 . eee ee oe — Kentucky, 
 with its green prairies where the _buffalo-and.deer _ 
 t Kentucky, from Ken-ta-ke, an Iroquois word meaning “the place 
 of old fields.” Adair calls the territory “the old fields.””. The Indians 
 apparently used the word “old,” as we do, in a sense of endearment 
 and possession as well as relative to age. 
 
96 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 were as “‘ten thousand thousand cattle feeding”’ in 
 the wilds, and where the balmy air vibrated with 
 the music of innumerable wings. 
 
 Accordingly, in the autumn of 1767, Boone began 
 his quest of the delectable country in the company 
 of his friend, William Hill, who had been with him 
 in Florida. Autumn was the season of departure on 
 all forest excursions, because by that time the sum- 
 mer crops had been gathered in and the day of the 
 deer had come. By hunting, the explorers must 
 feed themselves on their travels and with deerskins 
 and furs they must on their return recompense 
 those who had supplied their outfit. Boone, the 
 incessant but not always lucky wanderer, was in 
 these years ever in debt for an outfit. 
 
 ‘< Booneand-Hill made their way over the Blue 
 Ridge and the Alleghanies and crossed the Holston 
 and Clinch rivers. Then they came upon the west 
 
 "fork of the Big Sandy and, believing that it would 
 lead them to the Ohio, they continued for at least a 
 hundred miles to the westward. Here they found 
 a buffalo trace, one of the many beaten out by 
 the herds in their passage to the salt springs, and 
 they followed it into what is now Floyd County in 
 eastern Kentucky. But this was not the prairie 
 land described by Findlay; it was rough and hilly 
 
_ BOONE, THE WANDERER 97 
 
 and so overgrown with laurel as to be almost 
 impenetrable. They therefore wended their way 
 back towards the river, doubtless erected the usual 
 hunter’s camp of skins or blankets and branches, 
 and spent the winter in hunting and trapping. 
 Spring found them returning to their homes on the 
 Yadkin with a fair winter’s haul. 
 
 Such urgent desire as Boone’s, however, was not 
 to be defeated. The next year brought him his 
 great opportunity. John Findlay came to the Yad- 
 kin with a horse pack of needles and linen and, 
 
 er’s wares to tempt the slim purses of the 
 
 Back Country folk. The two erstwhile comrades 
 in arms were overjoyed to encounter each other 
 again, and Findlay spent the winter of 1768-69 in 
 Boone’s cabin. While the snow lay deep outside 
 and good-smelling logs crackled on the hearth, 
 they planned an expedition into Kentucky through 
 the Gap where Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky. 
 touch one another, which F indlay - felt _confident he 
 could find. Findlay “had learned of this route from 
 cross-mountain traders in 1753, when he had de- 
 scended the Ohio to the site of Louisville, whence 
 he had gone with some Shawanoes as a prisoner to 
 their town of Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki or Blue Licks." 
 1 Hanna, The Wilderness Trail, vol. 11, pp. 215-16. 
 
 % 
 
98 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 On the first day of May, 1769, Boone and 
 Findlay, accompanied by John Stewart and three 
 other venturesome spirits, Joseph. Holden, James 
 Mooney, and William—Cooley, took horse for the 
 fabled land. Passing through the Cumberland 
 Gap, they built their first camp in Kentucky on 
 the Red Lick fork of Station Camp Creek. 
 
 This camp was their base of operations. From 
 it, usually in couples, we infer, the explorers 
 branched out to hunt and to take their observa- 
 tions of the country. Here also they prepared the 
 deer and buffalo meat for the winter, dried or 
 smoked the geese they shot in superabundance, 
 made the tallow and oil needed to keep their 
 weapons in trim, their leather soft, and their kits 
 waterproof. Their first ill luck befell them in De- 
 cember when Boone and Stewart were captured 
 
 _by. a band_of anoes who were returning from 
 their autumn hunt on iver. The Indians 
 
 compelled the two white men to show them the 
 location of their camp, took possession of all it 
 contained in skins and furs and also helped them- 
 selves to the horses. They left the explorers with 
 just enough meat and ammunition to provide for 
 their journey homeward, and told them to depart 
 and not to intrude again on the red men’s hunting 
 
BOONE, THE WANDERER 99 
 
 grounds. Having given this pointed warning, the 
 Shawanoes rode on northward towards their towns 
 beyond the Ohio. On foot, swiftly and craftily, 
 Boone and his brother-in-law trailed the band for 
 two days. They came upon the camp in dead of 
 night, recaptured their horses, and fled. But this 
 was a game in which the Indians themselves ex- 
 celled, and at this date the Shawanoes had an ad- 
 -vantage over Boone in their thorough knowledge 
 of the territory; so that within forty-eight hours 
 the white men were once more prisoners. After 
 they had amused themselves by making Boone 
 caper about with a horse bell on his neck, while 
 they jeered at him in broken English, “Steal horse, 
 eh?” the Shawanoes turned north again, this 
 time taking the two unfortunate hunters withthem. 
 Boone and Stewart escaped, one day on the march, 
 by a plunge into the thick tall canebrake. Though 
 the Indians did not attempt to follow them through 
 the mazes of the cane, the situation of the two 
 hunters, without weapons or food, was serious 
 enough. When they found Station Camp deserted 
 and realized that their four companions had given 
 them up for dead or lost and had set off on the trail 
 for home, even such intrepid souls as theirs may 
 have felt fear. They raced on in pursuit and 
 
100 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 fortunately fell in not only with their party but 
 with Squire Boone, Daniel’s brother, and Alexander 
 Neely, who had brought in fresh supplies of rifles, 
 ammunition, flour, and horses. 
 
 After this lucky encounter the group separated. 
 Findlay was ill, and Holden, Mooney, and Cooley 
 had had their fill of Kentucky; but Squire, Neely, 
 Stewart, and Daniel were ready for more adven- 
 tures. Daniel, too, felt under the positive neces- 
 sity of putting in another year at hunting and 
 trapping in order to discharge his debts and provide 
 for his family. Near the mouth | of Red River the 
 new party built their-station.camp. Here, in idle 
 hours, Neely read aloud from a copy of Gulliver’s 
 Travels to entertain the hunters while they dressed 
 their deerskins or tinkered their weapons. In 
 honor of the “Lorbrulgrud” of the book, though 
 with a pronunciation all their own, they chris- 
 tened the nearest creek; and as “‘Lulbegrud Creek” 
 it is still known. i 
 
 Before the end of the winter the two Boones 
 were alone in the wilderness. Their brother-in- 
 law, Stewart, had disappeared; and Neely, dis- 
 _couraged by this tragic event, had returned to the 
 Yadkin. In May, Squire Boone fared forth, taking 
 with him the_season’s-eateh~of-beawer, otter, and 
 
BOONE, THE WANDERER 101 
 
 deerskins to exchange in the North Carolinian 
 trading houses for more supplies; and Daniel was \ 
 left solitary in Kentucky. 
 
 Now followed those lonely explorations which 
 gave Daniel Boone his special fame above all Ken- 
 tucky’s.pioneers. He was by no means the first 
 white man to enter Kentucky; and when he did 
 enter, it was as one of a party, under another man’s 
 - guidance —if we except his former disappointing 
 
 journey into the laurel thickets of Floyd County. 
 But these others, barring Stewart, who fell there, 
 turned back when they met with loss and hard- 
 ship and measured the certain risks against the 
 possible gains. Boone, the man of imagination, 
 turned to wild.earth as to his kin. His genius lay” 
 in the sense of oneness he felt with his wilderness en- 
 vironment. An instinct he had which these other 
 men, as courageous perhaps as he, did not possess. 
 
 Never in all the times when he was alone in the 
 woods and had no other man’s safety or counsel 
 to consider, did he suffer ill fortune. The nearest 
 approach to trouble that befell him when alone 
 occurred one day during this summer when some 
 Indians emerged from their green shelter and 
 found him, off guard for the moment, standing 
 on a cliff gazing with rapture over the vast rolling 
 
102 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 stretches of Kentucky. He was.apparently cut 
 ~~off_ from escape, for the savages were on thr 
 sides, advancing without haste to take him, mean- 
 while greeting him with mock amity. Over the 
 cliff leaped Boone, and into the outspread arms 
 of a friendly maple, whose top bloomed green 
 about sixty feet below the cliff’s rim, and left his 
 would-be captors on the height above, grunting 
 their amazement. 
 During this summer Boone journeyed through 
 the valleys of the Kentucky and the.Licking. He 
 
 followed the buffalo traces to the two Blue Licks 
 and saw the enormous herds licking up the salt 
 
 earth, a darkly ruddy moving mass of beasts 
 whose numbers could not be counted. For many 
 miles he wound along the Obi, as far as the 
 Falls. He also found the Big.BoneLick with its 
 mammoth fossils. 
 
 “InJ uly, 1770, Daniel returned-to the Red River 
 camp and there met Squire Boone with another 
 pack of-supplies. The two brothers continued their 
 hunting and exploration together for some months, 
 chiefly in Jessamine County, where two caves still 
 bear Boone’s name. In that winter they even 
 braved the Green River ground, whence had come 
 the hunting Shawanoes who had taken Daniel’s 
 
 £1 ee et 
 
BOONE, THE WANDERER 103 
 
 first fruits a year before. In the same year (1770) __ 
 there had come into Kentucky from the Yadkin 
 another party of hunters, called, from their lengthy 
 sojourn in the twilight zone, the LongHunters. 
 One of these, Gasper Mansker, afterwards related 
 how the Long Hunters were startled one day by 
 hearing sounds such as no buffalo or turkey ever 
 made, and how Mansker himself stole silently un- 
 - der cover of the trees towards the place whence 
 the strange noises came, and descried Daniel Boone 
 prone on his back with a deerskin under him, his 
 famous tall black hat beside him and his mouth 
 opened wide in joyous but apparently none too 
 tuneful song. This incident gives a true character 
 touch. It is not recorded of any of the men who 
 turned back that they sang alone in the wilderness. 
 In March, 1771, the two Boones started home- 
 ward, their horses bearing the rich harvest of furs 
 
 and deerskins which was to clear Daniel of debt 
 and to insure the comfort of the family he had not 
 seen for two years. But again evil fortune met 
 them, this time in the very gates — for in the Cum- 
 berland Gap they were suddenly surrounded by 
 Indians who took everything from them, leaving 
 them neither guns nor horses.” 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 
 
 Wuen Boone returned home he found the Back 
 Country..of..North..Carolina in the throes of the 
 Regulation Movement. This movement, which 
 had arisen first from the colonists’ need to police 
 their settlements, had more recently assumed a 
 political character. The Regulators were now in 
 conflict with the authorities, because the frontier 
 folk were suffering through excessive taxes, ex- 
 tortionate fees, dishonest land titles, and the 
 corruption of the courts. In May, 1771, the 
 conflict lost its quasi-civil nature. The Regula- 
 tors resorted to arms and were defeated by the 
 
 forces under GovernorTIryon in the Battle _of 
 
 \ «The Regulation Movement, which we shall follow 
 in more detail further on, was a culmination cf 
 those causes of unrest which turned men westward. 
 
 To escape from oppression and to acquire land 
 104 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 105 
 
 beyond 1 the bounds of tyranny became the earnest 
 desire of independent spirits throughout the Back 
 Country. But there was another and more potent 
 reason why the country east of the mountains no 
 longer contented Boone.” Hunting and trapping 
 were Boone’s chief means of livelihood. In those 
 eee sold for a dollar a skin to the 
 traders at the Forks or in Hillsborough; beaver at 
 about two dollars and a half, and otter at from 
 three to five dollars. A pack-horse could carry a 
 load of one hundred dressed deerskins, and, as cur- 
 rency was scarce, a hundred dollars was wealth. 
 Game was fast disappearing from the Yadkin. To 
 Boone above all men, then, Kentucky beckoned. 
 When he returned in the spring of 1771 from his 
 explorations, it was with the resolve to take his 
 family at once into the great game country and 
 to persuade some of his friends to join in this 
 hazard of new fortunes. 
 
 The perils of such a venture, only conjectural to 
 us at this distance, he knew well; but in him there 
 was nothing that shrank from danger, though he 
 did not court it after the rash manner of many of 
 his compeers. Neither reckless nor riotous, Boone 
 was never found among those who opposed vio- 
 lence to authority, even unjust authority; nor was 
 
106 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 he ever guilty of the savagery which characterized — 
 much of the retaliatory warfare of that period when 
 frenzied white men bettered the red man’s instruc- 
 tion. In him, courage was illumined with tender- 
 ness and made equable by self-control. Yet, though 
 he was no fiery zealot like the Ulstermen who were 
 to follow him along the path he had made and who 
 loved and revered him perhaps because he was so 
 different from themselves, Boone nevertheless had 
 his own religion. It was as simple faith best summed 
 up perhaps by himself in his old age when he said 
 that he had been only an instrument in the of 
 God to open the wilderness to settlement.” | 
 Two years passed before. Boone could muster a 
 company of colonists for the dangerous and de- 
 lectable land. The dishonesty practiced by Lord 
 Granville’s agents in the matter of deeds had made 
 it difficult for Daniel and his friends to dispose of 
 their acreage. When at last in the spring of 1773 
 the Wanderer was prepared to depart, he was 
 again delayed; this time by the arrival of a little 
 son to whom was given the name of John. By 
 September, however, even this latest addition to 
 the party was ready for travel; and that month 
 saw the Boones with a small caravan of families 
 journeying towards Powell’s Valley, whence the 
 
 en > 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 107 
 
 Warrior’s Path took its way through Cumberland 
 Gap. At this point on the march they were to 
 be joined by William Russell, a famous pioneer, 
 from the Clinch River, with his family and a 
 few neighbors, and by some of Rebecca Boone’s 
 kinsmen, the Bryans, from the lower Yadkin, with 
 a company of forty men. 
 
 Of Rebecca Boone history tells us too little — 
 .only that she was born a Bryan, was of low stature _ 
 and dark eyed, that she bore her husband ten 
 children, and lived beside him to old age. Except 
 on his hunts and explorations, she went with him 
 from one cabined home to another, always deeper 
 into the wilds. There are no portraits of her. We 
 can see her only as a shadowy figure moving along 
 the wilderness trails beside the man who accepted 
 his destiny of God to be a way-shower for those of 
 lesser faith. 
 
 He tires not forever on his leagues of march 
 
 Because her feet are set to his footprints, 
 
 And the gleam of her bare hand slants across his 
 shoulder. 
 
 Boone halted his company on Walden Mountain. 
 over Powell’s Valley to await the Bryan contingent 
 and dispatched two young men.under the leader- 
 ship of his son James, then in his seventeenth year, 
 
108 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 to notify Russell of the party’s arrival. As the 
 boys were returning with Russell’s son, also a strip- 
 ling, two of his slaves, and some white laborers, 
 they missed the path and went into camp for the 
 night. When dawn broke, disclosing the sleepers, 
 a small war band of Shawanoes, who had been spy- 
 ing on Boone and his party,, fell upon them and. 
 slaughtered.them. Only one of Russell’s slaves 
 and a laborer escaped, The tragedy seems aug- 
 mented by the fact that the point where the boys 
 lost the trail and made their night quarters was 
 hardly three miles from the main camp — to which 
 an hour later came the two survivors with their 
 gloomy tidings. Terror now took hold of the little 
 band of emigrants, and there were loud outcries 
 for turning back. The Bryans, who had arrived 
 meanwhile, also advised retreat, saying that the 
 ‘signs’? about the scene of blood indicated an 
 Indian_uprising. Daniel carried the scalped body 
 of his son, the boy-comrade of his happy hunts, 
 to the camp and buried it there at the the beginning 
 of the trail. His voice alone urged that they they go on. 
 Fortunately indeed, as events turned out, Boone 
 was overruled, and the expedition was abandoned. 
 The Bryan party and the others from North Caro- 
 lina went back to the Yadkin. Boone-himself with 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 109 
 his family accompanied Russell to the-Clinch set- 
 
 tlement, where he erected a temporary cabin on 
 the farm of one of the settlers, and then set out 
 alone on the chase to earn provision for his wife and 
 children through the winter. 
 
 Those who prophesied an Indian war were not 
 mistaken. When the snowy hunting season had 
 passed and the “Powwowing Days”’ were come, 
 the Indian war drum rattled in the medicine house 
 from the borders of Pennsylvania to those of Caro- 
 lina. The causes of the strife for which the red 
 men were making ready must be briefly noted to 
 help us form a just opinion of the deeds that fol- 
 lowed. Early writers have usually represented the 
 frontiersmen as saints in buckskin and the Indians 
 as fiends without the shadow of a claim on either 
 the land or humanity. Many later writers have 
 merely reversed the shield. The truth is that the 
 Indians and the borderers reacted upon each other 
 to the hurt of both. Paradoxically, they grew like 
 enough to hate one another with a savage hatred 
 —and both wanted the land..~ 
 
 Land! Land! was the slogan of all sorts and 
 conditions of men. Tidewater officials held solemn 
 powwows with the chiefs, gave wampum strings, 
 
110 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 and forthwith incorporated.* Chiefs blessed their 
 white brothers who had “‘forever brightened the 
 chain of friendship,” departed home, and pro- 
 ceeded to brighten the blades of their tomahawks 
 and to await, not long, the opportunity to use them 
 on casual hunters who carried in their kits the com- 
 
 3 
 
 pass, the “land-stealer.”” Usually the surveying 
 hunter was a borderer; and on him the tomahawk 
 descended with an accelerated gusto. Private 
 citizens also formed land companies and sent out 
 surveyors, regardless of treaties. Bold frontiers- 
 men went into No Man’s Land and staked out 
 theirclaims. In the very year when disaster turned 
 the Boone party back, James Harrod had entered 
 Kentucky from Pennsylvania and had marked the 
 site of a settlement. ~~ Jo-" 
 
 Ten years earlier (1763), the King had issued the 
 famous and much misunderstood Proclamation 
 restricting his “‘loving subjects” from the lands 
 west of the mountains. The colonists interpreted 
 this document as a tyrannous curtailment of their 
 liberties for the benefit of the fur trade. We know 
 now that the portion of this Proclamation relat- 
 ing to western settlement was a wise provision 
 
 t The activities of the great land companies are described in 
 Alvord’s exhaustive work, The Mississippr Valley in British Politics- 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 111 
 
 designed to protect the settlers on the frontier by 
 allaying the suspicions of the Indians, who viewed 
 with apprehension the triumphal occupation of 
 that vast territory from Canada to the Gulf of 
 Mexico by the colonizing English. By seeking to 
 compel all land purchase to be made through the 
 Crown, it was designed likewise to protect the 
 
 3 
 
 Indians from “whisky purchase,” and to make 
 impossible the transfer of their lands except with 
 consent of the Indian Council, or full quota of 
 headmen, whose joint action alone conveyed what 
 the tribes considered to be legal title. Sales made 
 ecording to this form, Sir William Johnson. de- 
 clared to the Lords of Trade, he had never known 
 to be repudiated by the Indians. This paragraph 
 of the Proclamation was in substance an embodi- 
 ment of Johnson’s suggestions to the Lords of 
 Trade. Its purpose was square dealing and paci- 
 fication; and shrewd men such as Washington 
 recognized that it was not intended as a final check 
 to expansion. “‘A temporary expedient to quiet the 
 minds of the Indians,’’ Washington called it, and 
 then himself went out along the Great Kanawha 
 and into Kentucky, surveying land. 
 It will be asked what had become of _the Ohio 
 
 Companyof-Virginia and that fort at the Forks of 
 
112 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the Ohio, once a bone of contention between France 
 and-England. Fort.Pitt, as it was now called, had 
 fallen foul of another dispute, this time between 
 Virginia.and Pennsylvania. Virginia claimed that 
 the far western.corner_of her boundary ascended 
 just far enough north to take in Fort Pitt. Penn- 
 sylvania asserted that it did nothing of the sort. 
 The Ohio Company had_meanwhile been merged 
 into.the Walpole Company. George Croghan, at 
 Fort_Pitt, was the Company’s agent and as such 
 was accused by Pennsylvania of favoring from 
 ulterior motives the claims of Virginia. Hot- 
 heads in both colonies asseveraied that the In- 
 dians were secretly being stirred up in connection 
 with the boundary disputes. If it does not very 
 clearly appear how an Indian rising would have 
 settled the ownership of Fort Pitt, it is evident 
 enough where the interests of Virginia and Penn- 
 sylvania clashed./| Virginia wanted land for.settle- 
 ment and. speculations? ennsylvania 2 wanted the 
 Indians left in possession for the_benefit of the 
 fur. ‘trade. So far from stirring up the Indians, as 
 his enemies declared, Croghan was as usual giving 
 away all his substance to keep them quiet.' Indeed, 
 
 : The suspicion that Croghan and Lord Dunmore, the Governor of 
 Virginia, were instigating the war appears to have arisen out of the 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 113 
 
 during this summer of 1774, eleven hundred Indians 
 were encamped about,Fort.Pitt visiting him. 
 
 Two hundred thousand acres in the West — 
 Kentucky and West Virginia — had been promised 
 to the colonial officers and soldiers who fought 
 in the Seven Years’ War. But after making the 
 Proclamation the British Government had delayed 
 issuing the patents. Washington interested him- 
 self in trying to secure them; and Lord Dunmore, 
 who also had caught the “land-fever,”’* prodded 
 the British authorities but won only rebuke for 
 his inconvenient activities. Insistent, however, 
 Dunmore sent out parties of surveyors to fix the 
 bounds of the soldiers’ claims. James Harrod, Cap- 
 tain Thomas Bullitt, Hancock Taylor, and three 
 McAfee brothers entered Kentucky, by the.Qhio, 
 under Dunmore’s orders. John Floyd went in by 
 
 eonduct of Dr., John Connolly, Dunmore’s agent and Croghan’s 
 nephew. Croghan had induced the Shawanoes to bring under escort 
 to Fort Pitt certain English traders resident in the Indian towns. The 
 escort was fired on by militiamen under command of Connolly, who 
 also issued a proclamation declaring a state of war to exist. Connolly, 
 however, probably acted on his own initiative. He was interested 
 in land on his own behalf and was by no means the only man at that 
 time who was ready to commit outrages on Indians in order to obtain 
 it. As Croghan lamented, there was “too great a spirit in the frontier 
 people for killing Indians.” 
 
 tSee Alvord, The Mississippi Valley in British Politics, vol. 11, pp. 
 191-94. 
 
 8 
 
a Se.) a 
 
 114 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 the Kanawha as Washington’s agent. A bird’s-eye 
 
 view of that period would disclose to us very few 
 indeed of His Majesty’s loving subjects who were 
 paying any attention to his proclamation... Early 
 
 in 1774,.Harzad began the building of cabins and a 
 fort, and planted corn on the > site of Harrodsburg. 
 
 Thus to him and not. to_Boone-fell-the honor of 
 founding...the.first...permanent..white~settlement 
 in. Kentucky 
 
 When summer came, its thick verdure proffering 
 ambuscade, the air hung tense along the border. 
 Traders had sent in word that Shawanoes, Dela- 
 wares, Mingos, Wyandots, and Cherokees were 
 refusing all other exchange than rifles, ammuni- 
 tion, knives, and hatchets. White men were shot 
 down in their fields from ambush. Dead In- 
 dians lay among their own young corn, their scalp 
 locks taken. There were men of both races who 
 wanted war and meant to have it — and with it 
 the land. 
 
 Lord Dunmore, the Governor, resolved that, if 
 war were inevitable, it should be fought out in 
 the Indian country. With this intent, he wrote to 
 
 Colonel Andrew-Lewis-of Botetourt-County, Com- 
 
 mander_ of the Southwest-Militia, instructing him 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 115 
 
 to raise a respectable body of troops and “join me 
 either at the mouth of the Great.Kanawha or 
 Wheeling, or such other part of the Ohio as may 
 be most convenient for you to meet me.” The 
 Governor himself witha force of twelve hundred 
 proceeded to Fort Pitt, where Croghan, as we 
 have seen, was extending his hospitality to eleven 
 hundred warriors from the disaffected tribes-—~ 
 On receipt of the Governor’s letter, Andrew 
 Lewis sent out expresses to his brother Colonel 
 Charles Lewis, County Lieutenant of Augusta, 
 and to Colonel William Preston, County Lieuten- 
 ant of Fincastle, to raise men and bring them with 
 “all speed to the rendezvous at Camp Union (Lewis- 
 burg) on the Big Levels of the Greenbrier (West 
 Virginia). Andrew Lewis summoned these off- 
 cers to an expedition for “‘reducing our inveterate 
 enemies to reason.” Preston called for volunteers 
 to take advantage of “the opportunity we have so 
 long wished for . . . this useless People may now 
 at last be Oblidged to abandon their country.” 
 These men were among not only the bravest but 
 the best of their time; but this was their view of 
 the Indian and his alleged rights. To eliminate 
 
 > 
 
 this “useless people,’’ inveterate enemies of the 
 
 white race, was, as they saw it, a political necessity 
 
ott) eae oe ee, n>. Se ee 
 \ 1 oe 
 
 116 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 and a religious duty. And we today who profit by 
 their deeds dare not condemn them. 
 Fervor less solemn was aroused in other quar- 
 
 Captain Michael Cresap of Maryland, were wait- 
 ing for the freshets to sweep them down the Ohio 
 into Kentucky. When thenews reached them, they 
 greeted it with the wild monotone chant and the 
 ceremonies preliminary to Indian warfare. They 
 planted the war pole, stripped and painted them- 
 selves, and starting the war dance called on 
 
 ce 
 
 Cresap to be their “white leader.” The captain, 
 however, declined; but in that wild circling line 
 was one who was a white leader indeed. He wasa 
 sandy-haired boy of twenty — one of the bold race 
 of English Virginians, rugged and of fiery counte- 
 nance, with blue eyes intense of glance and deep 
 set under a high brow that, while modeled for 
 power, seemed threatened in its promise by the too 
 sensitive chiseling of his lips. With every nerve 
 straining for the fray, with thudding of feet and 
 crooning of the blood song, he wheeled with those 
 other mad spirits round the war pole till the set 
 of sun closed the rites. “That evening two scalps 
 were brought into camp,” so a letter of his reads. 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 117 
 
 Does the bold savage color of this picture affright 
 us? Would we veil it? Then we should lose some- 
 thing of the true lineaments of George Rogers. 
 Clark,-who, within four short years, was to lead 
 a tiny army of tattered and starving backwoods- 
 men, ashamed to quail where he never flinched, 
 through barrens and icy floods to the conquest of 
 . Though Cresap had rejected the réle of “white 
 leader,” he did not escape the touch of infamy. 
 “Cresap-*s-"War” was the name the Indians gave 
 to the bloody encounters between small parties. of 
 whites and Indians, which followed on that war ~ 
 dance and scalping, during the summer months. 
 One of these encounters must be detailed here 
 because history has assigned it as the immediate 
 cause of Dunmore’s War. 
 
 Greathouse, Sapperton, and King, tlifee traders 
 who had a post on Yellow.Creek, a tributary of the 
 Ohio fifty miles below Pittsburgh, invited several 
 Indians from across the stream to come and drink 
 with them and their friends. Among the Indians 
 were two or three men of importance in the Minge— 
 tribe. There were also some women, one of whom 
 was the Indian wife of Colonel John Gibson, an 
 educated man who had distinguished himself as" 
 
te Ge fa el ee ” 
 
 118 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 a soldier with Forbes.in.1758. That the Indian 
 
 came in amity and apprehended no treachery wa 
 proved by the presence of the women. Gibson’ 
 wife carried her half-caste baby in her shawl. Th 
 disreputable traders plied their guests with drinl 
 to the point of intoxication and then murderec 
 them. King shot the first man and, when he fell 
 cut his throat, saying that he had served many 
 a deer in that fashion. Gibson’s Indian wife flec 
 and was shot down in the clearing. A man fol 
 lowed to dispatch her and her baby. She held th 
 child up to him pleading, with her last breath 
 that he would spare it because it was not India 
 
 but “‘one.of-yours.’’ The mother dead, the chile 
 
 i 
 
 was later sent to Gibson. Twelve Indians in al 
 were killed. 
 
 -Meanwhile Cro Croghan had persuaded the Iroquoi 
 to peace. With the help of f Dayid Zeisberger, th 
 Moravian missionary, and White Eyes, a Delawar 
 chief, he and Dunmore had won over the Delay awar 
 
 warriors. In the Cherokee councils, Oconostot: 
 
 demanded that the treaty of peace signed in 176 
 be kept. The Shawanoes, however, led by Corn 
 
 stalk, were implacable: and they had as allies th 
 
 Ottawas and Mingos, who had entered the counci 
 with them. 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 119 
 
 A famous chief of the day and one of great in- 
 fluence over the Indians, and also among the white 
 officials who dealt with Indian affairs, was Tach- 
 nech-dor-us, or Branching Oak of the.Korest, a 
 Mingo who had taken the name of Logan out 
 of compliment to James Logan of Pennsylvania. 
 Chief Logan had recently met with so much re- 
 proach from his red brothers for his loyalty to the 
 whites that he had departed _— the Ming o town 
 Srenined to assist the Shawanoes and had al- 
 ready taken some white scalps, he repaired to the 
 place where the Mingos were holding their war 
 council to exert his powers for peace. There, in 
 presence of the warriors, after swaying them from 
 their purpose by those oratorical gifts which gave 
 him his influence and his renown, he took the 
 war hatchet that had already killed, and buried it 
 in proof that vengeance was appeased. Upon this 
 scene there entered a oe Creek 
 with the news of the murders committed there by 
 the he three traders. The Indian whose throat had 
 fen al slit as King had served deer was Logan’s 
 brother. Another man slain was his kinsman. 
 The woman with the baby was his sister. Logan 
 tore up from the earth the bloody tomahawk and, 
 
120 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 raising it above his head, swore that he would not 
 rest till he had taken ten white lives to pay foreach 
 one of hiskin. Again the Mingo warriors declared 
 for_war and this.time were not dissuaded. But 
 Logan did not join this red army. He went out 
 alone to wreak his vengeance, slaying and scalping. 
 
 Meanwhile Dunmore prepared to push the war 
 with the utmost vigor. His first concern was te 
 
 recall the surveying parties from Kentucky, and 
 
 for so hazardous an errand he needed the services 
 
 of a man whose endurance, speed, and woodcraft 
 were equal to those of any Indian.scout afoot. 
 Through Colonel Preston, his orders were conveyed 
 to Daniel.Boone, for Boone’s fame had now spread 
 from the border to the tidewater regions. It was 
 stated that “‘Boone would lose no time,”’ and “i 
 they are alive, it is indisputable but Boone must 
 find them.”’ 
 
 So Boone set out in company with Michael 
 Stoner, another expert-—woodsman. His general 
 instructions were to go down the Kentucky River 
 to_Preston-s- Salt_Lick and across oS ee 
 
 ‘Lick 0 on n the ¢ Cumberland River. Indian war par- 
 
 ties were moving under cover across “the Dark 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 121 
 
 and Bloody Ground’”’ to surround the various 
 groups of surveyors still at large and to exterminate 
 them. Boone made his journey successfully. He 
 found John-EKloyd, who was surveying for Wash- 
 ington; he sped up to where Harrod and his band 
 were building cabins and sent them out, just in 
 time as it happened; he reached all the outposts of 
 Thomas. Bullitt’s party, only one of whom fell a 
 victim to the foe’; and, undetected by the Indians, 
 he brought himself and Stoner home in safety, after 
 covering eight hundred miles in sixty-one days. 
 Harrod and his homesteaders immediately en- 
 listed in the army. How eager-Boone was to go 
 with the forces under Lewis-is seen in the official 
 correspondence relative to Dunmore’s.War. Floyd 
 wanted Boone’s help in raising a company: “Cap- 
 tain Bledsoe says that Boone has more [influence] 
 than any man now disengaged; and you know 
 what Boone has done for me . . . for which reason 
 Tlove the man.” Even the border, it would seem, 
 had its species of pacifists who were willing to let 
 others take risks for them, for men hung back from 
 recruiting, and desertions were the order of the 
 day. Major Arthur Campbell hit upon a solution 
 
 t Hancock Taylor, who delayed in getting out of the country and 
 was cut off. 
 
122 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 of the difficulties in West Fincastle. He was con- 
 vinced that Boone could raise a company and hold 
 the men loyal. And Boone did. 
 
 For some reason, however, Daniel’s desire to 
 march with the army was denied. Perhaps it was 
 because just such a man as he—and, indeed, 
 there was no other — was needed to guard the set- 
 tlement. Presently he was put in command of 
 Moore’s Fort in Clinch Valley, and his “diligence” 
 received official approbation. A little later the 
 inhabitants of the valley sent out a petition to 
 have Boone made a “captain” and given supreme 
 command of the lower forts. The settlers de- 
 manded Boone’s promotion for their own security. 
 
 The land it is good, it is just to our mind, 
 
 Each will have his part if his Lordship be kind, - 
 The Ohio once ours, we’ll live at our ease, 
 
 With a bottle and glass to drink when we please. 
 
 So sang the army poet, thus giving voice, as bards 
 should ever do, to the theme nearest the hearts of 
 his hearers — in this case, Land! Presumably his 
 ditty was composed on the eve of the march from 
 Lewisburg, for it is found in a soldier’s diary. 
 
 On the evening of October 9, noes ie Lewis 
 with his force of eleven hundred frontiersmen 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 123 
 
 was encamped on Point Pleasant at the junction 
 of the Great Kanawha with the Ohio. Dunmore 
 in the fedntinic had led his forces into, Ohio 
 and had erected Fort Gower at the mouth of the 
 Hockhocking River, where he waited for word 
 from Andrew Lewis." 
 
 The movements of the two armies were being 
 observed by scouts from the force of red warriors 
 gathered in Ohio under the great leader of the 
 Shawanoes. Cornstalk purposed to isolate the 
 
 sn ] 
 
 two armies of his enemy and to crush them in 
 turn before they could come together. His first 
 move was to launch an attack on Lewis at Point, 
 
 tt has been customary to ascribe to Lord Dunmore motives of 
 treachery in failing to make connections with Lewis; but no real 
 evidence has been advanced to support any of the charges made 
 against him by local historians. The charges were, as Theodore 
 Roosevelt says, “an afterthought.” Dunmore was a King’s man in 
 the Revolution; and yet in March, 1775, the Convention of the Colony 
 of Virginia, assembled in opposition to the royal party, resolved: 
 “The most cordial thanks of the people of this colony are a tribute 
 justly due to our worthy Governor, Lord Dunmore, for his truly noble, 
 wise, and spirited conduct which at once evinces his Excellency’s 
 attention to the true interests of this colony, and a zeal in the execu- 
 tive department which no dangers can divert, or difficulties hinder, 
 from achieving the most important services to the people who have 
 the happiness to live under his administration.” (See American Ar- 
 chives, Fourth Series, vol. 11, p. 170.) Similar resolutions were passed 
 by his officers on the march home from Ohio; at the same time, the 
 officers passed resolutions in sympathy with the. American cause. 
 Yet it was Andrew Lewis who later drove Dunmore from Virginia. 
 Well might Dunmore exclaim, “That it should ever come to this!”’ 
 
 \ 
 
124 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Pleasant. In the dark of night, Cornstalk’s Indians 
 crossed the Ohio on raits, intending to surprise 2 the 
 white man’s camp.at-dawn. ‘They would have 
 succeeded but for the chance that three or four of 
 the frontiersmen, who had risen before daybreak to 
 hunt, came upon the Indians creeping towards the 
 camp. Shots were exchanged. An Indian and a 
 white man dropped. The firing roused-the camp. 
 ’ Three hundred men in two lines under, Charles 
 \ Lewis. and William.Fleming sallied forth expect- 
 ing to engage the vanguard of the enemy but en- 
 countered almost the whole force of from eight 
 hundred to a thousand Indians before the rest of 
 the army could come into action. Both officers 
 were wounded, Charles Lewis fatally. The battle, 
 which continued from dawn until an hour be- 
 \. fore sunset, was the bloodiest in Virginia’s long se- 
 “ties of Indian wars. The frontiersmen fought as 
 such men ever fought — with the daring, bravery, 
 swiftness of attack, and skill in taking cover which 
 were the tactics of their day, even as at a later time 
 many of these same men fought at King’ s Moun- 
 tain and in Illinois the battles that did so ‘much 
 to turn the tide in the Revolution.* 
 
 t With Andrew Lewis on this day were Isaac Shelby and Wil- 
 liam Campbell, the victorious leaders at King’s Mountain, James 
 eal 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 125 
 
 Colonel Preston wrote to Patrick Henry that the 
 enemy behaved with “inconceivable bravery,”’ the 
 head men walking about in the time of action 
 exhorting their men to “lie close, shoot well, be 
 strong, and fight.”” The Shawanoes ran up to the 
 muzzles of the English guns, disputing every foot 
 of ground. Both sides knew well what they were 
 ae for'— othe zich _Jand_held_in a_semicircle 
 
 a before ate the Indians, mistaking 
 a flank movement by Shelby’s contingent for the 
 arrival of reinforcements, retreated across. the Ohio... 
 Many of their most ‘noted warriors had fallen and 
 among them the Shawano chief, Puck-e-shin-wa, 
 father of a famous son, Tecumseh.* Yet they were 
 unwilling to accept defeat. When they heard that 
 Dunmore was now marching overland to cut them 
 off from.their towns, their fury blazed anew. ‘Shall 
 
 we first kill all our women and children and then 
 
 Robertson, the “father of Tennessee,”’ Valentine Sevier, Daniel Mor- 
 gan, hero of the Cowpens, Major Arthur Campbell, Benjamin Logan, 
 Anthony Bledsoe, and Simon Kenton. With Dunmore’s force were 
 Adam Stephen, who distinguished himself at the Brandywine, George 
 Rogers Clark, John Stuart, already noted through the Cherokee wars, 
 and John Montgomery, later one of Clark’s four captains in Illinois. 
 The two last mentioned were Highlanders. Clark’s Illinois force was 
 largely recruited from the troops who fought at Point Pleasant. 
 1 Thwaites, Documentary History of Dunmore’s War. 
 
126 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 fight till we ourselves are slain?” Cornstalk, in 
 irony, demanded of them; “No? Then I will go 
 and make peace.” 
 
 , By the treaty compacted between the chiefs.and 
 Boni Dunmore, the Indians gave. up.all claim to the 
 lands _south of the Ohio, even for en_for hunting, and 
 agreed t to allow boats to pass unmolested. In this 
 treaty the Minges. refused to join, and a detach- 
 ment of Dunmore’s troops made a punitive expedi- 
 tion to their towns. Some discord arose between 
 Dunmore and Lewis’s_frontier forces because, 
 since the Shawanoes had made peace, the Gover- 
 
 ' 
 
 nor.would not allow the frontiersmen to destroy 
 the Shawano towns. 
 
 Of all the chiefs, Logan alone still held aloof. 
 Major Gibson undertook to fetch him, but Logan 
 refused to come to the treaty grounds. He sent 
 by Gibson the short speech which has lived as an 
 example of the best Indian oratory: 
 
 I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered 
 Logan’s cabin hungry and he gave him not meat: if 
 ever he came cold and naked and he clothed him not. 
 During the course of the last long and bloody war, 
 Logan remained idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. 
 Such was my love for the whites that my countrymen 
 pointed as they passed and said, “Logan is the friend 
 of the white men.” I had even thought to have lived 
 
THE FIGHT FOR KENTUCKY 127 
 
 with you but for the injuries of one man. Colonel 
 Cresap, the last spring, in cold blood and unprovoked, 
 murdered all the relations of Logan, not even sparing 
 my women and children. There remains not a drop of 
 my blood in the veins of any living creature. This 
 called on me for revenge. I have sought it; I have 
 killed many; I have fully glutted my vengeance: for my 
 country I rejoice at the beams of peace. But do not 
 harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan 
 never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his 
 life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one.* 
 
 By rivers and trails, in large and small companies, 
 started home the army that had won the land. 
 
 The West Fincastle troops, from the lower settle- 
 ments of the Clinch and Holston valleys, were to 
 return by the Kentucky River, while those from 
 
 t Some writers have questioned the authenticity of Logan’s speech, 
 inclining to think that Gibson himself composed it, partly because of 
 the biblical suggestion in the first few lines. That Gibson gave biblical 
 phraseology to these lines is apparent, though, as Adair points out 
 there are many examples of similitude in Indian and biblical expres- 
 sion. But the thought is Indian and relates to the first article of the 
 
 ‘Indian’s creed, namely, to share his food with the needy. ‘There 
 remains not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature”’ 
 is a truly Indian lament. Evidently the final four lines of the speech 
 are the most literally translated, for they have the form and the primi- 
 tive rhythmic beat which a student of Indian poetry quickly recog- 
 nizes. The authenticity of the speech, as well as the innocence of 
 Cresap, whom Logan mistakenly accused, was vouched for by George 
 Rogers Clark in a letter to Dr. Samuel Brown dated June 17, 1798. 
 See Jefferson papers, Series 5, quoted by English, Conquest of the 
 Country Northwest of the River Ohio, vol. 11, p. 1029. 
 
128 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the upper valley would take the shorter way up 
 Sandy Creek. To keep them in provisions during 
 the journey it was ordered that hunters be sent out 
 along these routes to kill and barbecue meat and 
 place it on scaffolds at appropriate spots. 
 
 The way home by the Kentucky was a long road 
 for weary and wounded men with hunger gnawing 
 under their-belts. We know who swung out along 
 the trail to provide for that little band, “dressed 
 in deerskins colored black, and his hair plaited 
 and bobbed up.” It was Daniel Boone — now, 
 by popular demand, Captain Boone — just “dis- 
 charged from Service,’’ since the valley forts 
 needed him no longer. Once more only a hunter, 
 he went his way over Walden Mountain — past his 
 son’s grave marking the place where he had been 
 turned back — to serve the men who had opened 
 the gates. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE DARK AND BLOODY-GROUND Koa 
 Wirs the coming of spring Daniel Boone’s desire, 
 so long cherished and deferred, to make a way for 
 his neighbors through the wilderness was to be 
 fulfilled at last. But ere his ax could slash the 
 thickets from the homeseekers’ path, more than 
 ‘two hundzed-settlers had-entered Kentucky by 
 the northern waterways. Eighty or more of these 
 settled at Harrodsburg, where Harrod was laying 
 out his town on a generous plan, with “in-lots”’ 
 of half an acre and “‘out-lots”’ of larger size. 
 Among those associated with Harrod was George 
 Rogers Clark, who had surveyed claims for himself 
 during the year befor Pn gt 
 ~ While over two hundred colonists were picking 
 out home sites wherever their pleasure or prudence. 
 dictated, a gigantic land promotion scheme — in- 
 volving the very tracts where they were sowing 
 
 their first corn — was being set afoot in North 
 ° 129 
 
1 A i eke ere 
 fa ’ 
 
 \ 
 
 130 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Carolina by a body of men who figure in the early | 
 history_of Kentucky as the Transylvania Com- 
 pany. The leader of this organization was Judge 
 Richard Henderson. Judge Henderson dreamed 
 a big dream. His castle in the air had imperial 
 proportions. He resolved, in short, to purchase 
 from the Cherokee. Indians the—larger—part—of 
 Kentucky and to establish there a colony after 
 the manner and the economic form of the English 
 Lords Proprietors, whose day in America was so 
 nearly done. Though in the light of history the plan 
 loses none of its dramatic features, it shows the 
 practical defects that must surely have prevented 
 its realization. Like many another Cesar hunger- 
 ing for empire and staking all to win it, the pros- 
 pective lord of Kentucky, as we shall see, had left 
 the human equation out of his calculations. 
 
 t Richard Henderson (1734-1785) was the son of the High Sheriff 
 of Granville County. At first an assistant to his father, he studied 
 law and soon achieved a reputation by the brilliance of his mind and 
 the magnetism of his personality. As presiding Judge at Hillsborough 
 he had come into conflict with the violent element among the Regula- 
 tors, who had driven him from the court and burned his house and 
 barns. For some time prior to his elevation to the bench, he had been 
 
 ’ engaged in land speculations. One of Boone’s biographers suggests 
 ' that Boone may have been secretly acting as Henderson’s agent during 
 his first lonely explorations of Kentucky. However this may be, it 
 does not appear that Boone and his Yadkin neighbors were acting with 
 Henderson when in September, 1773, they made their first attempt to 
 enter Kentucky as settlers. 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 131 
 
 Richard Henderson had known Daniel Boone on 
 the Yadkin; and it was Boone’s detailed reports 
 of the marvelous richness and beauty of Kentucky 
 which had inspired him to formulate his gigantic 
 scheme and had enabled him also to win to his 
 support several men of prominence in the Back 
 Country. To sound the Cherokees regarding the 
 purchase and to arrange, if possible, for a confer- 
 ence, Henderson dispatched Boone to the Indian 
 towns in the early days of 1775. 
 ince we have just learned that Dunmore’s War 
 compelled the Shawanoes and their allies to relin- 
 quish their right to-Kentucky, that, both before 
 and after that eve ent, government surveyors were 
 in the territory surveying for the soldiers” claims, 
 and that private individuals. had already laid out 
 town sites and staked holdings, it may be asked 
 Slat ri right of ownership the Cherokees possessed 
 in Kentueky,-that-Henderson_desired-to_purchase 
 it of them. The Indian title to Kentucky seems 
 to have been hardly less vague to the red men than 
 it was to the whites. Several of the nations had 
 laid claim to the territory. As late as 1753, it will 
 be remembered, the Shawanoes had occupied a 
 town at Blue Licks, for John Findlay had been 
 taken there by some of them. But, “before Findlay 
 
132 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 guided Boone through.the.Gap-in-1%769; the Sha- 
 wanoes had been driven out by the Iroquois, whe 
 claimed suzerainty over them as well as over the 
 
 Cherokees. In 1768,.the Irequois*had-eeded-Ken- 
 tucky to the British Crown_by-the.treaty of Fort 
 
 Stanwix; ‘whereupon the Cherokees had protested 
 So V vociferously that the Crown’s Indian agent, te 
 quiet them, had signed a collateral agreement with 
 them. Though claimed by many, Kentucky was 
 by common consent not inhabited by any of the 
 tribes. It was the great Middle Ground where the 
 Indians hunted. It was the Warriors’ Path ove 
 which they rode from north and south to slaughter 
 and where many of their fiercest encounters took 
 place. However shadowy the title which Hender- 
 son purposed to buy, there was one all-sufficing 
 reason why he must come to terms with the Chero. 
 kees:their northernmost..towns.in..Tennessee lay 
 only fifty.or.sixty miles below Cumberland Gap anc 
 hence commanded the route over which he mus‘ 
 lead colonists into his « empire beyond. the hills. 
 The conference took place early in March, 1775. 
 at the Sycamore Shoals of the Watauga River 
 Twelve hundred Indians, led by their “town 
 chiefs”” — among whom were the old warrior and 
 the old statesman of their nation, Oconostota and 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 133 
 
 Attakullakulla — came to the treaty grounds and 
 were received by Henderson and his associates and 
 several hundred white men who were eager for a 
 chance to settle on new lands. Though Boone was 
 now on his way into Kentucky for the Transyl- 
 vania Company, “other feocdeds leaders of renown 
 or with their fame still to win were present, and 
 among them James Robertson, of serious mien, and 
 that blond gay knight in buckskin, John Sevier. 
 It is a dramatic picttre we evolve for ourselves 
 from the meager narratives of this event — a mass 
 of painted Indians moving through the sycamores 
 by the bright water, to come presently into a tense, 
 immobile semicircle before the large group of armed 
 frontiersmen seated or standing about Richard Hen- 
 derson, the man with the imperial dream, the ready 
 speaker whose flashing eyes and glowing oratory 
 won the hearts of all who came under their sway. 
 What though the Cherokee title be a flimsy one at 
 best and the price offered for it a bagatelle! The 
 spirit of Forward March! is there in that great 
 canvas framed by forest and sky. The somber 
 note that tones its lustrous color, as by a sweep of 
 the brush, is the figure of the Chickamaugan chief, 
 Dragging Canoe, warrior and seer and hater of white 
 men, who urges his tribesmen against the sale and, 
 
134 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 when they will not hearken, springs from their midst : 
 into the clear space before Henderson and his band 
 of pioneers and, pointing with uplifted arm, warns 
 them that a dark cloud hangs over the land the 
 white man covets which to the red man has long 
 been a bloody ground.' 
 
 The purchase, finally consummated, included the 
 ‘country lying between the Kentucky ai and Cum- 
 berland Rivers — almost all the present State of 
 Kentucky, with the adjacent land watered by the_ 
 Cumberland. River and_its.tributaries,.except.cer- 
 tain lands previously leased by the Indians.to.the. 
 Watauga Colony. Thetract comprised abouttwenty 
 million acres and extended into Tennessee. er hint 
 
 Daniel Boone’s work ‘was t¢ to cut out a road for 
 the wagons of the Transylvania Company’s colo- 
 nists to pass over. This was to be done by slash- 
 ing away the briers and underbrush hedging the 
 narrow Warriors’ Path that made a direct north- 
 ward line from Cumberland Gap to the Ohio bank, 
 opposite the mouth of the Scioto River. Just prior 
 to the conference Boone and “thirty guns” had 
 set forth from the Holston to prepare the road and 
 to build a fort on whatever site he should select. 
 
 *This utterance of Dragging Canoe’s is generally supposed to be the 
 origin of the descriptive phrase applied to Kentucky — “the Dark and 
 Bloody Ground.” See Roosevelt, The Winning of the West, vol.1,p.229. 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 135 
 
 By April, Henderson and his first group of ten- 
 ants were on the trail. In Powell’s Valley they came 
 up with a party of Virginians Kentucky bound, 
 led by Benjamin Logan; and the two bands joined 
 together for the march. They had not gone far 
 when they heard disquieting news. After leaving 
 Martin’ s Station, at the gates of his new domain, 
 Henderson received a letter from Boone telling of 
 an attack by Indians, in which two of his men 
 had been killed, but “we stood on the ground and 
 eo our baggage till the day and lost noth- 
 
 ”1 'These tidings, indicating that despite treaties 
 So sales, the savages. “were again ‘on the warpath, 
 might well alarmHenderson’s colonists. Whilethey 
 halted, some indecisive, others frankly for retreat, 
 there appeared a company of men making all 
 haste out of Kentucky because of Indian unrest. 
 Six of these Henderson persuaded to turn again 
 and go in with him; but this addition hardly off- 
 set the loss of those members of his party who 
 thought it too perilous to proceed. Henderson’s 
 own courage did not falter. He had staked his all 
 on this stupendous venture and for him it was for- 
 ward to wealth and glory or retreat into poverty 
 and eclipse. Boone, in the heart of the danger, 
 
 * Bogart, Daniel Boone and the Hunters of Kentucky, p. 121. 
 
136 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 was making the same stand. “If we give way to 
 them [the Indians] now,” he wrote, “it will ever 
 be the case.” 
 
 Signs of discord other than Indian opposition 
 met Henderson as he resolutely pushed on. His 
 conversations with some of the fugitives from Ken- 
 tucky disclosed the first indications of the storm 
 that was to blow away the empire he was going in 
 to found. He told them that the claims they had 
 staked in Kentucky would not hold good with the 
 Transylvania Company. Whereupon James Mc- 
 Afee, who was leading a group of returning men, 
 stated his opinion that the Transylvania Com= 
 pany’s claim would not hold good with Virginia. — 
 After the parley, three of McAfee’s brothers turned 
 back and went with Henderson’s party, but 
 whether with intent to join his colony or to make 
 good their own claims is not apparent. Benjamin 
 Logan continued amicably with Henderson on the 
 march but did not recognize him as Lord Proprie- 
 tor_of Kentucky. He left the Transylvania cara- 
 van shortly after entering the territory, branched - 
 off in the direction of Harrodsburg, and founded — 
 St. Asaph’s Station, in the present Lincoln County, © 
 independently of Henderson though the site lay 
 within Henderson’s purchase. 
 
 a 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 137 
 
 Notwithstanding delays and apprehensions, Hen- 
 derson and his colonists finally reached Boone’s 
 Fort, which Daniel and his “thirty guns” — lack- 
 ing two since the Indian encounter — had erected 
 at the mouth of Otter_Creek. 
 
 An attractive buoyancy of temperament is re- 
 vealed in Henderson’s description in his journal of 
 a giant elm with tall straight trunk and even foliage 
 ‘that shaded a space of one hundred feet. Instantly 
 he chose this “divine elm” as the council chamber 
 of Transylvania. Under its leafage he read the 
 constitution of the new colony. It would be too 
 great a stretch of fancy to call it a democratic doc- 
 ument, for it was not that, except in deft phrases. 
 Power was certainly declared to be vested in the 
 people; but the substance of power remained in 
 the hands of the Proprietors. 
 
 -Terms for land grants were generous enough in 
 the beginning, although Henderson made the fatal 
 mistake of demanding quitrents—one of the 
 causes of dissatisfaction which had led to the Regu-_ 
 lators’ rising in North Carolina. In September he 
 -bugmented this error by more than doubling the 
 price of land; adding a fee of eight shillings for 
 surveying, and reserving to the Proprietors one- 
 half of all gold, silver, lead, and sulphur found on 
 
 n 
 
SY ae ee eA 
 é ey ied : 
 
 138 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the land. No land near sulphur springs or show- 
 ing evidences of metals was to be granted to set- 
 tlers. Moreover, at the Company’s store the prices — 
 charged for lead..were.said..to be too-high — lead 
 being necessary for hunting, and hunting being the 
 only means of procuring food — while the wages 
 of labor, as fixed by the Company, were too low. 
 These terms bore too heavily on poor men who 
 were risking their lives in the colony. 
 
 Hence newcomers passed by Boonesborough, as _ 
 the Transylvania settlement-was_presently called, 
 and went elsewhere. They settled on Henderson’s 
 ‘land but refused his terms. They joined in their 
 sympathies with James Harrod, who, having es- 
 tablished Harrodsburg in*thé previous year at the 
 invitation of Virginia, was not in the humor to 
 acknowledge Henderson’s claim or to pay him 
 tribute. All were willing to combine with the 
 Transylvania Company for defense, and to enforce 
 law they would unite in bonds of brotherhood in 
 Kentucky, even as they had been one with each 
 other on the earlier frontier now left behind them. 
 But they would call no man master; they had done 
 with feudalism. That Henderson should not have 
 foreseen this, especially after the upheaval in North 
 Carolina, proves him, in spite of all his brilliant 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 139 
 
 gifts, to have been a man out of touch with the 
 spirit of the time. 
 The war of the Revolution broke forth and the 
 
 Indians descended upon—the.Kentucky_stations. 
 
 Defense was the one problem in all minds, and 
 
 defense required powder and lead in plenty. The 
 
 Transylyania Company~was not able to provide 
 the means of defense against-the hordes of savages 
 
 whom Henry Hamilton, the. British Governor at 
 
 Detroit, was sending to make war on the frontiers. 
 
 Practical men like Harrod and George Rogers 
 Clark — who, if not a practical man in his own 
 interests, was a most practical soldier — saw that 
 
 unification of interests within the territory with 
 
 the backing of either Virginia or Congress was 
 necessary. Clark personally would have preferred 
 to see the settlers combine as a freemen’s state. 
 It was plain that they would not combine and 
 stake their lives as a unit to hold Kentucky for the 
 benefit of the Transylvania Company, whose au- 
 thority some of the most prominent men in the 
 territory had refused to recognize. The Proprie- 
 tary of Transylvania could continue to exist only 
 to the danger of every life in Kentucky. 
 
 While the Proprietors.sent a delegate to the Cen= 
 tinental Congress to win official recognition 1 for 
 
 4 
 
140 PIONEERS OF vy OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Transylvania, cightstaae men at Ha 
 drew up a petition addressed to Virginia stating their 
 doubts of the legality..of-Henderson’s title and re and re- 
 questing Virginia to.assert herauthorityacsordingl 
 to the stipulations of her charter. That defense 
 
 was the primary and essential motive of the Har- 
 
 rodsburg Remonstrance seems plain, for when 
 George Rogers Clark set off on foot with one com- 
 panion to lay the document before the Virginian 
 authorities, he also went to plead for a load of 
 powder. In his account of that hazardous journey, 
 as a matter of fact, he makes scant reference to 
 Transylvania, except to say that the greed of the 
 Proprietors would soon bring the colony to its end, 
 but shows that his mind was seldom off the powder. 
 It is a detail of history that the Continental Con- 
 _gress. refused to seat the delegate from Transyl-— 
 yania. Henderson himself went to Virginia to 
 make the fight for his land before the Assembly. 
 The magnetic center of Boonesborough’s life 
 was the lovable and unassuming Daniel Boone. 
 Soon after the building of the fort Daniel had ; 
 
 brought in his wife and family. He-used often to 
 Cig pipes 
 
 «In 1778 Virginia disallowed Henderson’s title but granted him 
 two hundred thousand acres between the Green and Kentucky. 
 rivers for his trouble and expense im opening up the country. 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 141 
 
 state with a mild pride that his wife and daughters 
 were the first white women to stand onthe banks 
 of the Kentucky River. That pride had not been 
 unmixed with anxiety; his daughter Jemima and 
 ‘two daughters of his friend, Richard Calloway, 
 while boating on the river had been captured by 
 ‘Shawanoes and carried off. Boone, accompanied 
 by the girls’ lovers and by John Floyd (eager to 
 repay his debt of life-saving to Boone) had pursued 
 them, tracing the way the captors had taken by 
 broken twigs and scraps of dress goods which one 
 of the girls had contrived to leave in their path, 
 had come on the Indians unawares, killed them, 
 _and recovered the three girls unhurt. 
 
 In the summer of 1776, Virginia took official 
 note of “Captain Boone of Boonesborough,”’ for 
 she sent him a small supply of powder. The men 
 of the little colony, which had begun so preten- 
 tiously with its constitution and assembly, were 
 : now obliged to put all other plans aside and to 
 “eoncentrate on the question of food and defense. 
 There was a dangerous scarcity of powder and lead. 
 ‘The nearest points at which these necessaries could 
 be procured were the Watauga and Holston Riyer 
 —— which were themselves none too well 
 ed. Harrod and Logan, some time in 1777, 
 
PES Leese 
 
 142 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 reached the Watauga fort with ties or Pe 
 horses and filled their packs: from Sevier’s il 
 but, as they neared home, they were detected b 
 red scouts and Logan was badly wounded before 
 he and Harrod were able to drive their ee 
 
 load safely through the gates at Harrodsburg. In 
 the autumn of 1777, Clark, witha beleenadell 
 munition, reached Maysville on the Ohio, havi 
 successfully run the gauntlet between banks in 
 possession of.thefoe. He had wrested the powde 
 and lead from the Virginia Council by threats 
 the effect that if Virginia was so willing to lose 
 Kentucky — for of course “a country not worth 
 defending is not worth claiming” —he and his 
 fellows were quite ready to take Kentucky for 
 themselves and to hold it with their swords against 
 all comers, Virginia included. By even such co- 
 gent reasoning had he convinced the Council — 
 which had tried to hedge by expressing doubts: 
 that Virginia would receive the Kentucky settlers 
 
 “as “citizens of the State” —that it would be 
 
 cheaper to give him the powder. 
 
 Because so many settlers had fled and the others, 
 had come closer together for their common good, 
 Harrodsburg and Boonesborough were now the only 
 occupied posts in Kentucky. Other settlements, 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 143 
 
 once thriving, were abandoned; and, under the ter- 
 ror, the Wild reclaimed them. In April, 1777, Boones- 
 borough underwent it its first_siege. Boone, leading 
 
 -asortie, was shot and he fell with a shattered ankle. 
 
 ‘An Indian rushed upon him and was swinging the 
 tomahawk over him when Simon Kenton, giant 
 Ease ee ra oS 
 frontiersman and hero of many daring deeds, rushed 
 aaa 
 forward, shot the Indian, threw Boone aerate 
 back, and fought his way desperately to safety. 
 It was some months ere Boone was his nimble self 
 
 again. But though he could not “stand up to the 
 
 guns,” he directed all operations from his cabin. 
 The next year Boone was ready for new ven- 
 tures growing from the settlers’ needs. .Salt.was 
 necessary to_ to preserve meat through the. summer. 
 Accordingly Boone and twenty-seven men went up 
 ‘to the. Blue Licks in February, 1778, to replenish 
 their supply..by..the simple process of boiling the 
 salt water of the Licks till the saline particles ad- 
 hered to the kettles. Boone was returning alone, 
 with a pack-horse load of salt and game, when a 
 blinding snowstorm overtook him and hid from 
 view four stealthy. Shawanoes on his trail. He was 
 seed and carried to a camp of 120 warriors led by 
 he French... Canadian, Dequindre, and James and _ 
 ae Girty, two white renegades. Among the 
 
\nl : bs 
 144 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Indians were some of those who had captured him on 
 his first exploring trip through Kentucky and who 
 ‘he had twice given the slip. Their hilarity was un- 
 \bounded. Boone quickly learned that this band was 
 
 on its way to surprise Booneshorough. It wasasea 
 
 son when Indian attacks were not expected; nearl 
 threescore of the men were at the salt spring and, 
 to make matters worse, the walls of the new fo 
 
 where the settlers and their families had gather 
 were as yet completed on only three sides. Boones- 
 borough was, in short, well-nigh defenseless. To 
 turn the Indians from their purpose, Boone con- 
 ceived the desperate scheme of offering to lead 
 them to the salt makers’ camp with the assurance 
 that he and his companions were willing to join the 
 tribe. He understood Indians well enough to feel 
 sure that once possessed of nearly thirty prisoners, 
 the Shawanoes would not trouble further about 
 Boonesborough but would hasten to make ae 
 umphal entry into their own towns. That some, 
 perhaps all, of the white men would assuredly die, 
 he knew well; but it was the only way to save the 
 women and children in Boonesborough. In spite 
 of Dequindre and the Girtys, who were leading a. 
 military expedition for the reduction of a fort, the 
 Shawanoes fell in with the suggestion. When they 
 
 a 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 145 
 
 had taken their prisoners, the more bloodthirsty 
 warriors in the band wanted to tomahawk them 
 all on the spot. By his diplomatic discourse, how- 
 ever, Boone dissuaded them, for the time being at 
 least, and the whole company set off for the towns 
 on the Little Miami. 
 
 The weather became severe, very little game 
 crossed their route, and for days they subsisted on 
 ‘slippery elm bark. The lovers of blood did not 
 hold back their scalping knives and several of the 
 prisoners perished; but Black.Fishy-the chief then 
 of most power in Shawanoe councils, adopted 
 
 Meas oan 
 
 Boone as his son, and gave him the name.of Shel- 
 
 towee, or Big Turtle. Though watched zealously 
 
 ‘to prevent escape, Big Turtle was treated with 
 
 every consideration and honor; and, as we would 
 say today, he played the game. He entered into 
 the Indian life with apparent zest, took part in 
 hunts and sports and the races and shooting 
 matches in which the Indians delighted, but he 
 was always careful not to outrun or outshoot his 
 opponents. Black Fish took him to Detroit when 
 
 some of the tribe escorted the remainder of the 
 prisoners to the British post. There he met Goyer=~ 
 nor Hamilton and, in the hope of obtaining his 
 liberty, he led that dignitary to believe that he 
 
 ro 
 
146 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 and the other people of Boonesborough were eage! 
 to move to Detroit and take refuge under th 
 British flag.* It is said that Boone always carrie 
 in a wallet round his neck the King’s co 
 
 given him in Dunmore’ = “War; and that_h 
 hibited it to Hamilton to bear out his story. Hamil. 
 ton sought to ransom him from the Indians, bu 
 Black Fish would not surrender his new son. Th 
 Governor gave Boone a pony, with saddle and 
 
 ; 
 trappings, and other presents, including a 
 
 to be used in procuring his needs and possibly his 
 
 liberty from the Shawanoes. 
 Black Fish then took his son home to Chillicothe. 
 Here Boone found Delawares and. Mingos-assem- 
 
 bling with the main body of the Shawanoe warriors. 
 
 The war belt was being carried through t 
 country. Again Boonesborough-and Harrodsburg, 
 were to be the first_settlements attacked. To es- 
 cape and give warning was now the one purpose 
 ‘ 
 that-obsessed Boone. He redoubled his efforts to 
 : 
 *So well did Boone play his part that he aroused suspicion even 
 in those who knew him best. After his return to Boonesborough 
 his old friend, Calloway, formally accused him of treachery on two 
 counts: that Boone had betrayed the salt makers to the Indians an d 
 had planned to betray Boonesborough to the British. Boone was 
 tried and acquitted. His simple explanation of his acts satisfied the 
 court-martial and made him a greater hero than ever among the 
 
 frontier folk. 
 
 : 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 147 
 
 throw the Indians off their guard. He sang and 
 whistled blithely about the camp at the mouth 
 of the Scioto River, whither he had accompanied 
 his Indian father to help in the salt boiling. In 
 short, he seemed so very happy that one day_Black. 
 Fish took } took his eye off him.for.a.few.moments to 
 watch the p ch the passing o of a flock of turkeys. Big Tur- 
 tle tle passed with the flock, leaving no.trace. To his 
 lamenting 5 parent it must have seemed as though 
 he had vanished into the air. Daniel crossed-the | 
 : hioa an the 160 miles to Boonesborough in four 
 days, during hich +t time he had only ene meal, 
 from a buffalo he shot at the BlueLicks. When he 
 reached the fort after an absence of nearly five 
 months, he found that his wife had given him up 
 for dead and had returned to the Yadkin. 
 Boone now began with all speed to direct prepa- 
 rations to withstand a siege. Owing to the In- 
 dian’s leisurely system of councils and ceremonies 
 before taking the warpath, it was not until the 
 first week in September that Black Fish’s painted 
 warriors, with some Frenchmen under Dequindre, 
 appeared before Boonesborough. Nine days the 
 siege lasted and was the longest in border history. 
 Dequindre, seeing that the fort might not be 
 taken, resorted to trickery. He requested Boone 
 
148 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 and a few of his men to come out for a parle 
 saying that his orders from Hamilton were 
 protect the lives of the Americans as far as pos- 
 sible. Boone’s friend, Calloway, urged against 
 acceptance of the apparently benign propos 
 
 which was made, so Dequindre averred, for 
 ““bienfaisance et humanité.””’ But the words +e 
 the words of a white man, and Boone hearkened to 
 them. With eight of the garrison he went out to 
 the parley. After a long talk in which good will 
 was expressed on both sides, it was suggested by 
 Black Fish that they all shake hands and, as there 
 
 ‘ 
 
 were so many more Indians than white men, twol 
 + 
 
 Indians should, of course, shake hands with one 
 white man, each grasping one of his hands. The 
 moment that their hands gripped, the trick was 
 clear, for the Indians exerted their strength to drag 
 off the white men. Desperate scuffling ensued in 
 which the whites with difficulty freed themselves 
 and ran for the fort. Calloway had prepared for 
 emergencies. The pursuing Indians were met wi 
 a deadly ; fire. After a defeated attempt to mine 
 the fort the enemy withdrew. 
 
 The successful defense of Boonesborough was. 
 an achievement of national..importance,. for had 
 Boonesborough fallen, Harrodsburg alone could 
 
 oe 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 149 
 
 not have stood. The Indians _under.the British 
 would have overrun Kentucky; and George Rogers 
 Clark — whose base for his Illinois operations was 
 the Kentucky forts — could not have made the 
 campaigns which wrested the Northwest from the 
 control of Great Britain. 
 
 Again Virginia took official note of Captain 
 Boone when in 1779 the Legislature established 
 Boonesborough “a town for the reception of 
 traders” and appointed Boone himself one of the 
 trustees to attend to the sale and Tegistration Gg 
 lots... An odd office that was for Daniel, who never 
 learned to attend to the registration of his own; 
 he declined it. His name appears again, however, 
 
 : 
 | 
 
 alittle later when Virginia made the whole of Ken- 
 tucky one of her counties with the following officers: 
 ! Colonel _ David Robinson, County Lieutenant; 
 ‘George Rogers Clark, Anthony Bledsoe, and John 
 
 Bowman, Majors; Daniel. Boone, James Harrod, 
 jamin Logan, and John Todd, Captains. 
 
 — 
 
 e Boonesborough’s successful resistance caused land 
 speculators as well as prospective settlers to take 
 : heart of grace. Parties made their way to Boenes- 
 /borough, Harrodsburg, and even to the Falls of © 
 [tone where Clark's fort and blockhouses now 
 eerie 
 
 4 
 
Sage ee 
 
 150 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 stood. In the summer of 1779 Clark had erected 
 on the Kentucky.side..of,.the..river a large — 
 which became the nucleus of the town of Louis- 
 ville. Here, while he was eating his heart out 
 
 with impatience for money and men to enable 
 him to march to the attaek of Detroit, as he had 
 planned, he amused himself by drawing up plans 
 for a city. He laid out private sections and public 
 parks and contemplated the bringing in of fami- 
 lies only to inhabit his city, for, oddly enough, he 
 who never married was going to make short shift 
 of mere bachelors in his City Beautiful. Between 
 pen scratches, no doubt, he looked out frequently 
 upon the river to descry if possible a boatload o 
 ammunition or the banners of the troops he had 
 been promised. ' 
 
 When neither appeared, he gave up the idea of 
 Detroit and set about erecting defenses on the 
 southern border, for the Choctaws.and Cherokees, 
 united_under a white leader named Colbert, were 
 threatening Kentucky by) way | of the Mississippi. 
 He built in-1780 Fort Jefferson in what is now 
 Ballard.County, and had barely completed the 
 new post and garrisoned it with about thirty mer 
 
 when it was besieged by Colbert and his savages. 
 The Indians, assaulting by night, were lured into 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 151 
 
 a position directly before a cannon which poured 
 
 lead into a mass of them. The remainder fled in 
 terror from the vicinity of the fort; but Colbert 
 succeeded in rallying them and was returning to 
 the attack when he suddenly encountered Clark 
 with a company of men and was forced to abandon 
 “his enterprise. 
 Clark knew that the Ohio Indians would come 
 | down on the settlements again during the summer 
 
 and that to meet their onslaughts every man in 
 Kentucky would be required. He learned that 
 there was a new influx of land seekers over the 
 : Wilderness Road and that speculators were doing 
 a thriving business in Harrodsburg; so, leaving his 
 company to protect Fort Jefferson, he took two 
 men with him and started across the wilds on 
 foot for Harrodsburg. To evade the notice of the 
 Indian bands which were moving about the coun- 
 By the three stripped and painted themselves 
 as warriors and donned the feathered headdress. 
 “So successful was their disguise that they were 
 | fired on by a party of surveyors near the outskirts 
 of Harrodsburg. 
 _~ The records do not state what were the sensa- 
 tions of certain speculators in a land office in 
 Harrodsburg when a blue-eyed savage in a war 
 
152 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 bonnet sprang through the doorway and, with up- 
 lifted weapon, declared the office closed; but we 
 get a hint of the power of Clark’s personality and 
 of his genius for dominating men from the terse 
 report that he “enrolled” the speculators. He was 
 informed that another party of men, more nervous 
 than these, was now on its way out of Kentucky. 
 In haste he dispatened a dozen frontiersmen to 
 cut the party off at Crab Orchard and take away 
 the gun of every man who refused to turn back 
 and do his bit for Kentucky. To Clark a man 
 was a gun, and he meant that every gun should 
 do its duty. 
 
 The leaders and pioneers of the Dark. sind Blea sl 
 Ground were’iow Warriors, all under | Clark’s Ss com- 
 mand, while for tw. years longer the Red Terror 
 ranged Kentucky, falling ‘With - savage force now 
 here, now there. In the first battle of 1780, at the 
 Blue Licks, Daniel’s broth other, Edward Boone, was 
 killed and scalped. Later on in the war his second 
 son, Israel, suffered a like fate. The toll of life 
 among the settlers was heavy. Many of the best- 
 known border leaders were slain. Food and pow- 
 der_often»ran short. Corn might be ‘planted, but 
 whether it would be harvested or not the planters 
 never knew; and the hunter’s rifle shot, necessary 
 
 a 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 153 
 
 though it was, proved only too often an invita- 
 tion to the lurking foe. But sometimes, through 
 all the dangers of forest and trail, Daniel Boone 
 slipped away silently_to Harrodsburg.to..confer 
 with Clark; or Clark himself, in the Indian guise 
 that suited the wild man in him not ill, made his 
 way to and from the garrisons which looked to 
 him for eve g. 
 3 ‘Twice Clark gathered together the “guns” of 
 Kentucky and, marching north into the enemy’s 
 country, swept down upon the Indian _ towns of - of 
 Piqua and Chillicothe and razed them. Inf 1782, 
 in the second a yey *head enterprises, his cousin, 
 melaBtorers, who had been taken prisoner and 
 adopted by the Indians and then wore Indian 
 garb, was shot down by one of Clark’s men. On 
 is expedition Boone and Harrod are said to have 
 accompanied Clark. 
 | The ever present terror and horror of those days, 
 especially of the two years preceding this expedi- 
 tion, are vividly suggested by the quaint remark 
 f an old woman who had lived through them, as 
 .. for us by a traveler. The most beautiful 
 sight she had seen in Kentucky, she said, was a 
 young man dying a natural death in his bed. Dead 
 oa unmarred by hatchet or scalping knife, he was 
 
A eae eee a 
 
 154 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 so rare and comely a picture that the women of th 
 post ‘sat up all night looking at him. . ; 
 
 But, we ask, what golden emoluments were show 
 ered by a grateful country on the men who thu 
 held the land through those years of want an 
 war, and saved an empire for the Union? Wha 
 practical recognition was there of these brav 
 and unselfish men who daily risked their lives an 
 faced the stealth and cruelty lurking in the wilder 
 ness ways? There is meager eloquence in the ree 
 ords. Here, for instance, is a letter from Georg 
 Rogers Clark to the Governor.of,Virginia, date 
 May 27, 1783: 
 
 Sir. Nothing but necessity could induce me to mak 
 the following request to Your Excellency, which is t 
 grant me a small sum of money on account; as I cai 
 assure you, Sir, that I am exceedingly distressed for th 
 want of necessary clothing ete and don’t know an 
 channel through which I could procure any except o 
 the Executive. The State I believe will fall conside1 
 ably in my debt. Any supplies which Your Excellene 
 favors me with might be deducted out of my ine 
 
 Clark had spent all his own substance and all 7 
 
 he could beg, borrow — or appropriate — in t 
 
 conquest of Illinois and the defense of Kentuck} 
 5 Calendar of Virginia State Papers, volortt, p. 487. si 
 
THE DARK AND BLOODY GROUND 155 
 
 lis only reward-from-Virginia was a grant of land 
 ‘om which he realized-nothing;and-dismissal from. 
 er service when she needed.him.no_ longer. 
 
 All that Clark had asked for himself was.a.com-, 
 lission in the ContinentalArmy. This was denied 
 im, as it appears now, not through his own errors, 
 hich had not at that time taken hold on him, but 
 arough the influence of powerful enemies. It is 
 1id that both Spain and England, seeing a great 
 yldier without service for his sword, made him 
 ffers, which he refused. As long as any acreage 
 smained to him on which to raise money, he con- 
 inued to pay the debts he had contracted to 
 nance his expeditions, and in this course he had 
 he assistance of his youngest brother, William, 
 9 whom he assigned his Indiana grant. , 
 | ‘Ais. health. impaired by. hardship. and exposure 
 = his heart broken by his country’s indifference, 
 
 lark sank into alcoholic _excesses,. In his sixtieth » © 
 
 ear, just six years before his death, and when he 
 as a helpless paralytic, he was granted a pension 
 t four hundred.dollars. There is a ring of bitter 
 ony in the words with which he accepted the 
 word sent him by Virginia in his crippled old age: 
 
 When Virginia needed a sword I gave her one.” 
 Te died near Louisville on February 13, 1818. 
 
 188 
 
» Va? 2 eran 
 Ly) 
 
 156 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Kentucky was admitted to the Union in | 
 But even before Kentucky became a State hel 
 affairs, particularly as to land, were arranged, let 
 us say, on a practical business basis. Then it was 
 discovered that Daniel Boone had no legal c claim 
 to any foot of ground in Kentucky. Daniel owned 
 nothing but the clothes he wore; and for those 
 as well as for much powder, lead, food, and su 
 trifles — he was heavily in debt. | 
 
 So, in 1788, Daniel Boone put the list of his debt 
 in his wallet, gathered his wife and his younger son 
 about him, and, shouldering his hunter’s rifle, one 
 more turned towards the wilds. The country of the 
 Great.Kanawha in West Virginia was still a wilder 
 ness, and a hunter and trapper might, in some years 
 earn enough to pay his debts. For others, now, the 
 paths he had hewn and made safe; for Boone once 
 more the wilderness road. 
 
: CHAPTER VIII 
 TENNESSEE 
 
 Inp1ANn law, tradition, and even superstition had 
 shaped the conditions which the pioneers faced 
 when they crossed the mountains. This savage 
 inheritance had decreed that Kentucky should be 
 a dark and bloody ground, fostering no life but that 
 of four-footed beasts, its fertile sod never to stir 
 with the green push of the corn. And so the white 
 men who went into Kentuelsy to build and to plant 
 went as warriors go, and for every cabin. they 
 erected they battled as warriors to hold a fort. In 
 the first years they planted little corn-and, reaped 
 less, for it may be said that their rifles were never 
 out of their hands. We have seen how stations 
 were built and abandoned until but two stood. 
 ous vigilance and SEES warfare were the 
 
 the Indian’s place of ‘desolation and death into a 
 
 land productive and a living habitation. 
 157 
 
1) ge Ci 
 158 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST | 
 
 Herein lies the difference, slight apparently, 
 significant, between the first Kentucky and 
 first Tennessee’ colonies. Within the memory 
 the Indians only one tribe had ever attempt 
 to make their home in K Kentucky. —a ‘tribe of 
 
 fighting Shawanoes — and they had been terrib 
 chastised for their temerity. But Tennessee w: 
 the home of the Cherokees, and at Chickasz 
 
 + Eee Sa, ; 
 
 Bluffs (Memphis) began the southward trail 
 the principal towns of the Chickasaws. By 
 red man’s, fiat, then, human life might abide i 
 Tennessee, though not in Kentucky, and it fol- 
 lowed that in seasons of peace the frontiersmen 
 might settle in Tennessee. So it was that as early 
 
 ae from the Indians, tie Fort 
 near Great Telliko, the Cherokees’ principal tow 
 and that, after the treaty of am in 1761, Wadde 
 and _ his rangers.of.North-Garolina.had erected 
 fort on the Holston. 
 Though Fort Loudon had fallen tragically d r- 
 ing the war, and though Waddell’s fort had bee 
 t Tennessee. The name, Ten-as-se, appears on Adair’s map as . 
 of the old Cherokee towns. Apparently net e meaning nor # 
 
 réason why the colonists called both state and river by this name : 
 been handed down to us. 
 
: / . TENNESSEE 159 
 Fi abandoned, neither was without influence in the 
 | colonization of Tennessee, for some of the men who 
 built these forts drifted back a year or two later and 
 | set up the first cabins on the Holston. These earliest 
 settlements, thin and scattered, did not survive; 
 
 |} but in 1768 the same settlers or others of their kind 
 3 tog discharged militiamen from Back Country regi- 
 j| ments — once more made homes on the Holston. 
 
 They were joined by a few families from near_ 
 the present Raleigh, North Carolina, who had de- 
 } spaired of seeing justice done to the tenants on the 
 |) mismanaged estates of Lord Granville. About the 
 ‘same time there was erected the first cabin on 
 ‘the Watauga River, as is generally believed, by a 
 man of the name of William Bean (or Been), hunter 
 _and frontier soldier from Pittsylvania County, Vir- 
 ginia. This man, who had hunted on the Watauga 
 with Daniel Boone in 1760, chose as the site of his 
 | dwelling the place of the old hunting camp near 
 the mouth of Boone’s-Creek. He soon began to 
 ' have neighbors. 
 
 er a sr 
 
 t 
 
 | Meanwhile the Regulation Movement stirred the 
 Back Country_of.both.the Car olinas. In 1763, 
 
 | the year in which William Bean built his cabin 
 | on the bank of the Watauga, five hundred armed 
 
 —_—— 
 
able. It is worthy of note that they included in their 
 “ demands articles which are now constitutional. 
 
 160 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Regulators in North Carolina, aroused by irregu i 
 larities in the conduct of public office, gathered 
 to assert their displeasure, but dispersed mine 
 bly on receipt of word from Governor Tryon that he 
 had ordered the prosecution of any officer found 
 guilty of extortion. Edmund Fann nning, the most 
 hated of Lord Granville’s agents, thouble convicted, 
 escaped punishment. Enraged at this miscarriage 
 of justice, the Regulators began a system of ter- 
 rorization by taking possession of the court, pre- 
 sided over by Richard Henderson. The judge 
 himself was obliged to slip out by a back way to 
 avoid personal injury. The Regulators burned his 
 house and stable. They meted out mob treatment 
 likewise to William Hooper, later one of the signers" 
 of the Declaration of Independence. 
 
 Two oe with at aims, had been 
 
 tarmevent 
 
 failure of justice in the case of Fanning hadiant given 
 the corrupt element its opportunity to seize con- 
 trol. In the petitions addressed to Goyernor 
 Tryon by the leaders of the movement in its earlier 
 stages the aims of liberty-loving thinkers are trace- 
 
 They desired that “suffrage be given by ticket and 
 
| 
 
 I 
 
 . TENNESSEE 161 
 
 : 
 ' 
 
 | ballot”; that the mode of taxation be altered, and 
 
 each person be taxed in proportion to the profits 
 arising from his estate; that judges and clerks be 
 given salaries instead of perquisites and fees. They 
 likewise petitioned for repeal of the act prohibit- 
 ing dissenting ministers from celebrating the rites 
 of matrimony. The establishment of these re- 
 forms, the petitioners of the Regulation concluded, 
 would “conciliate” their minds to “every just 
 measure of government, and would make the laws 
 what the Constitution ever designed they should 
 be, their protection and not their bane.” Herem 
 clearly enough we can discern the thought and the 
 phraseology of the Ulster. Presbyterians. 
 
 But a change took place in both leaders and 
 methods. During the Regulators’ career of violence 
 
 they were under the sway of an agitator named 
 Hermon Husband. This demagogue was reported 
 to have been expelled from the Quaker Society for 
 cause; it is on record that he was aa from the 
 North Carolina Assembly because a vicious anony- 
 
 us letter was traced to him. He deserted his 
 Z.. just before the shots cracked at Alamance 
 Creek and fied from the colony. .He was after- 
 wards apprehended in Pennsylvania for complicity 
 
 in the Whisky Insurrection. 
 | tie 
 
 tr 
 
162 PIONEERS OF THE OLD § 
 
 Four of the leading Preshyyiclalainaa of th 
 Back Country issued a letter in condemnation of 
 the Regulators. One of these ministers was the 
 famous Dayid Caldwell. son-im-law of the Reyer, 
 end Alexander Craighead. and a man who kne 
 the difference between liberty and license and who 
 proved himself the bravest of patriots in the War 
 of Independence. The records of the time contain 
 sworn testimony against ERE 
 still Avery. a signer of the Mecklenburg 
 who later presided honorably over. anid in ad 
 western circuit of Tennessee; and there is evide 
 indicating Jacobite and French intrigue. That Gov- 
 ernor Tryon recognized a hidden hand at work seems 
 clearly revealed in his proclamation addressed to 
 those “whose understandings have been run away 
 with and whose passions have been led in captivity 
 by some evil designing men who, actuated by cow- 
 ardice and a sense of that Publick Justice which is 
 due to their Crimes, have obscured themselves 
 from Publick view.” What the Assembly thought 
 of the Regulators was expressed in 1770 in a drastic 
 bill which so shocked the authorities in England 
 that instructions were sent forbidding any Gover- 
 nor to approve such a bill in future, declaring it 
 “a disgrace to the British Statute Books.” 
 
eaeahammees 168 
 
 =. 16, 1771, some Ps. 7 aisle Regula- 
 tors were precipitated by Husband into ihe Baitle 
 : of Alamance, which took place in ra aE setiled 
 largely by a rough and ignorant type of Germans, 
 ' many of whom Husband had lured to swell his 
 mob. Opposed to him were eleven hundred of 
 Governor Tryon’s-ireops, officered. by. such. patri-_ 
 ots as Griffith Rutherford, Hugh Waddell, and 
 4 is Nash. During an hour’s engagemeni about 
 twenty Regulators were killed, while the Gover- 
 | nor’s troops had nine killed and sixty-one wounded. 
 | pene he: leaders were hanged. = took the 
 | which Tryon a 
 Tt has been said about the Regulators that ae 
 were not cast down by their defeat at Alamance 
 _ but “hke the mammoth, they shook the bolt from 
 | their brow and crossed the mountains,” but such 
 | flowery phrases do not seem to have been inspired 
 by facts. Nor do the records show that “fifteen 
 . hundred Regulators” arrived at Watauga in 1771, 
 as has also been stated. Nor are the names of the 
 _ leaders of the Regulation to be found in the list of 
 signatures affixed to the one “state paper” of Wa, 
 tauga which was preserved and written into his- 
 _ torie annals. Nor yet do those names appear on 
 the roster of the Watauga and Holston men who, 
 
164 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 in 1774, fought with Shelby under Andrew Lew; 
 in the Battle of Point. Pleasant. Tete © = 
 the Bryans, the Robertsons, the Seviers, the Shel- 
 bys,,the men who opened up the West and eae 
 the destiny of its inhabitants, were genuine 
 men, with a sense of law and order ricci | 
 from liberty. “They would followa Washinsoasbel 
 not a Hermon Husband.. 
 James Hunter, whose signature leads onall Regu- 
 lation manifestoes just prior to the Battle of Ala- 
 mance, was a sycophant of Husband, to whom he 
 addressed fulsome letters; and in the real batile for 
 democracy — the War of Independence — he was 
 a Tory. The Colonial Records show that those 
 who, “like the mammoth,” shook from them the 
 ethical restraints which make man superior to the 
 giant beast, and who later bolted into the moun- 
 tains, contributed chiefly the lawlessness that har- © 
 assed the new settlements. They were the banditti 
 and, in 1776, the Tories of the western hills; they 
 pillaged the homes of the men who were fighting © 
 for the democratic ideal. 
 It was not tl the Regulati 
 turned ‘westward t the m: makers of the Old eee 
 but_ the free and enterprising spirit of th 
 
TENNESSEE 165 
 
 It was emphatically an age of doe doers; and if men 
 who felt the constructive Leerona in them might not 
 lay hold on conditions where they were and.re- 
 shape them, then they must go forward seeking 
 that environment which would give their genius 
 its opportunity. 
 
 Ofsuch adventurous spirits was James Robertson, 
 a Virginian born of Ulster Scot parentage, anda resi- 
 dent of (the present) Wake County, North Caro- 
 lina, since his boyhood. Robertson was twenty- 
 eight years old when, in 1770, he rode over the hills 
 to Watauga. We can imagine him as he was 
 then, for the portrait taken much later in life shows 
 the type of face that does not change. It is a 
 high type combining the best qualities of his race. 
 Intelligence, strength of purpose, fortitude, and 
 moral power are there; they impress us at the first 
 glance. At twenty-eight he must have been a 
 serious young man, little given to laughter; in- 
 deed, spontaneity is perhaps the only good trait 
 we miss in studying his face. He was a thinker who 
 had not yet found his purpose — a thinker in leash, 
 for at this time James Robertson could neither ; 
 read nor v write. 
 
 ) At Watauga, Robertson lived for a while in the 
 e of a man named Honeycut. He chose land 
 
 ied 
 
ae! eT POO eee ot , 
 s é | 
 
 166 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 for himself and, in accordance with the custom ¢ 
 the time, sealed his right to it by planting corn 
 He remained to harvest his first crop and then set 
 off to gather his family and some of his friends to: 
 gether and escort them to the new country. Bu 
 on the way he missed the trail and wandered fot 
 a fortnight in the mountains. The heavy rains 
 ruined his powder so that he could not hunt; fol 
 food he had only berries and nuts. At one place 
 where steep bluffs opposed him, he was obliged te 
 abandon his horse and scale the mountain side of 
 foot. He was in extremity when he chanced upoi 
 two huntsmen who gave him food and set him ot 
 the trail. If this experience proves his lack of 
 hunter’s instinct and the woodsman’s resourceful 
 ness which Boone possessed, it proves also his specia 
 qualities of perseverance and endurance which wer 
 toreach their zenith in his successful Istruggle tocolo 
 nize.and hold western. Tennessee. “He returned LC 
 Watauga in the following spring (1771) with hi 
 family and a small group of colonists. Robert 
 son’s wife was an educated woman and under he 
 instruction he now began to study. . 
 
 Next year a young Virginian from the Sheng; 
 doah Valley rode on down Holston Valley on ahu ot 
 ing and exploring trip and loitered at Watauga 
 
ia 
 
 Here he found not only a new settlement but an in- 
 
 TENNESSEE 167 
 
 dependent government in the making; and forth- 
 with he determined to have a part in both. This 
 young Virginian had already shown the inclina- 
 tion of a political colonist, for in the Shenandoah 
 
 Valley he had, at the age of nineteen, laid out the 
 town of New Market (which exists to this day) 
 | and had directed its municipal affairs and invited 
 
 and iostered its clergy. This young Virginian — 
 born on September 23, 1745, and so in 1772 twenty- 
 Seven years of age — was John Sevier, that John 
 Sevier whose monument now towers from its site. 
 | in Knoxville to testify of both the wild and the great 
 deeds of old Tennessee’s beloved knight. Like Rob- 
 : ertson, Sevier hastened home andremoyed hiswhole 
 family, including his wife and children, his parents 
 and his brothers and sisters, to this new haven of 
 freedom at Watauga. 
 | The friendship formed between Robertson and 
 Sevier in these first years of their work together 
 was never broken, yet two more opposite types 
 could hardly have been brought together. Robert- 
 son was a man of humble origin, unlettered, not a 
 dour | Scot but a solemn one. Sevier was cayalier as. 
 _seniealieaatetl 
 ' well as frontiersman. On his father’s side he was 
 of the patrician family of Xavier in France. His 
 
168 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 progenitors, having become Huguenots, had t: 
 refuge in England, where the name Xavier 
 fimally changed to Sevier. John Sevier’s mothe 
 was an Englishwoman. Some years before his birt 
 his parents had emigrated to the Shenandoah Val 
 ley. Thus it happened that John Sewer, wi 
 mingled good English blood with the blue blood of 
 old France, was bere ee 
 frontier hunter_and soldiers. He stood about f 
 feet nine from his moccasins to his crown.of li 
 brown hair.. He was well-proportioned_ 2 
 Scaccful of body as he walla vif 
 
 His chin was firm, his nose of a Roman cast, his 
 mouth well-shaped, its slightly full lips slanting in 
 asmile thai would not berepressed. Underthehigh 
 finely modeled brow, small keen dark blue eye 
 sparkled with health, with i intelligence, ax 
 the man’s joy in life. 
 
 John Sevier indeed cannot be listed as a 
 he was individual. There is no other c ctel 
 like him in border annals. Fe-nataiecaail 
 prince in his leadership of men; he had their he 
 age. Yet he knew how to be comrade and bre 
 to the lowliest. He won and held the confidence 
 
 and friendship of the serious-minded.Raberison 
 less than the idolatry of the wildest spirits on th 
 
TENNESSEE 169 
 
 frontier throughout the forty-three years of the 
 spectacular career which began for him on the day 
 he brought his tribe to Watauga. In his time he 
 wore the governor’s purple; and a portrait painted 
 of him shows how well this descendant of the noble 
 Xaviers could fit himself to the dignity and formal 
 habiliments of state. Yet in the fringed deerskin of 
 frontier garb, he was fleeter on the warpath than the 
 Indians who fled before him; and he could outride 
 and outshoot — and, it is said, outswear — the best 
 
 and the worst of the men who followed him. Per- 
 haps the lurking smile on John Sevier’s face was 
 a flicker of mirth that there should be found any 
 man, red or white, with temerity enough to try 
 conclusions with him. None ever did, successfully. 
 _ The historians of Tennessee state that the Wa- 
 taugans formed their government in 1772 and that 
 — was one of its LVS commissioners. yee as 
 possible that the Watauga Nee eitenes « was ae 
 formed until then. Unhappily the written con- 
 stitution of the little commonwealth was not 
 preserved; but it is known that, following the. Ul. 
 sterman’s ideal, manhood suffrage and_religious 
 Peeerennane 
 independence were two of its provisions. The 
 commissioners enlisted a militia and they recorded 
 
CMa ae ge 
 
 170 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 deeds for land, issued marriage licenses, and triec 
 offenders against the law. They believed them- 
 selves to be within the boundaries of Virginia and 
 therefore adopted the laws of that State for their 
 guidance. They had numerous offenders to deal 
 with, for men fleeing from debt or from the con: 
 sequence of crime sought the new settlements 
 just across the mountains as a safe and adjacent 
 harbor. The attempt of these men to pursue the 
 lawlessness in Watauga was one reason why th 
 Wataugans organized a government. 
 
 was discovered to be south of S., 
 hence on Indian lands. This was in weve with 
 the King’s Proclamation, and Alexander Cameron, 
 British agent to the Cherokees,.accordingly.ordered 
 the encroaching settlers to depart. The Indians, 
 however, desired them to remain. But since it was 
 illegal to purchase Indian lands, Robertson nego: 
 tiated a lease for ten years. In 1775, when He n- 
 derson made his purchase from the Cherokees, al 
 Sycamore Shoals,on the Watauga, - Robertson, and 
 Sevier, who were present at the sale with othet 
 Watauga commissioners, followed Henderson’s ex 
 ample and bought outright the lands they desired 
 
TENNESSEE 171 
 
 _toinclude in Watauga’s domain. In 1776 they pe- 
 _ titioned North Carolina for “annexation.” As they 
 “were already within North Carolina’s bounds, it 
 
 _ was recognition rather than annexation which they 
 sought. This petition, whichis the only Wataugan 
 _ document to survive, is undated but marked as re- 
 
 ceived in August, 1776. It is in Sevier’s handwrit- 
 
 | ing and its style suggests that it was composed by 
 
 him, for in its manner of expression it has much in 
 
 - common with many later papers from his pen. That 
 _ Wataugans were a law-loving community and had 
 
 formed their government for the purpose of mak- 
 ing law respected is reiterated throughout the docu- 
 ment. As showing the quality of these first western 
 statemakers, two paragraphs are quoted: 
 
 Finding ourselves on the frontiers, and being apprehen- 
 sive that for want of proper legislature we might becomea 
 shelter for such as endeavored to defraud their creditors; 
 considering also the necessity of recording deeds, wills, 
 and doing other public business; we, by consent of the 
 people, formed a court for the purposes above men- 
 tioned, taking, by desire of our constituents, the Virginia 
 laws for our guide, so near as the situation of affairs 
 would permit. This was intended for ourselves, and 
 was done by consent of every individual. 
 
 The petition goes on to state that, among their 
 measures for upholding law, the Wataugans had 
 
172 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 enlisted “‘a company of fine riflemen” and put the 7 | 
 under command of ‘ Coe Ja ames Robertson.” 
 
 RRs 
 
 We . . . thought proper to station them on our fron- 
 tiers in defense of the common cause, at the expense and 
 risque of our own private fortunes, till farther public 
 orders, which we flatter ourselves will give no offense. 
 
 . We pray your mature and deliberate consideration 
 in our behalf, that you may annex us to your Province 
 (whether as county, district, or other division) in such 
 manner as may enable us to share in the glorious cause 
 of Liberty : enforce our laws under authority and in every 
 respect become the best members of society; and for our- 
 selves and our constituents we hope we may venture to” 
 assure you that we shall adhere strictly to your determi- 
 nations, and that nothing will be lacking or anything 
 neglected that may add weight (in the civil or military 
 establishments) to the glorious cause in-which we are 
 now struggling, or contribute to the welfare of our own 
 or ages yet to come. 
 
 One hundred and thirteen names are signed to. 
 the document. In the following year (1777) Nort j 
 Carolina erected her overhill territory, into. Wash-— 
 ington County. The Govermen appointed justices 
 of the peace and militia officers who in the follow-— 
 ing year organized the new county and its courts. — 
 And so Watauga’s independent government, be- 
 gun in the spirit of true liberty, came as s lawfully | 
 toits end. 
 
: 
 : 
 
 | 
 
 TENNESSEE 173 
 
 - But for nearly three years before their political 
 
 _ status was thus determined, the Wataugans were 
 
 sharing “in the glorious cause of Liberty”’ by de- 
 fending their settlements against Indian attacks. 
 While the majority of the young Cherokee warriors 
 
 _ were among their enemies, their chief battles were 
 
 fought with those from the Chickamaugan towns 
 on the Tennessee River, under the leadership of 
 
 Dragging Canoe. The Chickamaugans embraced 
 _ the more vicious and bloodthirsty Cherokees, with 
 _ a mixture of Creeks and bad whites, who, driven 
 
 from every law-abiding community, had cast in 
 their lot with this tribe. The exact number of 
 
 _ white thieves and murderers who had found harbor 
 _ in the Indian towns during a score or more of years 
 is not known; but the letters of the Indian agents, 
 _ preserved in the records, would indicate that there 
 were a good many of them. They were fit allies 
 for Dragging Canoe; their hatred of those from 
 
 whom their own degeneracy had separated them 
 was not less than his. 
 
 In July, 1776, John Sevier wrote to the Virginia 
 Committee as follows: 
 
 Dear GENTLEMEN: Isaac Thomas, William Falling, 
 
 Jaret Williams and one more have this moment come 
 ’ in by making their escape from the Indians and say six 
 
174 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 hundred Indians and whites were to start for this fort 
 and intend to drive the country up to New River before 
 they return. 
 
 Thus was heralded the beginning of a savage war- 
 fare which kept the borderers engaged for years. 
 It has been a tradition of the chroniclers that 
 Isaac Thomas received a timely warning from 
 Nancy Ward, a half-caste Cherokee prophetess who 
 often showed her good will towards the whites; 
 and that the Indians were roused to battle by Alex- 
 
 ca 
 ander Cameron and John Stuart, the British agents 
 
 or superintendents among the overhill tribes. 
 
 There was a letter bearing Cameron’s name stating 
 that fifteen hundred savages from the Cherokee 
 and Creek nations were to join with British troops 
 landed at Pensacola in an expedition against the 
 southern frontier colonies. This letter was brought — 
 to Watauga at dead of night by a masked man who” 
 slipped it through a window and rode away. Ap- | 
 parently John Sevier did not believe the military : 
 information contained in the mysterious missive, 
 for he communicated nothing of it to the Virginia 
 Committee. In recent years the facts have come 
 to light. This mysterious letter and others of a 
 
 similar tenor bearing forged signatures are cited 
 
 in a report by the British Agent, John. Stuart, to 
 
TENNESSEE 175 
 
 his Government. It appears that such inflamma- 
 ‘tory missives had been industriously scattered 
 through the back settlements of both Carolinas. 
 There are also letters from Stuart to Lord Dart- 
 mouth, dated a year earlier, urging that something 
 
 be done immediately to counteract rumors set 
 afloat that the British were endeavoring to insti- 
 gate both the Indians and the negroes to attack 
 ns eediienaneeianet Saab M ti Foe 
 Eow i is, of course, an ees fact that Pen 
 in the War of f Independence, e even as both together is 
 chad used them against. the F rench and the Span- 
 | a and their allied Indians. It was inevitable 
 | that the Indians should participate in any severe 
 conflict between the whites. They were a numer- 
 ous and a warlike people and, from their point of 
 view, they had more at stake than the alien whites 
 who were contesting for control of the red man’s 
 continent. Both British and Americans have been 
 blamed for “half-hearted attempts to keep the In- 
 dians neutral.”’ The truth is that each side strove 
 to enlist the Indians — to be used, if needed later, 
 as warriors. Massacre was no part of this policy, 
 though it may have been countenanced by indi- 
 vidual officers in both camps. But it is obvious 
 
176 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 that, once the Indians took the warpath, they we 
 to be restrained by no power and, no matter und T 
 whose nominal command, they would carry olf 
 wartare by their own methods. * 4 
 
 Whatever may have been the case elsewhere, the 
 attacks on the Watauga and Holston settlements 
 
 > ey gener en pe 
 
 1 “There is little doubt that either side, British or Americans, s 
 ready to enlist the Indians. Already before Boston the American 
 had had the help of the Stockbridge tribe. Washington found the 
 service committed to the practise when he arrived at Cambridge early 
 in July. Dunmore had taken the initiative in securing such allies, ai 
 least in purpose; but the insurgent Virginians had had of late more 
 direct contact with the tribes and were now striving to secure the: 
 but with little success.” The Westward Movement, by Justin Winsor, 
 p. 87. F 
 
 General Ethan Allen of Vermont, as his letters show, sent emissaries 
 into Canada in an endeavor to enlist the French Canadians and the 
 Canadian Indians against the British in Canada. See American Ar- 
 chives, Fourth Series, vol. 11, p. 714. The British General Gage wrote 
 to Lord Dartmouth from Boston, June 12, 1775: “We need not be 
 tender of calling on the Savages as the rebels have shown us the 
 example, by bringing as many Indians down against us as they could 
 collect.” American Archives, Fourth Series, vol. 11, p. 967. 
 
 In a letter to Lord Germain, dated August 23, 1776, John Stuart 
 wrote: “Although Mr. Cameron was in constant danger of assassina- 
 tion and the Indians were threatened with invasion should they dare 
 to protect him, yet he still found means to prevent their falling on the 
 settlement.”” See North Carolina Colonial Records, vol. x, pp. 608 
 and 763. Proof that the British agents had succeeded in keeping the 
 Cherokee neutral till the summer of 1776 is found in the instructions, 
 dated the 7th of July, to Major Winston from President Rutledge of 
 South Carolina, regarding the Cherokees, that they must be forced to 
 give up the British agents and “instead of remaining in a State of 
 Neutrality with respect to British Forces they must take part with us 
 against them.” See North Carolina Colonial Records, vol. x, p. 658. 
 
him il 
 : \ TENNESSEE 177 
 
 were not instigated by British.agents--It was not 
 Nancy Ward but HenryS Stuart, John Stuart’s depu- 
 ty, who sent Isaac Thomas to warn the settlers. 
 
 In their efforts to keep the friendship of the red 
 men, the British and the Americans were providing 
 them with powder and lead. The Indians had run 
 short of ammunition and, since hunting was their 
 only means of livelihood, they must shoot or starve. 
 South Carolina sent the Cherokees a large supply 
 of powder and lead which was captured en route 
 by Tories. “About the same time Henry Stuart 
 set out from Pensacola with another consignment 
 from the British. His report to Lord Germain of 
 his arrival in the Chickamaugan towns and of what 
 took place there just prior to the raids on the Ten- 
 nessee settlements is one of the most illuminating 
 as well as one of the most dramatic papers in the 
 collected records of that time.’ 
 
 | Stuart's first act was secretly.to send.out Thomas, 
 the trader, to warn the settlers of their peril, for a 
 small war party of braves was even then conclud- 
 ing the preliminary war ceremonies. The reason 
 for ‘this Indian alarm and projected excursion was 
 the fact that the settlers had built one fort at least 
 
 on the Indian lands. Stuart finally persuaded | the 
 
 t North Carolina Colonial Rede vol. Ke pp. 7163-785. 
 
 12 
 
ict 
 eae a 
 
 178 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Indians to remain at peace until he could write te 
 the settlers stating the grievances and asking for 
 negotiations. The letters were to be carried by 
 Thomas on his return. 
 
 But no sooner was Thomas on his way again with 
 the letters than there arrived a deputation of we 
 riors from the Northern tribes — from “the Con. 
 federate nations, the Mohawks, Ottawas, Nantu: 
 cas, Shawanoes and Delawares.”’ — fourteen mer 
 in all, who entered the council hall of the Old 
 Beloved Town of Chota with their faces painted 
 black and the war belt carried before them. They 
 said that they had been seventy days on their jour- 
 ney. Everywhere along their way they had seen 
 houses and forts springing up like weeds across 
 the green sod of their hunting lands. Where once 
 were great herds of deer and buffalo, they had 
 watched thousands of men at arms preparing for 
 war. So many now were the white warriors an¢ 
 their women and children that the red men had 
 been obliged to travel a great way on the other side 
 of the Ohio and to make a detour of nearly three 
 hundred miles to avoid being seen. Even on this 
 outlying route they had crossed the fresh tracks of 
 a great body of people with horses and cattle going 
 still further towards the setting sun. But ther 
 
TENNESSEE 178 » 
 
 se. Hesaid that some American people had made 
 war on one of their towns and had aaa Seca 
 c Ftheir Great Beloved Man, Sir William Johnson, 
 mprisoned him, and put him to a cruel death; 
 this crime demanded a great vengeance and they 
 " ould not cease until they had taken it. One after 
 a nother the fourteen delegates rose and made their 
 t. and presented their wampum strings to 
 
 ing Canoe. The last to speak was_a chief 
 
 fai ners, the French,”’ who had been so long dead, 
 e “alive again,”’ that they had supplied them 
 jlentifully with arms and ammunition and had 
 ) ised to assist them in driving out the Amer- 
 jeans and in reclaiming their country. Now all the 
 N orthern tribes were joimed in one for this great 
 = and they themselves were on their way to 
 allthe Southern tribes and had resolved that, if any 
 triberefused to join, they would fall upon and extir- 
 i sticatietotaes overcome the whites. 
 At the conclusion of his oration the Shawanoe 
 ——— the war belt — nine feet of six-inch-wide 
 
sey Ph ae ‘et 
 
 180 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 purple wampum spattered with vermilion —t 
 Dragging Canoe, who held it extended between hi 
 two hands, in silence, and waited. Presently ros 
 a headman whose wife had been a member of Si 
 William Johnson’s household. He laid his hand o1 
 the belt and sang the war song. One by one, ther 
 chiefs and warriors rose, laid hold of the great bel 
 and chanted the war song. Only the older men 
 made wise by many defeats, sat still in their places 
 mute and dejected. “After that day every yo 
 fellow’s face in the overhills towns appeare 
 blackened and nothing was now talked of but war. 
 
 Stuart reports that “all the white men” in 
 tribe also laid hands on the belt. Draggi 
 then demanded that Cameron and Stuart_co 
 forward and take hold of. the war belt— “which 
 we refused.”’ Despite the offense their 
 
 gave—and it would seem a dangerous wii 
 give such offense — Cameron delivered a “ 
 talk”’ for peace, warning the Cherokees of cial 
 musi surely be the end of the rashness they con- 
 templated. Stuart informed the chief that if 
 Indians persisted in attacking the settlements with- 
 out waiting for answers to his letters, he would 
 not remain with them any longer or bring thez 
 any more ammunition. He went to his house z 
 
TENNESSEE 181 
 
 nade ready to leave on the following day. Early 
 he next morning Dragging C appeared at his 
 door and told him Gente ictinns were now very 
 ingry about the letters he had written, which could 
 only have put the settlers on their guard; and that 
 Wa any white man attempted to leave the nation 
 “they had determined to follow him but not to 
 ” Dragging Canoe had painted his 
 e black to carry this message. Thomas now now 
 | eturned with an_answerfrom.."‘the West Fin- 
 castle men,”’ which was so unsatisfactory to the 
 
 bring him back. 
 
 tribe that war ceremonies were immediately begun. 
 art and Cameron could no longer influence the 
 
 s. “All that could now be done was to give 
 them strict charge not to pass the Boundary Line, 
 mot to injure any of the King’s faithful subjects, not 
 to Kill any women and children”; and to threaten 
 to “stop all ammunition” if they did not obey 
 these orders. 
 
 _ The major part of the Watauga militia went out 
 ito meet the Indians and defeated : ‘a large advance. 
 Hoxce at at_Long Long Island FI Flats on the Holston. The 
 Watauga fort, where many y of th the settlers had taken 
 refuge, contained forty fighting men under Robert- 
 
 be 
 son and Sevier, As Indians usually retreated and 
 
te ee eee ore 
 
 182 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST | 
 
 ~ waited for a while after a defeat, those within t 
 fort took it for granted that no immediate atta 
 was to be expected; and the women went out : 
 daybreak into the fields to milk the cows. Sud 
 denly the war whoop shrilled from the edge 
 
 the clearing. Red warriors leaped from the gree 
 skirting of the forest. The women ran for the fa 
 
 Quickly the heavy gates swung to and the droppe 
 bar secured them. Only then did the watchme 
 discover that one woman had been shut out. 
 Was a young woman nearing her twenties and, 
 legend has reported her truly, “Bonnie Kate Sher 
 rill’ wasa beauty. Through a porthole Sevier sa’ 
 her running towards the shut gates, dodging 2 ne 
 darting, her brown hair blowing from the wind oi 
 her race for life— and offering far too rich a pri 
 to the yelling fiends who dashed after her. Sevi 
 coolly shot the foremost of her pursuers, the 
 sprang upon the wall, caught up Bonnie Kate 
 and tossed her inside to safety. And legend say 
 further that when, after Sevier’s brief widower 
 hood, she became his wife, four years later, Bonnie 
 Kate was.wont to say that she would be willin; 
 to run another such race any day to have anothe 
 such introduction! . 
 
 There were no casualties within the fort anc 
 
thirt; vietories.” His method was io takea 
 small company of the hardiesit and swiftest 
 semen— men who could keep them seat and 
 eadurance. and horses thai could keep ther feet 
 ad ther speed. om any sicep of the mouniams no 
 ex how tangled and rough the going mighi be 
 swoop down upon war camp. or iown. and go 
 pugh it with rifle and haichet and fire. then dash 
 rd at the same pace before ihe enemy had 
 begun to consider whether io follow him or noi. 
 im all his “thirty-five baiiles™ ii is said he lost not 
 more than fifty men 
 ae RE 
 sof almost coatinuoas warfare. the treaty being 
 jud. ed om their side by ihe old chicis who had 
 
184 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 So fast was population growing, owing to the open- 
 ing of a wagon road into Burke County, North Caro- 
 lina, that Washington County. was divided. T 
 Sevier became Colonel of Washington and Isaa¢ 
 Shelby Colonel. of the newly erected i 
 County. J onesborough, the oldest town in Ten 
 
 nessee, was laid out as the county seat of Washing- 
 ton; and in the same year (1778) Sevier moved to 
 the bank of the Nolichucky River, so-called after the 
 Indian name of this dashing sparkling stream, mean- 
 ing rapid or precipitous. Thus the nickname given 
 John Sevier by his devotees had a dual application. 
 He was well called Nolichucky Jack. 
 
  , 
 When Virginia annulled Richard Henderson’s im 
 
 chew renee me: 
 
 mense purchase but_allowed- him-a- arget 
 the Cumberland, she by.no vmeaiilaispiia noel a 
 
 intrepid pioneer. Henderson’s tenure of Kentucky 
 had been brief, but not. unprofitable i in experience. 
 He had learned that colonies must be treated with 
 less commercial pressure and with more regard 
 to individual liberty, if they were to be held loyal 
 either to a King beyond the water or to an un 
 
 crowned leader nearer at hand. He had been mak | 
 ing his plans for colonization of that portion of 
 
 the Transylvania purchase which lay within the 
 
TENNESSEE 185 
 
 bounds of North Carolina along the Cumberland 
 and choosing his men to lay the foundations of his 
 , projected settlement in what was then a wholly un- 
 inhabited country; and he had decided on generous 
 terms, such as ten dollars a thousand acres for land, 
 ‘the certificate of purchase to entitle the holder 
 to further proceedings in the land office without 
 extra fees. 
 
 | * To head an enterprise of such danger and hard- 
 ‘ship Henderson required a man of more than 
 ‘mere courage; a man of resource, of stability, of 
 proven powers, one whom other men would follow 
 and obey with confidence. So it was that James 
 Robertson was chosen to lead the first white settlers 
 ‘into middle Tennessee. He set out in February, 
 ‘1779, accompanied by his brother, Mark Robert- 
 ‘aaite for Pelenent aad to Say Maainwtite 
 laother small party led by Gaspar Mansker had 
 aurived As the boundary line between Virginia 
 and North Carclina had not been run to this point, 
 Robertson believed that the site he had chosen lay 
 within Virginia and was in the disposal of General 
 Clark. To protect the settlers, therefore, he jour- 
 neyed into the Illinois country to purchase cabin 
 rights from Clark, but there he was evidently 
 
186 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 convinced that the site on the Cumberland woul 
 be found to lie within North Carolina. He 7ebarael 
 to Watauga to lead a party of settlers into the new 
 territory, towards which they set out in October. 
 After crossing the mountain chain through_Cum- 
 berland Gap;-the party followed Boone’s road — 
 the Warriors’ Path — for some distance and then 
 made their own trail southwestward through the 
 wilderness to the bluffs on the Cumberland, where 
 they built cabins to house them against one of the 
 coldest winters ever experienced in that country. 
 ,,So were laid the first foundations of the presen 
 ree at first named Nashborough by 
 Robertson.2. On the way, Robertson had fallen in 
 with a party of men and families bound for Ken- 
 tucky and had persuaded them to accompany his 
 little band to the Cumberland. Robertson’s 0 
 wife and children, as well as the families of hi 
 
 party, had been left to follow in the second expe 
 dition, which was to be made by water under th 
 command of Captain John Donelson. 
 
 The little fleet of boats containing the settler 
 their families, and all their household goods, wai 
 to start from Fort Patrick Henry, near Long Islan | 
 
 tIn honor of General Francis Nash, of North Carolina, who w: 
 mortally wounded at Germantown, 1777. 
 
TENNESSEE 187 
 
 in the Holston River, to float down into the Ten- 
 nessee and along the 652.miles of that widely wan- 
 dering stream-to-the.Ohio,-and then to proceed up 
 
 the Ohio to the mouth of the Cumberland and up 
 
 the Cumberland until Robertson’s station should 
 appear — a journey, as it turned out, of some nine.” 
 hundred miles through unknown country and on 
 waters at any rate for the greater part never before 
 navigated by white men. 
 
 Journal of a voyage, intended by God's permis 
 sion, in the good boat Adventure is the title of the 
 log book in which Captain Donelson entered the 
 events of the four months’ journey. Only a few 
 pages endured to be put into print: but those few 
 tell a tale of hazard and courage that seems com- 
 plete. Could a lengthier narrative, even if en- 
 riched with literary art and fancy, bring before us 
 more vividly than do the simple entries of Donel- 
 son’s log the spirit of the men and the women who 
 won the West? If so little personal detail is re- 
 corded of the pioneer men of that day that we must 
 deduce what they were from what they did, what 
 do we know of their unfailing comrades, the pio- 
 neer women? Only that they were there and that 
 they shared in every test of courage and endur- 
 ance, save the march of troops and the hunt. 
 
188 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Donelson’ s Journal therefore has a special value, 
 because in its terse account of Mrs me ennings~¢ 
 
 Mrs... Peyton it depicts unfaneuiasilieies aa y 
 
 of pioneer. womanhood.* 
 
 December 22nd, 1779. Took our departure from the 
 fort and fell down the river to the mouth of Reedy 
 Creek where we were stopped by the fall of water and 
 most excessive hard frost. 
 
 Perhaps part of the Journal was lost, or perhaps 
 the ‘‘excessive hard frost” of that severe winter, 
 when it is said even droves of wild game perished 
 prevented the boats from going on, for the next 
 entry is dated the 27th of February. On this 
 date the Adventure and two other boats grounded 
 and lay on the shoals all that afternoon and the 
 succeeding night “‘in much distress. ”’ 
 
 March 2nd. Rain about half the day.... M 
 Henry’s boat being driven on the point of an island b: 
 the force of the current was sunk, the whole cargo muck 
 damaged and the crew’s lives much endangered, which 
 occasioned the whole fleet to put on shore and go te 
 their assistance. 
 Monday 6th. Got under way before sunrise; the morn- 
 ing proving very foggy, many of the fleet were much 
 bogged — about 10 o’clock lay by for them; wher 
 
 1 This Journal is printed in Ramsey’s Annals of Tennessee. 
 
- 
 
 TENNESSEE 189 
 
 collected, proceeded down. Camped on the north shore, 
 ‘where Captain Hutching’s negro man died, being much 
 frosted in his feet and legs, of which he died. 
 
 Tuesday, 7th. Got under way very early; the day 
 /proving very windy, a S. S. W., and the river being 
 wide occasioned a high sea, insomuch that some of the 
 smaller crafts were in danger; therefore came to at the 
 uppermost Chiccamauga town, which was then evacu- 
 ated, where we lay by that afternoon and camped that 
 night. The wife of Ephraim. Peyton was here delivered 
 of a child. Mr. Peyton has gone through by land with 
 Captain Robertson. 
 
 Wednesday 8th . . . proceed down to an Indian vil- 
 lage which was inhabited . . . they insisted on us to come 
 ashore, called us brothers, and showed other signs of 
 friendship. . . . And here we must regret the unfortu- 
 nate death of young Mr. Payne, on board Captain Blake- 
 -more’s boat, who was mortally wounded by reason of 
 the boat running too near the northern shore opposite 
 
 the town, where some of the enemy lay concealed; and 
 
 the more tragical misfortune of poor Stuart, his family 
 and friends, to the number of twenty-eight persons. 
 
 This man had embarked with us for the Western coun- 
 
 try, but his family being diseased with the small pox, 
 
 it was agreed upon between him and the company that 
 he should keep at some distance in the rear, for fear of 
 the infection spreading, and he was warned each night 
 when the encampment should take place by the sound 
 
 of ahorn. . . . the Indians having now collected to a 
 
 considerable number, observing his helpless situation 
 
 singled off from the rest of the fleet, intercepted him and 
 killed and took prisoners the whole crew . . . ; their 
 cries were distinctly heard. ... 
 
190 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 After describing a running fight with Indians st 
 tioned on the bluffs on both shores where the rive 
 narrowed to half its width and boiled through a can 
 yon, the entry for the day concludes: “‘Jennings’ 
 boat is missing.” 
 
 Friday 10th. This morning about 4 o’clock we were 
 surprised by the cries of “help poor Jennings” at some 
 distance in the rear. He had discovered us by our fire: 
 and came up in the most wretched condition. He states 
 that as soon as the Indians discovered his situation [hi 
 boat had run on a rock] they turned their whole atten- 
 tion to him and kept up a most galling fire at his boat. 
 He ordered his wife, a son nearly grown, a young man 
 who accompanies them and his negro man and woman, 
 to throw all his goods into the river to lighten their boa’ 
 for the purpose of getting her off; himself returning their 
 fire as well as he could, being a good soldier and an ex- 
 cellent marksman. But before they had accomplished 
 their object, his son, the young man and the negro, 
 jumped out of the boat and left. . . . Mrs. Jennings, 
 however, and the negro woman, succeeded in unloading 
 the boat, but chiefly by the exertions of Mrs. Jennings 
 who got out of the boat and shoved her off, but was near 
 falling a victim to her own intrepidity on account of the 
 boat starting so suddenly as soon as loosened from the 
 rock. Upon examination he appears to have made a 
 wonderful escape for his boat is pierced in numberless: 
 places with bullets. It is to be remarked that Mrs. 
 Peyton, who was the night before delivered of an infant, 
 which was unfortunately killed upon the hurry and con- 
 fusion consequent upon such a disaster, assisted them, 
 
TENNESSEE 191 
 
 | being frequently exposed to wet and cold.... Their 
 clothes were very much cut with bullets, especially 
 | Mrs. Jennings’s. 
 
 ‘Of the three men who deserted, while the women 
 stood by under fire, the negro was drowned and 
 Jennings’s son andthe other young man were 
 captured by the Chickamaugans. “The latter was 
 \burned at the stake. Young Jennings was tohavé 
 |shared the same fate; but a trader in the village, 
 Jearning that the boy was known to John Sevier, 
 ‘ransomed him by a large payment of goods, as a 
 
 ~ 
 
 | eame in sight of the Muscle Shoals. Halted on the 
 | northern shore at the appearance of the shoals, in order 
 _ to search for the signs Captain James Robertson was to 
 | make for us at that place . . . that it was practicable 
 _for us to go across by land . . . we can find none — 
 from which we conclude that it would not be prudent 
 to make the attempt and are determined, knowing our- 
 selves in such imminent danger, to pursue our journey 
 
 down the river. . . . When we approached them [the 
 : Shoals] they had a dreadful appearance. . .. The water 
 being high made a terrible roaring, which could be heard 
 at some distance, among the driftwood heaped fright- 
 fully upon the points of the islands, the current running 
 in every possible direction. Here we did not know how 
 soon we should be dashed to pieces and all our troubles 
 
 to him. AANA AMA GO 
 4 —— > 
 Sunday 12th... . After running until about 10 o’clock 
 
 | return for an act of kindness Sevier had once done _ 
 
 |} 
 
bottom and appeared constantly in danger of striking 
 They warped as much as in a rough sea. But by the 
 hand of Providence we are now preserved from this dan 
 ger also. I know not the length of this wonderful shoal 
 it had been represented to me to be twenty-five or thirty 
 miles. If so, we must have descended very rapidly, as 
 indeed we did, for we passed it in about three hours. 
 
 On the twentieth the little fleet arrived at the 
 mouth of the Tennessee and the voyagers landed 
 on the bank of the Ohio. 
 
 Our situation here is truly disagreeable. The river is 
 very high and the current rapid, our boats not con- 
 structed for the purpose of stemming a rapid stream 
 our provisions exhausted, the crews almost worn dow 
 with hunger and fatigue, and know not what distance 
 we have to go or what time it will take us to our place of 
 destination. The scene is rendered still more melan 
 choly as several boats will not attempt to ascend the 
 rapid current. Some intend to descend the Mississippi 
 to Natchez; others are bound for the Illinois — among 
 the rest my son-in-law and daughter. We now part, 
 perhaps to meet no more, for I am determined 
 pursue my course, happen what will. | 
 
 Tuesday 21st. Set out and on this day labored very 
 hard and got but little way. . . . Passed the two fol- 
 lowing days as the former, suffering much from hunger 
 and fatigue. 
 
 Friday 24th. About three o’clock came to the mouth of 
 a river which I thought was the Cumberland. Some of 
 
TENNESSEE 193 
 
 _ the company declared it could not be — it was so much 
 smaller than was expected. . . . We determined how- 
 ever to make the trial, pushed up some distance and 
 encamped for the night. 
 
 Saturday 25th. Today we are much encouraged; the 
 river grows wider; . . . we are now convinced it is 
 the Cumberland... . 
 
 Sunday 26th . . . procured some buffalo meat; though 
 poor it was palatable. 
 
 Friday 31st . . . met with Colonel Richard Hender- 
 
 | son, who is running the line between Virginia and North 
 
 | Carolina. At this meeting we were much rejoiced. He 
 
 gave us every information we wished, and further in- 
 formed us that he had purchased a quantity of corn 
 in Kentucky, to be shipped at the Falls of Ohio for the 
 
 | use of the Cumberland settlement. We are now with- 
 
 q 
 
 out bread and are compelled to hunt the buffalo to 
 
 | preserve life. . . . 
 
 Monday, April 24th. This day we arrived at our jour- 
 ney’s end at the Big Salt Lick, where we have the pleas- 
 ure of finding Captain Robertson and his company. It 
 is a source of satisfaction to us to be enabled to restore 
 to him and others their families and friends, who were 
 entrusted to our care, and who, sometime since, perhaps, 
 despaired of ever meeting again... . 
 
 Past the camps of the Chickamaugans — who 
 
 _ were retreating farther and farther down the twist- 
 
 ing flood, seeking a last standing ground in the 
 giant caves by the Tennessee — these white voy- 
 agers had steered their pirogues. Near Robertson’s 
 . . (a 
 station, where they landed after having traversed 
 
 X3 
 
close the larger part.of.wes 26, .S a 
 crumbling trading house 1 ake ee a 
 Frenchman who.had, one time, sailed in from the 
 Ohio. to. establish an outpost | of his nation there. 
 At a little distance were the ruins of a rude fort 
 cast up by the Cherokees in the days when the re 
 doubtable Chickasaws had driven them from the 
 pleasant shores of the western waters. Under the 
 towering forest growth lay vast burial mounds 
 and the sunken foundations of walled towns, tell- 
 ing of a departed race which had once flashed its 
 rude paddles and had its dream of permanence 
 along the courses of these great waterways. Now 
 another tribe had come to dream that dream 
 anew. Already its primitive keels had traced 
 the opening lines of its history on the face of the 
 immemorial rivers. 
 
mast 
 
 _Azovct the time when James Robertson went from ~ 
 ‘Watauga to fling out the frontier line three-hun— 
 dred miles farther westward, the British took Sa- 
 LT 
 tyvannah. In 178Q they took CharlestonandA 
 Georgia. Augusta was the point where 
 the old trading path forked north and west, 
 and it was the key to the Back Country and the 
 
 : 
 : 
 
 ‘overhill domain. In Georgia and the Back Coun- 
 try of South Carolina there were many Tories 
 ‘Teady to rally to the King’s standard whenever a 
 
 | = 
 
 ‘King’s officer should carry it through their midst. 
 
 A large number of these Tories were Scotch, chiefly 
 from the Highlands. In fact, as we have seen, 
 ‘Scotch bleod predominated among the racial 
 streams in the Back Couniry from Georgia to Pena- 
 sylyania. Now, to insure a triumphant march 
 northward for Cornwallis and his royal troops, 
 
 these sons of Scotland must be gathered together, 
 195 
 
the loyal encouraged and those of rebellious tend- 
 encies converted, and they must be drilled and 
 turned to account. This task, if it were to be ac- 
 complished successfully, must be entrusted to 2 
 officer with positive qualifications,-one who would 
 command respect, whose personal address would at: 
 tract men and disarm opposition, and especially one 
 who could go as aScot among hisownclan. Corn- 
 wallis found his man in. Major. Patrick.Ferguson. 
 
 Ferguson was a Highlander, a son of Lord it. 
 four of Aberdeen, and thirty-six years of age. _He 
 was of short stature for a Highlander — about fiv five 
 feet eight — lean and dark, with straight black. hai ; 
 He hada serious unhandsome countenance which, 
 at casual glance, might not arrest attention; but 
 when he spoke he became magnetic, by reason of 
 the intelligence and innate force that gleamed in his 
 _ eyes and the convincing sincerity of his manner 
 He was admired and respected by his brother offi- 
 cers and by the commanders under whom he hae 
 
 served, and he was loved by his men. 
 
 He had seen his first service in the Seven Years 
 War, having joined the British army in Flanders 
 at the age of fifteen; and he had early distinguishec¢ 
 himself for courage and coolness. In 1768, as ¢ 
 captain of infantry, he quelled an insurrection of 
 
‘ok KING’S MOUNTAIN 197 
 
 the natives on the island of St. Vincent in the 
 West Indies. Later, at Woolwich. he took up the 
 
 scientific study of his profession of arms. He not 
 only became a crack shot, but he invented a new 
 type of rifle which he could load at the breach — 
 
 “without ramrod and so quickly as to fire seven 
 
 times in aminute. Generals and statesmen attend- 
 ed his exhibitions of shooting; and even the King 
 
 rode over at the head of his guards to watch | Fer- 
 
 guson rapidly loading and firing. 
 In America under Cornwallis, Ferguson had the 
 
 } reputation of being the best shot in the army; and 
 it was soon said that, in his quickness at loading 
 and firing, he excelled the most expert American 
 
 frontiersman. Eyewitnesses have left their testi- 
 mony that, seeing a bird alight on a bough or rail, 
 he would drop his bridle rein, draw his pistol, toss 
 it in the air, catch and aim it as it fell, and shoot 
 the bird’s head off. He was given command of a 
 corps of picked riflemen; and in the Battle of the 
 Brandywine in_ 1777, he rendered services which 
 won acclaim from the whole army. For the honor 
 of that day’s service to his King, Ferguson paid 
 what from him, with his passion for the rifle, 
 must have been the dearest price that could have 
 been demanded. His right arm was shattered, and 
 
198 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 for the remaining three years of his short life it 
 hung useless at his side. Yet he took up swordplay | 
 and attained a remarkable degree of skill as a left-_ 
 handed swordsman. ] 
 
 Such was Ferguson, the soldier. What of the 
 man? For he has been pictured as a woli and a | 
 fiend and a coward by early chroniclers, who evi- | 
 dently felt that they were adding to the virtue of ; 
 those who fought in defense of liberty by Tepre-— 
 senting all their foes as personally odious. We 
 can read his quality of manhood in a few lines of 
 the letter he sent to his kinsman, the noted Dr. 
 Adam Ferguson, about an incident that occurred 4 
 at Chads Ford. As he was lying with his men ~ 
 in the woods, in front of Knyphausen’s army, so 
 he relates, he saw two American officers ride out. 
 He describes their dress minutely. One was in~ 
 hussar uniform. The other was in a dark green 
 and blue uniform with a high cocked hat and was” 
 mounted on a bay horse: 
 
 I ordered three good shots to steal near to and fire at 
 them; but the idea disgusting me, I recalled the order. 
 The hussar in retiring made a circuit, but the other 
 passed within a hundred yards of us, upon which I ad- 
 vanced from the wood towards him. Upon my calling 
 he stopped; but after looking at me he proceeded. I 
 again drew his attention and made signs to him to stop, 
 
| 
 
 KING’S MOUNTAIN 199 
 
 levelling my piece at him; but he slowly cantered away. 
 
 As I was within that distance, at which, in the quickest 
 firing, I could have lodged half a dozen balls in or about 
 him before he was out of my reach, I had only to deter- 
 
 mine. But it was not pleasant to fire at the back of an 
 
 unofiending individual who was acquitting himself very 
 
 coolly of his duty — so I let him alone. The day after, 
 
 I had been telling this story to some wounded officers, 
 
 who lay in the same room with me, when one of the sur- 
 
 geons who had been dressing the wounded rebel officers 
 came in and told us that they had been informing him 
 that General Washington was all the morning with the 
 
 light troops, and only attended by a French officer in 
 _hussar dress, he himself dressed and mounted in every 
 _ point as above described. I am not sorry that I did not 
 
 know at the time who tt was. 
 
 Ferguson had his code towards the foe’s women 
 
 also. On one occasion when he was assisting in 
 
 ene 
 
 an action carried out by Hessians_and_ Dragoons, 
 he learned that some American women had been 
 shamefully maltreated. He went in a white fury 
 
 t Doubt that the officer in question was Washington was expressed 
 by James Fenimore Cooper. Cooper stated that Major De Lancey, 
 his father-in-law, was binding Ferguson’s arm at the time when the 
 two officers were seen and Ferguson recalled the order to fire, and that 
 De Lancey said he believed the officer was Count Pulaski. But, as 
 
 _ Ferguson, according to his own account, “leveled his piece” at the 
 
 officer, his arm evidently was not wounded until later in theday. The 
 probability is that Ferguson’s version, written in a private letter to 
 his relative, is correct as to the facts, whatever may be conjectured as 
 to the identity of the officer. See Draper’s King’s Mountain and its 
 Heroes, pp. 52-54. 
 
200 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST _ 
 
 to the colonel in command, and demanded that. 1e 
 men who had so disgraced their uniforms instant y 
 “be put to death. Be 
 
 In rallying the loyalists of the Back Coun Cy 
 of Georgia and the Carolinas, Ferguson was very 
 successful. He was presently in command of a 
 thousand or more men, including small detach- 
 ments of loyalists from New York and New J Yew Jersey, 
 under American-born officers. such as De. De-Peyste , 
 and Allaire. There were good honest men among 
 the loyalists and there were also rough and vicious 
 men out for spoils — which was true as well of the 
 Whigs or Patriots from the same counties. Among 
 the rough element were Tory banditti from the 
 overmountain region. It is to be gathered from 
 Ferguson’s records that he did not think any too 
 highly of some of his new recruits, but he set 0 
 work with all energy to make them useful. - 
 
 The American.Patriots hastily prepared to op- 
 pose him. Colonel Charles McDowell of..Burke 
 County, North ¢ Carolina, with a ‘eel force of mili- 
 tia was just “south of the line at a point on the 
 Broad River when he heard that Ferguson was 
 sweeping. onnorthward. In haste he sent a call for 
 help across the mountains. to Sevier and Shelby. 
 Sevier had his hands full at_Watauga, but he 
 
? ores 
 bd 
 
 ENG. MOUNTAIN 201 
 
 ee 
 
 ; Eiclby, with a Saran rel from iene County 
 -erossed the mountains to McDowell’s..assistance. 
 These ““overmountain men”’ or “‘backwater men,” 
 as they were called east of the hills, were trained 
 in Sevier’s method of Indian warfare — the secret 
 approach through the dark, the swift dash, and 
 the swifter flight. “‘Fight strong and run away 
 : fast” was the Indian motto, as their women had 
 ‘often been heard to call it after the red men as they 
 ran yelling to fall on the whites. The frontiers- 
 men had adapted the motto to fit their case, as 
 they had also made their own the Indian tactics 
 of ambuscade and surprise attacks at dawn. To 
 sleep, or ride if needs must, by night, and to fight 
 by day and make off, was to them a reasonable 
 soldier’s life. 
 But Ferguson was a night marauder. The terror 
 of his name, which grew among the Whigs of the 
 Back Country until the wildest legends about his 
 ferocity were current, was due chiefly to a_habit« 
 he had of of pouncing on his foes i in the middle of the 
 night and pulling them out of bed to give fight or 
 die. It was generally both fight and die, for these 
 Bark adventures of his were particularly success- 
 ful. Ferguson knew no neutrals or conscientious 
 
ce Ol Oar) Pst, 
 “ M 
 
 202 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 objectors; any man who would not carry arms for 
 _the King was a traitor, and his life and goo ‘goods were 
 forfeit. A report. of his-reads: “The attack being 
 made at night, no quarter could be given.” Hence 
 his wolfish fame. Werewolf” would have been a 
 fit name for him for, though he was a wolf at nigh 
 in the daylight he was a man and, as we have seen, 
 a chivalrous one. 
 
 In the guerrilla fighting that went on for a brief 
 time between the overmountain. men..and..various 
 detachments of Ferguson’s forces, sometimes one 
 side, sometimes the other, won the heat. But the 
 field remained open. Neither side could claim the 
 mastery. In a minor engagement fought at M s- 
 grove’s..Mill on the Enoree,.Shelby’s command 
 came off victor an was about to pursue the enemy 
 towards. Ni Ninety® foi when a messenger from Me 
 Dowell galloped madly into camp with word of 
 General Gates’s crushing defeat at Camden# This 
 was a warning for Shelby’s guerrillas to flee as 
 birds to their mountains, or Ferguson would cut 
 them off from the north and wedge them in be- 
 tween his own force and the victorious Cornwallis. 
 McDowell’s men, also on the run for safety, joined 
 them. For forty ight nee without food or rest 
 they rode a race with Ferguson, who kept hard on 
 
| 
 
 | KING’S MOUNTAIN 203 
 their trail until they disappeared into the mystery 
 | of the winding mountain paths they alone knew. 
 Ferguson reached the gap where they had 
 
 ‘swerved into the towering hills only half an hour 
 
 after their horses’ hoofs had pounded across it. 
 
 Here he turned back. His troops were exhausted 
 from the all-night ride and, in any case, there 
 
 were not enough of them to enable him to cross the 
 mountains and give the Watauga men battle on 
 their own ground with a fair promise of victory. 
 So keeping east of the hills but still close to them, 
 Ferguson turned into Burke County, North-Garo- 
 lina. He sat him down in Gilbert Town (present 
 Lincolnton, Lincoln County) at the foot of the Blue_ 
 Ridge and indited a letter_to the “Back Water 
 Men,” telling them that if they did not lay down 
 ‘their arms and return to their rightful allegiance, 
 
 he would come over their hills and raze their settle- 
 : ments and hang their leaders. He paroled a kins- 
 : man of Shelby’s, whom he had taken prisoner in the 
 : chase, and sent him home with the letter. Then 
 he set about his usual business of gathering up 
 
 Tories and making soldiers of them, and of hunting 
 
 down rebels. 
 
 One of the “rebels” was a certain Captain Létle. 
 When Ferguson drew up at Lytle’s door, Lytle had 
 
 ) 
 
204 PIONEERS OF THE OLD 
 
 already made his escape; but Mrs. awemaa ties eT 
 She was a very handsome woman and she hi: 
 dressed herself in her best to receive Ferguson, v 
 was reported a gallant as well as sa wolf. After | 
 few spirited passages between the lady i in the doc 
 way and the officer on the white horse before if 
 the latter advised Mrs. Lytle to use her influen 
 to bring her husband back to his duty. She be 
 came grave then and answered that her husbane 
 would never turn traitor to his country. Fergu 
 frowned at the word “traitor,” but presently h 
 said: “Madam, I admire you as the handsomes 
 woman I have seen in North Carolina. I eve 
 half way admire your zeal in a bad cause. FE 
 take my word for it, the rebellion has had its daj 
 and is now virtually put down. Give my rega 
 to Captain Lytle and tell him tocomein. He 
 not be asked to compromise his honor. His y 
 pledge not again to take up arms a the F 
 is all thai will be asked of him.” 
 
 This was another phase of the character of thi 
 one-armed Highlander whose final challenge to the 
 back water men was now being considered in ever 
 log cabin beyond the hills. A man who would noi 
 shoot an enemy in the back, who was ready toy u 
 
 — 
 
 * Draper, King's Mountain and is Heroes, pp. 151-53. 
 
g KING’S MOUNTAIN 205 
 
 th same faith in another soldier's honor which 
 ne knew was due to his own, yet in battle a wolf- 
 ish fighter who leaped through the dark to give 
 
 When elby on the Holston received Ferguson’s 
 pungent letter, he flung himself on his horse and 
 
 ‘rode posthaste to Watauga to consult with Sevier. 
 He found the bank of the Nolichucky teeming 
 ‘with merrymakers. Nolichucky Jack was giving 
 -am immense barbecue and a horse race. Without 
 letting the festival crowd have an inkling of the 
 Serious nature df Shelby’s errand, the two men 
 dre drew apart to confer. It is said-to have-been-Se- 
 Vier’s idea that they should muster the forces of 
 the western country and go in search of Ferguson 
 | ere 1 the latter should be able to get sufficient re- 
 inforcements to cross the mountains. Sevier,like 
 [ Ferguson, always preferred-to seek his foe, knowing 
 _ well the advantage of the offensive. Messengers 
 | were s sent_to Colonel William Campbell of the 
 | | Virginia settlements on the Clinch, asking his aid. 
 Campbell ai first refused, thinking it better to 
 fortify the positions they held and let Ferguson 
 
‘ 
 
 206 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 come and put the mountains between himself and” 
 ‘Cornwallis. On receipt of a second message, how 
 _ ever, he concurred. The call to arms was heard up 
 and down the valleys, and the frontiersmen poure¢ 
 
 into Watauga. The overhill men were augmented 
 by McDowell’ s troops from Burke County, who had 
 dashed over the mountains a few weeks before i n 
 their escape from Ferguson. 
 
 At daybreak on the 26th of September they 
 mustered at the Sycamore Shoals on the Watauga 
 over a thousand strong. It was a different picture 
 they made from that other great gathering at the 
 same spot when Henderson had made his purchase 
 in money of the Dark and Bloody Ground, and 
 Sevier_and Robertson-had-beught, for the Watau- 
 gans this strip.of-Tennessee. There were no In- 
 dians in this picture. Dragging ‘Canoe, who had 
 uttered his bloody prophecy, had by these very 
 men been driven far south into the caves of the 
 Tennessee River. But the Indian prophecy still 
 hung over them, and in this day with a heavier 
 menace. Not with money, now, were they to seal 
 their purchase of the free land by the western 
 waters. There had been no women in that other 
 picture, only the white men who were going for- 
 ward to open the way and the red men who were 
 
\ 
 retreating. But in-this picture there were women 
 —wives and children, mothers, sisters, and sweet- 
 hearts. All the women of the settlement were 
 there at this daybreak muster to cheer on their 
 
 ‘way the men who were going out to battle that 
 
 KING’S MOUNTAIN 207 
 
 ‘they might keep the way of liberty open not for 
 ‘men only but for women and children also. And 
 the battle to which the men were now going forth 
 
 must be fought against Back Country men of their 
 
 own stripe under a leader who, in other circum- 
 
 stances, might well have been one of themselves — 
 
 a primitive spirit of hardy mountain stock, who, 
 having once taken his stand, would not barter and 
 would not retreat. 
 
 “With the Sword of the Lord and of Gideon!” 
 eried their pastor, the Reverend Samuel Doak, 
 with upraised hands, as the mountaineers swung 
 into their saddles. And it is said that all the 
 women took up his words and cried again and 
 again, “With the sword of the Lord and of our 
 Gideons!” To the shouts of their women, as bugles 
 on the wind of dawn, the buckskin-shirted army 
 dashed out upon the mountain trail. 
 
 The warriors’ equipment included rifles and am- 
 munition, tomahawks, knives, shot pouches, a knap- 
 sack, and a blanket for each man. Their uniforms 
 
208 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 were leggings, breeches, and long loose shirts of 
 gayly fringed deerskin, or of the linsey-woolsey s sp 1 
 by their women. Their hunting shirts were bound 
 in at the waist by bright-colored linsey sashes tied 
 behindinabow. They wore moccasins s forfeotgear, 
 and on their heads high fur or ‘deerskin caps 
 trimmed with colored bands of raveled clot 
 
 pitas 
 Around their necks hung their powder-horns orn; orna- 
 mented with their own rude carvings. re 
 
 On the first day they drove along with them 
 a number of beeves but, finding that the cattle 
 impeded the march, they left them behind on the 
 mountain side. Their provisions thereafter were 
 wild game and the small supply each man carried 
 of mixed corn meal and maple sugar. For drink, 
 they had the hill streams. 
 
 They passed upward between Roan and Yellow 
 mountains-to-the top of the range. Here, on the 
 bald summit, where the loose snow lay to their 
 ankles, they halted for drill and rifle practice. 
 When Sevier called up his men, he discovered that 
 two were missing. He suspected at once that they 
 had slipped away to carry warning to Fergus a 
 for Watauga was known to be infested with oul : 
 Two problems now confronted the mountaineers. 
 (1) They must increase the speed of their march, so 
 
KING’S MOUNTAIN 209 
 
 that Ferguson should not haye time to get rein- 
 forcements from Cornwallis; ‘and they must make 
 that extra speed by another trail than il than they had 
 intended tz taking so g so that they themselves cc could not 
 be intercepted before they had picked up the Back 
 Country militia under Colonels Cleveland, Hamp- 
 bright, Chronicle, and Williams, who were moving 
 to join them. We are not told who took the lead 
 when they left the known trail, but we may sup- 
 pose it was Sevier and-his Wataugans, for the mak- 
 ing of new warpaths and wild riding were two of 
 the things which distinguished Nolichucky Jack’s 
 leadership. Down the steep side of the mountain, 
 finding their way as they plunged, went the over- 
 hill men. They crossed the Blue Ridge at _Gil- 
 lespie’s Gap and pushed on to Quaker Meadows, 
 where Colonel Cleveland with 350 men swung into 
 their column. Along their route, the Back Country 
 Patriots with their rifles came out from the little 
 hamlets and the farms and joined them. 
 
 | They now had an army of perhaps fifteen hun- 
 dred men but no commanding officer. Thus far, 
 a the march, the four colonels had conferred 
 
 gether and agreed as to procedure; or, in real- 
 ity, the influence of Sevier and Shelby, who had 
 lanned the enterprise and who seem always to 
 
 14 
 
= Os ee 
 tig ite. 
 J 
 
 210 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 have acted in unison, had swayed the others. 
 would be, however, manifestly improper to go int 
 battle without a real general. Something m : 
 be done. McDowell volunteered to carry a lette 
 explaining ahisnies need to General Gates, who hae 
 escaped with some of his staff into North Caroling 
 and was not far off. It then occurred to Sevi 
 and Shelby, evidently for the first time, that Gates 
 on receiving sucha—request, might well ask why 
 the Governor of North Carolina, as the military 
 head of the State, had not provided a com 
 mander. The truth is that Sevier and Shelb 
 had been so busy drumming up the militia am 
 
 planning their campaign that they had foune 
 no time to consult the Governor. Moreover, the 
 means whereby the expedition had been finance 
 might not have appealed to the chief executive 
 After finding it impossible to raise sufficient fund 
 on his personal credit, Sevier had appropriated) 
 the entry money in the government land office t 
 the business in hand — with the good will of th 
 entry taker, who was a patriotic man, although, ai 
 he had pointed out, he could not, officially, hand 
 over the money. Things being as they were, n 
 doubt Nolichucky Jack felt that an interview wit 
 the Governor had better be deferred until after” 
 
KING’S MOUNTAIN 211 
 
 the capture of Ferguson. Hence the tenor of this 
 
 communication to General Gates: 
 
 _As we have at this time called out our militia without 
 any orders from the Executive of our different States 
 and with the view of expelling the Enemy out of this 
 part of the Country, we think such a body of men 
 
 worthy of your attention and would request you to send 
 
 a General Officer immediately to take the command. 
 J All our Troops being Militia and but little ac- 
 quainted with discipline, we could wish him to be a 
 Gentleman of address, and able to keep up a proper 
 discipline without disgusting the soldvery. 
 
 For some unknown reason — unless it might be 
 the wording of this letter! — no officer was sent 
 in reply. Shelby then suggested that, since all the 
 | @ificers but Campbell were North Carolinians and, 
 therefore, no one of them could be promoted with- 
 out arousing the jealousy of the others, Campbell, 
 
 as the only Virginian, was the appropriate choice. 
 
 | The sweet reasonableness of selecting a commander 
 ‘from such a motive appealed to all, and Campbell 
 became a general in fact if not in name! Shelby’s 
 principal aim, however, had been to get rid of Mc- 
 ‘Dawell, who, as their senior, would naturally ex- 
 pect to command and whom he considered “too 
 far advanced in life and too inactive” for such 
 anenterprise. At this time McDowell must have 
 
es 
 
 <oring ‘on the loyalists to jom-him. If the overmout 
 
 My 
 yen 
 
 an Ferguson’s proclamation shows what the wol 
 
 212 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST > 
 
 been nearly thirty-nine; and Shelby, who was jus 
 thirty, wisely refused to risk the campaign under 
 general who was in his dotage! 
 
 News of the frontiersmen’s approach, with thei 
 augmented force, now numbering between sixteel 
 and eighteen hundred, had reached Ferguson bj 
 the two Tories who had deserted from Sevier 
 troops. Ferguson there 
 out of Gilbert Town and was marchin hwar 
 to_get_in touch with Cornwallis. His force wa 
 much reduced, as some of his men were in pursui 
 of Elijah Clarke towards Augusta and a number ¢ 
 his other Tories were on furlough. As he passe 
 through the Back Country he posted a notice call 
 
 _ tain men felt that they were out on a wolf hunt 
 
 thought of his hunters. 
 
 To the Inhabitants of North Carolina. 
 
 GENTLEMEN: Unless you wish to be eat up by ani 
 nundation of barbarians, who have begun by murderin 
 an unarmed son before the aged father, and afterwar 
 lopped off his arms, and who by their shocking cruelti 
 and irregularities give the best proof of their cowardice 
 and want of discipline: I say if you wish to be pinione 
 robbed and murdered, and see your wives and dager te 
 in four days, abused by the dregs of mankind —in 
 
KING’S MOUNTAIN 213 
 
 short if you wish to deserve to live and bear the name of 
 men, grasp your arms in a moment and run to camp. 
 The Back Water men have crossed the mountains: 
 McDowell |, Hampton, Shelby, and Cleveland are at their 
 head, so that you know what you have to depend upon. 
 you choose to be degraded forever and ever by a 
 set of mongrels, say so at once, and let your women 
 turn their backs upon you, and look out for real men to 
 protect them. 
 
 Pat. Fercuson, Major 71st Regiment.* 
 5 Ferguson’ s force has been estimated at about 
 | leven ‘hundred men, but it is likely that this esti- 
 ate does not take the absentees into considera- 
 tion. In the diary of Lieutenant Allaire, one of his 
 officers, the number is given as only eight hundred. 
 Because of the state of his army, chroniclers have 
 found Ferguson’s movements, after leaving Gil- 
 feet Town, difficult to explain. It has been pointed 
 out that = could easily have escaped, aes he had 
 ‘quarters, w was only sixty miles distant. We have 
 seen something of Ferguson’s quality, however, and 
 we may simply take it that he did not want to 
 escape. He had been planning to cross the high 
 hills — to_him, the Highlander, no barrier but a 
 challenge — to fight these men. Now that they 
 
 * Draper, King’s Mountain and its Heroes, p. 204. 
 
VS Ole ere, & 
 
 214 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 had taken the initiative he would not show them 
 his back. He craved the battle. So he sent out ii 
 runners to the main-army~-and-rode_on_along th 
 
 eastern base of the racuntains, seeks std 
 
 site e to go into” camp and wait for-Corn 
 _On the 6th of October he rine the sant 
 “of the King’s Mountain-ridge; in South es ina 
 
 about half a_mile south of the northern boundary. 
 Here a rocky, semi-isolated spur juts out from the 
 ridge, its summit — a table-land about six hundred 
 yards long and one hundred and twenty wide at 
 its northern end —rising not more than sixty feet 
 above the surrounding count y- On he summit 
 Ferguson pitched_his-eamp. . 
 
 The hill was a natural fortress, its sides forested, 
 its bald top protected by rocks and bowlders. All 
 the approaches led through denseforest. Anenemy 
 force, passing through the immediate, wooded terri ; 
 tory, might easily fail to discover a small army 
 nesting sixty feet above the shrouding leafage. 
 Word was evidently brought to Ferguson here, 
 telling him the now augmented number of his foe, 
 for he dispatched another emissary to Cornwallis” 
 with a letter stating the number of his own troops 
 and urging full and immediate assistance. ‘ 
 
 Meanwhile-the frontiersmen had halted at the. 
 
 A) 
 J a 
 
r 
 
 : 
 
 KING’S MOUNTAIN 215 
 
 ‘ 
 Cowpens. There they feasted royally off roasted 
 cattle and corn belonging to the loyalist who owned 
 the Cowpens. It is said that they mowed his fifty 
 acres of corn in an hour. And here one of their 
 “spies, in the assumed réle of _a Tory, learned Fer- 
 guson’s plans, his approximate force, his route, and 
 his system of communication with Cornwallis. 
 The officers now held council and determined to 
 ‘take a detachment of the hardiest and fleetest horse- 
 men and sweep down on the enemy before aid 
 
 _ according to Shelby’s report, 910 mounted men set 
 
 off at full speed, leaving the main body of horse 
 
 _ and foot to follow after at their best pace. 
 
 Rain poured down on them all that night as 
 
 they rode. At daybreak they crossed the Broad— 
 
 at Cherokee Ford and dashed on in the drenching 
 eee 
 
 rain alltheforenoon. They kept their firearms and 
 powder dry by wrapping them in their knapsacks, 
 blankets, and hunting shirts. The downpour had 
 so churned up the soil that many of the horses 
 mired, but they were pulled out and whipped for- 
 ward again. The wild horsemen made no halt for 
 
 food or rest. Within two miles of King’s Mountain~ : » 
 _ they captured Ferguson’s messenger with the letter 
 
 that told of his desperate situation. They asked 
 
 h | 0 
 
 f. a eee et 
 (UHOUA~” ! 
 \ pe : 
 
 a fl 
 ole 
 J Not 
 
 = 
 
this man how they should know Ferguson. He 
 told them that Ferguson was in full uniform bul 
 wore a checkered shirt or dust cloak over it. This 
 
 was not the only messenger of Ferguson’s who faile¢ 
 to carry through. The men he had sent out pre- 
 viously had been followed and, to escape capture 
 or death, they had been obliged to lie in hiding 
 so that they did not reach Cornwallis until the day 
 of the battle. 
 
 At three o’clock on the afternoon of the_7th 0 
 October, the overmountain men were in the forest 
 at the base of the hill. The rain had ceased and the 
 sun was shining. They dismounted and tethered 
 their steaming horses. Orders were given that every 
 man was to “‘throw the priming out of his pan, pick 
 his touchhole, prime anew, examine bullets and se 
 that everything was in readiness forbaittle.” The 
 plan of battle agreed on was to surround the hill, 
 hold the enemy on the top and, themselves screened 
 by the trees, keep pouring in their fire. There was 
 a good chance that most of the answering fire would 
 go over their heads. . 
 
 As Shelby’s-men crossed a_gap in the woods, the 
 outposts on the hill discovered their presence and 
 sounded the alarm. Ferguson sprang to horse, 
 blowing his silver whistle to call his men to attac kc, 
 
| KING’S MOUNTAIN Q17 
 
 a riflemen poured fire into Shelby’s contingent, 
 
 jut meanwhile the frontiersmen on the other sides_ 
 
 ————E 
 
 were creeping up, and presently a_circle of fire 
 
 ourst upon the hill. With fixed bayonets, some of 
 Ferguson’s men charged down the face of the slope, 
 igainst the advancing foe, only to be shot in the 
 
 dack as they charged. Still time and time again 
 they charged; the overhill men reeled and retreated; 
 
 out always their comrades took toll with their 
 rifles; Ferguson’s men, preparing for a mounted 
 charge, were shot even as they swung to their 
 saddles. Ferguson, with his customary indiffer- 
 ence to danger, rode up and down in front of his 
 ine blowing his whistle to encourage his men. 
 “Huzza, brave boys! The day is our own!” Thus 
 he was heard to shout above the triumphant war 
 whoops of the circling foe, surging higher and 
 higher about the hill. 
 
 But there were others in his band who knew the 
 fight was lost. The overmountain men saw two 
 white handkerchiefs, affixed to bayonets, raised 
 above the rocks; and then they saw Ferguson dash 
 by and slash them down with his sword. Twe 
 horses were shot under Ferguson in the latter part 
 of the action; but he mounted a third and rode 
 again into the thick of the fray. 
 
CT eee ee, Pt ae 
 *h, pith pA pas ’ q 
 218 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Suddenly the cry spread among the attacla 
 troops that the British officer, Tarleton, had com 
 
 to Ferguson’s rescue; and the mountaineers begai 
 
 to give way. But it was only the g galloping horse 
 of their own comrades; Tarleton had not come 
 Nolichucky Jack spurred out in front of his me 
 
 and rode along the line. Fired by his courage the} 
 sounded the war whoop again and renewed thi 
 attack with fury. 
 
 “These are the same yelling devils that wer 
 at Musgrove’s Mill,” said Captain De 7 
 to Ferguson. 
 
 Now Shelby and Sevier, leading his Wataugans 
 had reached thesummit. The firing circle pressed i 
 Thebuckskin-shirted warriors leaped the rocky bar 
 riers, swinging their tomahawks and long knives 
 Again the white handkerchiefs fluttered. Ferguso 
 saw that the morale of his troops was shattered. 
 
 *“Surrender,’’ De Peyster, his second in com 
 mand, begged of him. 
 
 “Surrender to those damned banditti?_ Never ‘ 
 
 Ferguson turned his horse’s head \ downhill anc 
 charged into the Wataugans, hacking right and lef 
 with his sword till it was broken at the hilt. . 
 dozen rifles were leveled at him. An iron muzzle 
 pushed at his breast, but the powder flashed in thi 
 
KING’S MOUNTAIN 219 
 
 an. He swerved and struck at the rifleman with 
 is broken hilt. But the other guns aimed at him 
 spoke; and Ferguson’s body jerked from the saddle 
 
 ierced by eight bullets. Men seized the bridle 
 lof the frenzied horse, plunging on with his dead 
 
 master dragging from the stirrup. 
 
 The battle had lasted less than an hour. After 
 Ferguson fell, De_Peyster advanced with a white 
 flag and surrendered his sword to Campbell. Other 
 white flags waved along the hilltop. But the kill- 
 ing did not yet cease. It is said that many of the 
 
 mountaineers did not know the significance of the 
 white flag. Sevier’s sixteen-year-old son, having 
 heard that his father had fallen, kept on furiously 
 loading and firing until presently he saw Sevier ride 
 in among the troops and command them to stop 
 shooting men who had surrendered and thrown 
 down their arms. 
 
 ’ The victors made a bonfire of the enemy’s bag- 
 gage wagons and supplies. Then they killed some 
 of his beeves and cooked them; they had had nei- 
 ther food nor sleep for eighteen hours. They dug 
 shallow trenches for the dead and scattered the 
 loose earth over them. Ferguson’s body, stripped 
 of its uniform and boots and wrapped in a beef 
 hide, was thrown into one of these ditches by 
 
‘+> ) ee 
 
 220 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST © 
 
 the men detailed to the burial work, while the offi- 
 cers divided his personal effects among themselves, 
 
 ) 
 
 The triumphant army turned homeward as the 
 dusk descended. The uninjured prisoners and th 
 wounded who were able to walk were marched of 
 carrying their empty firearms. The badly wounded 
 were left lying where they had fallen. 
 
 At Bickerstaff’s Old Fields in Rutherford County 
 the frontiersmen halted; and here they selected 
 
 thisty of their prisoners to be hanged. They swung 
 them aloft, by torchlight, three at a time, unti 
 nine had gone to their last account. Then Seyie 
 interpesed; and, with Shelby’s added authority 
 saved the other twenty-one. Among those whe 
 thus weighted the gallows tree were some Gi 
 the Tory brigands from Watauga; but not all the 
 victims were of this character. Some of the troops 
 would have wreaked vengeance on the two Torie 
 from Sevier’s command who had betrayed theit 
 army plans to Ferguson; but Sevier claimed them 
 as under his jurisdiction and refused consent 
 Nolichucky Jack dealt humanely by his foes. Te 
 the. coarse and brutish Cleveland, now astride o 
 Ferguson’s horse and wearing his sash, and to th 
 three hundred who followed him, may no doubt b 2 
 laid the worst excesses of the battle’s afterpiece. © 
 
ie 
 
 | . KING’S MOUNTAIN 221 
 | WVictors and vanquished drove on in the dark, 
 
 to the great flank of hills. From where King’s 
 Mountain, strewn with dead and dying, reared its 
 black shape like some rudely hewn tomb of a pri- 
 mordial age when titans strove together, perhaps 
 ... ears of the marching men came faintly 
 through the night’s stillness the how] of a wolf and 
 the answering chorus of the pack. For the wolves 
 e down to King’s Mountain from all the sur- 
 ounding hills, following the scent of blood, and 
 nade | their lair where the Werewolf had fallen. 
 The scene of the mountaineers’ victory, which 
 marked the turn of the tide for the Revolution, 
 Beane for years the chief resort of wolf hunters 
 from both the Carolinas. 
 _ The importance of the overmountain men’s vic- 
 tory lay in what it achieved for the cause of Inde- 
 
 pendence.” King’s Mountain was the prelude to 
 
 Cornwallis’s defeat. It heartened the Southern 
 Patriots, until then cast down by Gates’s disaster. 
 
 To the British the death of Ferguson was_an_irre- 
 
 parable loss because of .its.depressing effect on the 
 Back Country Tories. King’s Mountain, indeed, 
 
 eG, Seven days after the battle 
 seneral Nathanael_Greene succeeded to the com- 
 
Be 1 haa tid 
 
 222 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 had led to defeat. Greene’s genius met the rising 
 tide of the Patriots’ courage and hope and took it a 
 the flood. His strategy, in dividing his army an 
 thereby compelling the division of Cornwallis 
 force, led to Daniel Morgan’s victory at the Co 7 
 
 pens, in the Back Cou South Car ina, 01 
 January 17, 1781 — another frontiersme tri- 
 
 umph. Though the British won the next engage 
 ment between Greene and Cornwallis—the batt! 
 of Guilford Court House in the North Carolina Back 
 Country, on the 15th of March— Greenemadeth on 
 pay so dearly for their victory that Tarleton callec 
 it “the pledge of ultimate defeat”’; and, three day 
 later, Cornwallis was retreating towards Wilming 
 y Gi ton. In a sense, then, King’s Mountain was the 
 pivot of the war’s revolving stage, which swung 
 
 ree om 
 
 British from their_succession of victories tows 
 
 the surrender at Yorktown. 
 
 Shelby, Campbell, and Cleveland escorted tk 
 prisoners to Virginia. Sevier, with his men, rode 
 home to Watauga. When the prisoners had beer 
 delivered to the authorities in Virginia, the Hol 
 ston men also turned homeward through the hill: 
 Their route lay down through the Clinch and Hol 
 ston valleys to the settlement at the base of th 
 
| fe Mae J 
 
 prdinatains Sevier and his Wataugans had gone by 
 
 | Gillespie’s Gap, over the pathway that hung like a 
 } narrow ribbon about the breast of Roan Moun- 
 tain, lifting its crest in dignified isolation sixty- 
 three hundred feet above the levels. The‘ Unakas” 
 was the name the Cherokees had given to those 
 white men who first invaded their hills; and the 
 Unakas is the name that white men at last gave 
 te the mountains. 
 
 | Great companies of men were to come over the 
 ‘mountain paths on their way to the Mississippi 
 ‘country and beyond; and with them, as we know, 
 jwere to go many of these mountain men, to pass 
 ‘away with their customs in the transformations 
 | Sia come with progress. But there were others 
 ‘who clung to these hills. They were of several 
 |stocks — English, Scotch, Highlanders, Ulster- 
 ‘men, who mingled by marriage and sometimes took 
 | their mates from among the handsome maids of 
 hei Cherokees. They spread from the Unakas of 
 
 | Tennessee into the Cumberlan i e 
 
 \tucky; and they have remained to this day what 
 
 they were then, a primitive folk of strong and 
 fiery men and brave women living as their fore- 
 fathers of Watauga and Holston lived. In the log 
 cabins in those mountains today are heard the 
 
Lonl ® Sd Nah crn ae 
 
 224 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 same ballads, sung still to the dulcimer, that enter 
 tained the earliest settlers. The women still tur 
 
 the old-fashioned spinning wheels. The code oi 
 the men is still the code learned perhaps from the 
 Gaels — the code of the oath and the feud and 
 the open door to the stranger. Or were these, thé 
 ethical tenets of almost all uncorrupted primiti 
 tribes, transmitted from the Indian strain and a 
 sociation? Their young people marry at boy and 
 girl ages, as the pioneers did, and their wedding 
 festivities are the same as those which made re 
 joicing at the first marriage in Watauga. Theil 
 common speech today contains words that have 
 been obsolete in England for a hundred years. 
 
 Thrice have the mountain men come down again 
 from their fastnesses to war for America since the 
 day of King’s Mountain and thrice they have ae 
 quitted themselves so that their deeds are noted it 
 history. A souvenir of their part in the War o 
 1812 at the Battle of the Thames is kept in one o 
 the favorite names for mountain girls — “Lak 
 Erie.”’ In the Civil War many volunteers fron 
 the free, non-slaveholding mountain regions 0 
 Kentucky and Tennessee joined the Union Army 
 and it is said that they exceeded all others in stat 
 ure and physica] development. And in our ow: 
 
. -KING’S MOUNTAIN 225 
 
 _ day their sons again came down from the moun- 
 tains to carry the torch of Liberty overseas, and 
 _to show the white stars in their flag side by side 
 with the ancient cross in the flag of England 
 | against which their forefathers fought. 
 
 . 5 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 
 
 AFTER King’s Mountain, Sevier reached home just 
 in time to fend off a Cherokee attack.on Watauga 
 
 ron press — 
 
 Again warning had come to the settlements that 
 
 the Indians were about to descend upon them. Se- 
 vier set out at once to meet the red invaders. Learn 
 ing from his scouts that the Indians were near he 
 went into ambush with his troops disposed in the 
 figure of a half-moon, the favorite Indian for- 
 mation. He then sent out a small body of men 
 to fire on the Indians and make a scampering re- 
 treat, to lure the enemy on. The maneuver was so 
 well planned and the ground so well chosen that the 
 Indian war party would probably have been annihi- 
 lated but for the delay of an officer at one horn of 
 the half-moon in bringing his troops into play. 
 Through the gap thus made the Indians escaped, 
 with a loss of seventeen of theirnumber. The deli 
 quent officer was Jonathan Tipton, younger brother 
 
 ‘ 226 ; 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 227 
 
 | of Colonel John Tipton,of whom we shall hear later. 
 It is possible that from this event dates the Lip- 
 
 tons’ feud with Sevier, which supplies one of the 
 breeziest _pages-in-the story of early Tennessee. 
 
 - Not content with putting the marauders to flight, 
 Sevier pressed on after them, burned several of the 
 upper towns, and took prisoner a number of women 
 | and children, thus putting the red warriors to the 
 
 depth of shame, forthe Indians never deserted their 
 
 women in battle. The chiefs at once sued for peace. 
 
 Butthey had made peace often before. Sevier drove 
 
 down upon the Hiwassee towns, meanwhile pro- 
 claiming that those among the tribe who were 
 friendly might send their families to the white 
 settlement, where they would be fed and cared 
 for until a sound peace should be assured. He 
 also threatened to continue to make war until his 
 enemies were wiped out, their town sites a heap of 
 blackened ruins, and their whole country in pos- 
 session of the whites, unless they bound them- 
 selves to an enduring peace. 
 
 _ Having compelled the submission of the Otari 
 and Hiwassee towns, yet finding that depredations 
 still continued, Sevier determined to invade the 
 group of towns hidden in the mountain fastnesses 
 
 near the headwaters of the Little Tennessee where, 
 
| om 
 ere. 
 
 ~~ 
 
 oo SS 
 
 298 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 y 
 
 deeming themselves inaccessible except—by._thei 
 Te eee eannene. 
 
 own trail, “the Cherokees freely plotted mischie 
 and sent out raiding ing parties. These hill towns lay 
 
 in the high gorges of the Great_Smoky Moun- 
 
 tains, 150 miles distant. No one in Watauga had 
 ever been in them except Thomas, the trader, who, 
 however, had reached them from the eastern 
 
 side of the mountains. With no knowledge of the 
 Indians’ path and without a guide, yet nothing 
 daunted, Sevier, late in the summer of 178] headed 
 his force into the mountains. So steep were some 
 of the slopes they scaled that the men were obliged 
 to dismount and help their horses up. Unexpect- 
 edly to themselves perhaps, as well as to the In- 
 dians, they descended one morning on a group of 
 villages and destroyed them. Before the fleeing 
 savages could rally, the mountaineers had plunged 
 up the steeps again. Sevier then turned southward 
 into Georgia, and inflicted_a_severe castigation on 
 the tribes.along the Coosa River. 
 
 When, after thirty days of warfare and mad 
 riding, Sevier arrived at his Bonnie Kate’s door 
 on_the Nolichucky, he found a messenger from 
 General Greene calling on him for immediate-as- 
 sistance to cut off Cornwallis from his expected 
 retreat through North Carolina. Again he set out, 
 
| 
 rdhen ties 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 229 
 
 and with two hundred men crossed the mountains 
 and made all speed to_Charlotte, in Mecklenburg 
 County, where he learned that Cornwallis had sur- 
 rendered at Yorktown on October 19, 1781. Un- 
 der Greene’s orders he turned south to the Santee. 
 to assist a fellow scion of the Huguenots, General 
 Francis Marion, in the pursuit—of Stuart’s—Brit- 
 ishers. Having driven Stuart into Charleston, 
 Sevier and his active Wataugans returned home, 
 now perhaps looking forward to a rest, which they 
 had surely earned. Once more, however, they were 
 hailed with alarming news. Dragging Canoe had 
 come to life again and was emerging from the 
 caves of the Tennessee with a substantial force of 
 Chickamaugan-warriors. Again the Wataugans, 
 augmented by a detachment from Sullivan Coun- 
 ty, galloped forth, met the red warriors, chastised 
 them heavily, put them to rout, burned their dwell- 
 ings and provender, and drove them back into their 
 hiding places. For some time after this, the In- 
 dians dipped not into the black paint pots of war 
 but were content to streak their humbled counte- 
 nances with the vermilion of beauty and innocence. 
 
 It should be chronicled that Sevier, assisted pos- 
 sibly by other Wataugans, eventually returned 
 
 “ys 
 
 i 
 
 i 
 
 /j 
 
230 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 to the State.of North Carolina the money which 
 he had forcibly borrowed to finance the King’s 
 Mountain expedition; and that neither he nor 
 Shelby received any pay for their services, not 
 asked it. Before Shelby left_ the Holston in 178 
 and moved to Kentucky, of which State he was to 
 become the first Governor, the Assembly of North 
 Carolina passed a resolution of gratitude to the 
 overmountain men in general, and to Seyjer and 
 Shelby in particular, for their “very generous and 
 patriotic seryices’’ with which the “General A :- 
 sembly of this State are feelingly impressed.”’ The 
 resolution concluded by urging the recipients of 
 the Assembly’s acknowledgments to “continue” 
 in their noble course. In view of what followed, 
 this resolution is interesting! 
 
 For some time the overhill pioneers had been 
 growing dissatisfied with the treatment they were 
 receiving from the State, which on the \plea_ of 
 poverty had refused to establish a Superior Court 
 for them and to appoint a prosecutor. Asa res 
 crime was on the increase, and the law-abiding were 
 deprived of the proper legal means to check the law- 
 less. In 1784 when the western soldiers’ claims be 
 gan to reach the Assembly, there to be scrutinized 
 by unkindly eyes, the dissatisfaction increased 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 231 — 
 
 The breasts of the mountain men — the men who” 
 had made that spectacular ride to bring Ferguson 
 to his end — were kindled with hot indignation 
 when they heard that they had been publicly as- 
 sailed as grasping persons who seized on every 
 pretense to “fabricate demands against the Gov- 
 ernment.” Nor were those fiery breasts cooled by 
 further plaints to the effect that the “industry and 
 property” of those east of the hills were “becom- 
 ing the funds appropriated to discharge the debts” 
 of the Westerners. They might with justice have 
 asked what the industry and property of the East- 
 erners were worth on that day when the overhill 
 men drilled in the snows on the high peak.of Yellow 
 Mountain and looked down on Burke County— 
 overrun by Ferguson’s Tories, and beyond, to Char- 
 lotte, where lay Cornwallis. — 
 
 The North Carolina Assembly did not confine 
 itself to impolite remarks. It proceeded to get rid 
 of what it deemed western rapacity by ceding the 
 eee orcemountain territory tothe United States 
 with the proviso that Congress must accept the gift 
 within twelve months. And after passing the Ces- 
 sion-Aet, North Carolina closed the land_office in. 
 the undesired domain and nullified all entries made 
 after May 25, 1784. The Cession Act also enabled 
 
 SS 
 po ea 
 
~~ than the men of f Washington, Sullivan, and Green 
 
 _ 232 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 the State to evade its obligations to the Cherokee 
 in the matter of an expensive consignment of good 
 to pay for new lands. 
 
 This clever stroke of the Assembly’s bioilll 
 about immediate consequences in the region be 
 yond the hills()’The Cherokees, who knew nothin 
 about the Assembly’s.system_of_political econom 
 but who found their own provokingly upset by.th 
 non-arrival of the promised goods, began again t 
 darken the mixture in their paint pots; and th 
 dug up the war hatchet, never.indeed_ so deepl 
 patted down under the dust that it could not k 
 unearthed-by.a_stub of the toe. Needless to say 
 it was not the thrifty and distant Easterners wh 
 felt their anger, but the nearby settlements. __ 
 
 As for the white overhill dwellers, the last stra 
 had been laid on their backs; and it felt like a hick 
 sory log. No sooner had the Assembly adjourne 
 
 counties, which comprised the settled portiol 
 of what is now east Tennessee, la 
 to conyene for the purpose of discussing the for 
 mation.of a new State. They could assert he 
 they were not acting illegally, for in her first con 
 stitution North Carolina = made _—_ 0 
 
 sereeneterecremer rene) 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 233 
 
 compelled them to take steps for their protec- 
 tion. Some of them, and Sevier was of the number, 
 | doubted if Congress would accept the costly gift; 
 and the majority realized that during the twelve 
 months which were allowed for the decision they 
 | would have no protection from either North. Caro- 
 _ Jina or Congress and would not be able to command 
 their own resources. 
 
 | - In August, 1784, the delegates met_at_Jones- 
 
 borough and_passed_-preliminary_resolutions, and 
 Hien adjourned | to. Aneet_later in the year. The 
 lina and the Assembly convened in October and 
 hastily repealed the Cession- Act, voted to-estab- 
 lish the District of Washington-out.of the four 
 count unties, and sent. -word of the altered policy to 
 Sevier, with a commission for himself as Brigadier 
 General. > From the steps of the improvised con- 
 vention hall, before which the delegates had gath- 
 ered, Sevier read the Assembly’s message and 
 advised his neighbors to proceed no further, since 
 North Carolina had of her own accord redressed 
 alltheir grievances. But for once Nolichucky Jack’s 
 followers refused to follow. The adventure too 
 greatly appealed. Obliged to choose between North 
 
 Carolina and his own people, Sevier’s hesitation 
 
234 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST q 
 wasshort. The State of Frankland, or Land o the 
 Free, was formed; and Nolichucky Jack was ele- 
 vated to the office of Governor — with a yearly 
 salary of two hundred mink cae 
 
 Perhaps John Tipton had hoped to head the new 
 State, for he had been one of its prime movers and 
 
 was a delegate to this convention. But when the 
 man whom he hated — apparently for no reason eX- ; 
 cept that other men loved him — assented to the 
 people’s will and was appointed to the highest 
 post within their gift, Tipton withdrew, disavow- 
 ing all connection with Frankland and affirming 
 his loyalty to North Carolina. From this time on, 
 the feud was an open one. 
 
 That brief and now forgotten State, Frankland, 
 the Land of the Free, which bequeathed its name 
 as an 1 appellation for America, was founded as Wa- 
 tauga had b been founded — to meet the practi 
 needs and _ aspirations ions-of-its people. It will be re- 
 membered that one of the things written by Sevier 
 into the only Watauga document extant was that 
 they desired to become “in every way thebest mem- 
 bers of society.”” Frankland’s aims, as ronal 
 included the intent to “improve agriculture, perfec 
 manufacturing, encourage literature and every thin : 
 truly laudable.” 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER ~— 235 
 The constitution of Frankland, agreed to on the 
 14th of November, 1785, appeals to us today rather 
 
 | by its spirit than by its practical provisions. “This 
 
 State shall be called the Commonwealth of Frank- 
 
 land and shall be governed by a General Assembly 
 of the representatives of the freemen of the same, a 
 
 - Governor and Council, and proper courts of jus- 
 tice. ... The supreme legislative power shall 
 
 be vested in a single House of Representatives of 
 
 ee ne 
 
 the freemen of 1 the commonwealth of Frankland. 
 The House of Representatives of the freemen of 
 the State shall consist of persons most noted for 
 wisdom and virtue.” 
 
 In these exalted desires of the primitive men who 
 held by their rifles and hatchets the land by the 
 western waters, we see the influence of the Rever- 
 end Samuel Doak, their,pastor, who founded the 
 first church and the first school beyond the great 
 hills. Early in the life > of Watauga he had come 
 thither from Princeton, a zealous and broadminded 
 young man, and a sturdy one, too, for he came on 
 foot driving before him a mule laden with books. 
 Legend credits another minister, the Reverend Sam- 
 uel Houston, with suggesting the name of Frank- 
 land, after he had opened the Convention with 
 prayer. Itisnotsurprising to learn that this glorified 
 
_ waseagertojoin. Sevier and his Assembly took th 
 necessary steps to receive the overhill Virginians, 
 provided that the transfer of allegiance co 
 
 236 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 constitution was presently put aside in favor of one 
 modeled on that. of North Carolina. | 
 
 Sevier persuaded the more radical members o 
 the community to abandon their extreme views and 
 to adopt thelaws of North Carolina. However law 
 less his acts as Governor of a bolting colony may 
 appear, Sevier was essentially a constructive force 
 His purposes were right, and small motives are not 
 discernible in his record. He might reasonably 
 urge that the Franklanders had only followed t he 
 example of North Carolina and the other American 
 States in seceding from the parent body, and 
 similar causes, for the State’s system of taxation 
 had long borne heavily on the overhill men. | 
 
 The whole transmontane populace welcomed 
 Frankland with enthusiasm. Major Arthur Camp- 
 bell, of the Virginian settlements, on the Holston 
 
 be made with Virginia’s consent. Meanwhile 
 he replied in a dignified manner to the ia 
 and menacing expostulations of North Caroline? 
 Governor. North Carolina was bidden to rena 
 
 ber the epithets her assemblymen had hurled 
 at the Westerners, which they themselves had by 
 
be 
 
 7 
 
 - SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 237 
 
 -nomeans forgotten. And was it any wonder that 
 they now doubted the love the parent State pro- 
 
 fessed to feel for them? As for the puerile threat 
 of blood, had their quality really so soon become 
 obliterated from the memory of North Carolina? 
 At this sort of writing, Sevier, who always pulsed 
 hot with emotion and who had a pretty knack in 
 turning a phrase, was more than a match for the 
 Governor of North Carolina, whose prerogatives 
 he had usurped. | 
 
 The overmountain men no longer needed to 
 complain bitterly of the lack of legal machinery to 
 keep them “‘the best members of society.”” They 
 now had courts to spare. Frankland had its courts, 
 its judges, its legislative body, its land office — in 
 fact, a full governmental equipment. North Caro- 
 lina also performed all the natural functions of 
 political organism, within the western territory. 
 Sevier appointed_oneDavid Campbell a judge 
 peopel held court in J onesborough. Ten ni . 
 for North Ere. eg haiapeiseal Fiquehtte that 
 officers and attendants of the rival law courts met, 
 as they pursued their duties, and whenever they 
 met they fought. The post of sheriff — or sheriffs, 
 for of course there were two — was filled by the 
 
_knowledged the compliment and advised the 
 
 the Gavernor_of Georgia, who had previously ap- 
 
 238 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 biggest and heaviest man and the hardest hitte 
 in the ranks of the warring factions. A favorit 
 game was raiding each other’s courts and carrying 
 off the records. Frankland sent William Co 
 later the first senator from Tennessee, to Congress 
 
 it into the Union as a separate State. Congress 
 ignored the plea. It began to appear that North 
 Carolina would be victor in the end; and so there 
 
 were defections among the Franklanders. Seviei 
 wrote to Benjamin Franklin asking his aid in es 
 tablishing the status of Frankland; and, with : 
 graceful flourish of his ready pen, changed the new 
 State’s name to Franklin by way of reinfor ing 
 his arguments. But the old philosopher, more ex 
 pert than Seyier in diplomatic calligraphy, only ae 
 
 of Franklin to make peace withNorth-Carolina. 
 Sevier then appealed for aid and recognition to 
 
 pointed him Brigadier General of militia. But the 
 Governor of Georgia also avoided giving the ree 
 ognition requested, though he earnestly besought 
 Sevier to come down and settle the Creeks for him. 
 There were others who sent pleas to Sevier, the 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 239 
 
 warrior, to save them from the savages. One of 
 the writers who addressed him did not fear to say 
 “Your Excellency,” nor to accord Nolichucky Jack 
 the whole dignity of the purple in appealing to 
 him as the only man possessing the will and the 
 power to prevent the isolated settlements on the 
 Cumberland from being wiped out. That writer 
 was his old friend, James Robertson. 
 
 -In 287, while Sevier was on the frontier of 
 Greene County, defending it from Indians, the 
 legal forces of North Carolina swooped down on 
 his estate and took possession of his negroes. It 
 was Tipton who represented the Jaw; and Tipton 
 carried off the Governor’s slaves to his own estate. 
 When Nolichucky Jack came home and found that 
 his enemy had stripped him, he was in a towering 
 rage. With a body of his troops and one small 
 cannon, he marched to Tipton’s house and besieged 
 it, threatening a bombardment. He did not, how- 
 ever, fire into the dwelling, though he placed some 
 shots about it and in the extreme corners. This 
 opéra bouffe siege endured for several days, until 
 Tipton was reinforced by some of his own clique. 
 Then Tipton sallied forth and attacked the be- 
 siegers, who hastily scattered rather than engage 
 in a sanguinary fight with their neighbors. Tipton 
 
captured Sevier’s two elder sons and was only re 
 strained from hanging them on being info 
 
 that two of his own sons were at that moment ii 
 Sevier’ s hands. 
 
 eclipse. ie ‘yas overtime al 
 af North Carolina. Most of the officials who hac 
 served under him were soothed by being rea 
 pointed to their old positions. Tipton’s star wa 
 now in the ascendant, for his enemy was to be mad 
 the vicarious sacrifice for the sins of all whom h 
 had “‘led astray.’’ Presently David Campbell, stil 
 graciously permitted to preside over the § 
 rior_Court, received from the Governor of Nortl 
 Carolina the following letter: 
 
 Str: It has been represented to the Executive 
 John Sevier, who styles himself Captain-General of th 
 State of Franklin, has been guilty of high treason i 
 levying troops to oppose the laws and government 
 the State. . . . You will issue your warrant to appré 
 hend the said John Sevier, and in case he cannot be suff 
 
 ciently secured for trial in the District of Washing 
 order him to be committed to the public gaol. 
 
 The judge’s authority was to be exercised afte 
 he had examined the “‘affidavits of credible pei 
 
 sons.”” Campbell’s judicial opinion seems to ha’ 
 been that any affidavit against “the said Joh 
 
ee 
 : 
 
 Sevier” could not be made by.a “credible person..”’ 
 He refused to issue the warrant. Tipton’s friend, 
 Spencer, who had been North Carolina’s judge _ 
 of the Superior Court in the » West and w who was 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 241 
 
 sharing that honor now with Campbell, issued the 
 warrant and sent Tipton to make the arrest. 
 
 Sevier was at the Widow Brown’s inn with some 
 of his men when Tipton at last came up with him. 
 [t was early morning. Tipton and his posse were 
 about to enter when the portly and dauntless 
 widow, surmising their errand, drew her chair into 
 she doorway, plumped herself down in it, and re- 
 ‘used to budge for all the writs in North Carolina. 
 Tipton blustered and the widow rocked. The al- 
 ercation awakened Sevier. He dressed hurriedly 
 und came down. As soon as he presented himself 
 m the porch, Tipton thrust his pistol against his 
 »ody, evidently with intent to fire if Sevier made 
 signs of resistance. Sevier’s furious followers were 
 10t disposed to let him be taken without a fight, 
 out he admonished them to respect the law, and re- 
 quested that they would inform Bonnie Kate of his 
 oredicament. Then, debonair as ever, with perhaps 
 a tinge of contempt at the corners of his mouth, he 
 held out his wrists for the manacles which Ie 
 
 nsisted on fastening upon them. 
 iiticeenentsnenenn 
 
 Ona Sma 
 
 16 
 
Ge 
 ie 
 242 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 feared ariot; and it was decided to send the prisonel 
 for incarceration and trial to Morgantown in Nort] 
 Carolina, just over the hills. 
 
 Tipton did not accompany the guards he sent 
 with Sevier. It was stated and commonly believe 
 that he had given instructions of which the honors 
 able men among his friends were ignorant. Wher 
 the party entered the mountains, two of the guard 
 were to lag behind with the prisoner, till the others 
 were out of sight on the twisting trail. Then one 
 of the two was to kill Sevier and assert that he had 
 done it because Sevier had attempted to escap e 
 It fell out almost as planned, except that the othe 
 guard warned Sevier of the fate in store for him 
 and gave him a chance to flee. In plunging down 
 the mountain, Sevier’s horse was entangled in 
 a thicket. The would-be murderer overtook him 
 and fired; but here again fate had interposed for 
 her favorite. The ball had dropped out of the 
 assassin’s pistol. So Sevier reached Morgantown 
 in safety and was deposited in care of the sherif 
 who was doubtless cautioned to take a good look 
 at the prisoner and know him for a dangerous and 
 a daring man. 
 
: SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 243 
 
 _ There is a story to the effect that, when Sevier 
 was arraigned in the courthouse at Morgantown 
 and presently dashed through the door and away 
 on a racer that had been brought up by some of his 
 friends, among those who witnessed the proceed- 
 ings was a young Ulster Scot named Andrew Jack- _ 
 son; and that on this occasion these two men, later 
 to become foes, first saw each other. Jackson may 
 hhave been in Morgantown at the time, though this 
 is disputed; but the rest of the tale is pure legend 
 invented by some one whose love of the spectacular 
 ’ led him far from the facts. The facts are less the- 
 atrical but much more dramatic. Sevier was not 
 arraigned at all, for no court was sitting in Mor- 
 gantown atthetime.* The sheriff to whom he was 
 delivered did not need to look twice at him to know 
 him for a daring man. He had served with him at 
 King’s Mountain. He struck off his handcuffs and 
 set him at liberty at once. Perhaps he also notified 
 General Charles McDowell at his home in Quaker 
 Meadows of the presence of a distinguished guest 
 in Burke County, for McDowell-and his brother 
 Joseph, another officer of militia, quickly appeared 
 and went on Sevier’s bond. Nolichucky Jack was 
 
 t Statement by John Sevier, Junior, in the Draper MSS., quoted by 
 ‘Turner, Life of General Jokn Sevier, p. 182. 
 
244 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 presently holding a court of his own in the taver 
 with North Carolina’s men at arms—as many é 
 were within call—drinking his health. So his sor 
 and a company of his Wataugans found him, whe 
 they rode into Morgantown to give evidence in h 
 behalf — with their rifles. Since none now dispute 
 the way with him, Sevier turned homeward with h 
 cavalcade, McDowell and his men accompanyin 
 him as far as the pass in the hills. . 
 No further attempt was made to mn John Sem 
 for treason, either _west.or-east-ofthemountain 
 In November, however, the Asknablj: paaalall 
 Pardon Act, and thereby granted absolution | 
 every one who had been associated with the § Sta 
 of Franklin, except John Sever. In aclause said 
 have been introduced by Tipton, now a senator, 
 suggested by him, John Sevier was debarred fc 
 ever from “the enjoyment of any office of profit 
 
 honor or trust in the State of North Carolina.” 
 
 The overhill men in Greene County took du 
 note of the Assembly’s fiat and at the next electi 
 sent Sevier to the North Carolina Senate. No 
 chucky Jack, whose (demeanor was never so de 
 rous as when the ill-considered actions of chal 
 authority had made him appear to have ci 
 vented the law, considerately waited outside unt 
 
1 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 245 
 she House had lifted the ban — which it did per- 
 ‘force and by a large majority, despite Tipton’s 
 ypposition — and then took his seat on the sena- 
 orial bench beside his enemy. The records show 
 hat he was reinstated as Brigadier General of the 
 Counties and also appointed at the head 
 
 - Committee on Indian Affairs. 
 : Not only in the region about Watauga did the 
 yioneers of Tennessee endure the throes of danger 
 ind strife during these years. The little settle- 
 ments on the Cumberland, which were scattered 
 ver a short distance of about twenty-five or thirty 
 niles.and had a frontier line of two hundred miles, 
 terribly afflicted. Their nearest white neigh- 
 among the Kentucky settlers were one hun- 
 ired and fifty miles away; and through the cruelest 
 years these could render no aid — could not, in- 
 leed, hold their own stations. The Kentuckians, 
 is we have seen, were bottled up in Harrodsburg 
 ind Boonesboreugh; and, while the northern In- 
 lians led by Girty and Dequindre darkened the 
 3loody Ground anew, the Cumberlanders were 
 naking a desperate stand against the Chickasaws 
 ind the Creeks. So terrible was their situation 
 hat panic took hold on them, and they would have 
 
246 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 fled but for the influence of Robertson. He . 
 have put the question to them in the biblical wor 
 “Whither shall I flee?” For they were surround 
 and those who did attempt to escape were “ weigh 
 on the path and made light.” Robertson kn 
 
 that their only chance of survival was to sta 
 their ground. The greater risks he was willing 
 take in person, for it was he who made trips 
 Boonesborough and Harrodsburg for a share of 
 powder and lead which John Sevier was sendi 
 into Kentucky from time to time. In the stress 
 conflict Robertson bore his full share of grief, 
 his two elder sons and his brother fell. He hims 
 was often near to death. One day he was cut 
 in the fields and was shot in the foot as he r: 
 yet he managed to reach shelter. There is a ste 
 that, in an attack during one of his absences, tf 
 Indians forced the outer gate of the fort 2 
 Mrs. Robertson went out of her cabin, firing, a 
 let loose a band of the savage dogs which the s 
 tlers kept for their protection, and so drove ¢ 
 the invaders. * 
 
 The Chickasaws were loyal to.the treaty. th 
 had made with the British in the early daigl 
 James Adair’ s association with them. “They w 
 friends to England’s friends and foes to her fc 
 
beg 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 247 
 
 While they resented the new settlements made on 
 and they considered theirs, they signed a peace 
 vith Robertsox at the conclusion of the-War of 
 ndependence.’ They kept their word with him as 
 hey had kept it with the British. Furthermore, 
 heir chief, Opimingo or the Mountain Leader, 
 ave Robertson his assistance against the Creeks 
 nd the Choctaws and, in so far as he understood 
 ts workings, informed him of the new Spanish and 
 ‘rench conspiracy, which we now come to consider. 
 0 once again the Chickasaws were servants of 
 estiny to the English-speaking race, for again 
 hey drove the wedge of their honor into an Indian 
 olidarity welded with European gold. 
 
 Since it was generally believed at that date that 
 he tribes were instigated to war by the British 
 nd supplied by them with their ammunition, sav- 
 ge inroads were expected to cease with the signing 
 f peace. But Indian warfare not only continued; 
 ; increased. In the last two-years of the Revo- 
 ition, when the British were driven from the 
 sack Country of the Carolinas and could no longer 
 each the tribes with consignments of firearms 
 
 nd powder, it should have been evident that 
 he Indians had other sources of supply and other 
 llies, for they lacked nothing which could aid 
 
248 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 them in their efforts to exterminate the settle 
 of Tennessee. 
 
 Neither France nor Spain wished to see an Eng 
 lish-speaking republic based on ideals of demoe 
 racy successfully established in America. Thoug! 
 in the Revolutionary War, France was a close ally 
 of the Americans and Spain something more thai 
 a nominal one, the secret.diplomacy of the co 
 of the Bourben cousins ill matched with thei 
 open professions. Both cousins hated Englane 
 The American colonies, smarting under injusticé 
 had offered a field for their revenge. But hatret 
 of England was not the only reason why activitie 
 had been set afoot to increase the discord whicel 
 should finally separate the colonies from Great Brit 
 ain and leave the destiny of the colonies to be de 
 cided by the House of Bourbon. Spain saw in 
 Americans, with their English modes of thought 
 a menace to her authority in her own colonies 01 
 both the northern and southern continents. Thi 
 menace would not be stilled but augmented if th 
 colonies should be established as a republic. 5 t 
 an example might be too readily followed. Thou, 
 France had, by a secret treaty in 1762, made ov 
 to Spain the province of Louisiana, she was né 
 unmindful of the Bourbon motto, “He who attack 
 
4i§ id 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 249 
 
 the Crown of one attacks the other.” And she saw 
 her chance to deal a crippling blow at England’s 
 prestige and commerce. 
 
 MMIn 1764, the French Minister, Choiseul, had sent 
 a secret agent, named Pontleroy, to America to as- 
 sist in making trouble and to watch for any signs 
 that might be turned to the advantage of les deux 
 couronnes. Evidently Pontleroy’s reports were en- 
 couraging for, in 1768, Johann Kalb — the same 
 Kalb who fell at Camden in 1780 — arrived in Phil- 
 adelphia to enlarge the good work. He was not 
 only, like several of the foreign officers in the War 
 of Independence, a spy for his Government, but he 
 was also the special emissary of one Comte de Brog- 
 lie who, after the colonies had broken with the 
 mother country, was to put himself at the head of 
 American affairs/ This Broglie had been for years 
 one of Louis XV’s chief agents in subterranean 
 diplomacy, and it is not to be supposed that he 
 was going to attempt the stupendous task of 
 controlling America’s destiny without substantial 
 backing. Spain had been advised meanwhile to 
 rule her-new_Louisiana-territory with great liber- 
 ality — in fact, to let it shine as a republic before 
 the yearning eyes of the oppressed Americans, so 
 that the English colonists would arise and cast off 
 
Oh A ee 
 
 250 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 their fetters. Once the colonies had freed them- 
 selves from England’s protecting arm, it would be 
 
 a simple matter for the Bourbons to gather them ir 
 like so many little lost chicks from a rainy yard, 
 The intrigants of autocratic systems have never 
 been able to understand that the urge of the spirit 
 of independence in men is not primarily to break 
 shackles but to stand alone and that the breaking 
 of bonds is incidental to the true demonstration of 
 freedom. The Bourbons and their agents were ne 
 more nor less blind to the great principle stirring 
 the hearts of men in their day than were the Prus 
 sianized hosts over a hundred years later who, hay- 
 ing themselves no acquaintance with the law of 
 liberty, could not foresee that half a world wou 
 rise in arms to maintain that law. 
 
 When the War of Independence had ended, the 
 French Minister, Vergennes, and the Spanish Min: 
 ister, Floridablanca, secretly worked in unison to 
 prevent England’s recognition of the new republic; 
 and Floridablanca in 1782 even offered to assist 
 England if she would make further efforts to sub 
 due her “‘rebel subjects.”’ Both Latin powers had 
 their own axes to grind, and America was to tend 
 
 the grindstone. Mreoaes looked for recovery. of he her 
 
 old prestige in Eufope and <r to supersede 
 
_ 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 251 
 
 land in commerce. She would do this, in the 
 perch cigh control of America and _ 
 ofAmerica’s commerce. Vergennes thereforesought 
 not only to dictate the final terms of peace but also 
 to say what the American commissioners should 
 and should not demand. Of the latter gentle- 
 men he said that they possessed “‘caractéres peu 
 
 maniables!”” In writing to Luzerne, the French 
 Ambassador in Philadelphia, on October 14,1782, 
 Vergennes said: “it behooves us to leave them 
 [the American commissioners] to their illusions, 
 to do everything that can make them fancy that 
 we share them, and undertake only to defeat any 
 attempts to which those illusions might carry them 
 if our codperation is required.” Among these 
 “illusions”? were America’s desires in regard to the 
 fisheries and to the western territory. Concern- 
 ing the West, Vergennes had written to Luzerne, 
 as early as July 18,1780: “At the moment when 
 the revolution broke out, the limits of the Thir- 
 teen States did not reach the River [Mississippi] 
 ‘and it would be absurd for them to claim the 
 rights of England, a power whose rule they had 
 abjured.”’ By the secret treaty with Spain, further- 
 more, France had agreed to continue the war until 
 
 Gi taken, and — if the British 
 
Oe a eS ae 
 
 252 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST | 
 
 should be driven from Newfoundland — to sha 
 the fisheries only with Spain, and to support Spai 
 in demanding that the Thirteen States renounce al 
 territory west of the Alleghanies. The America 
 States must by no means achieve a genuine inde 
 pendence but must feel the need of sureties, allie 
 and protection. 
 
 So intent was Vergennes on these aims that b 
 sent a secret emissary to England to further then 
 there. This act of his perhaps gave the first ink 
 ling to the English statesmen? that American 2 
 French desires were not identical and hastene 
 England’s recognition of American independence 
 and her agreement to American demands in regar 
 to the western territory. When, to his amazement 
 Vergennes learned that England had acceded t 
 all America’s demands, he said that England had 
 “bought the peace” rather than made it. 
 policy of Vergennes in regard to America was no 
 unjustly pronounced by a later French statesm a1 
 “a vile speculation.” 
 
 See John Jay, On the Peace Negotiations of 1782-1788 as Illustrat 
 by the Secret Correspondence of France and England, New York, 188% 
 2“ Your Lordship was well founded in your suspicion that the gra 
 ing of independence to America as a previous measure is a point whic 
 the French have by no means at heart and perhaps are entirely avers 
 from.” Letter from Fitzherbert to Grantham, September 3, 17% 
 
ss SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER = 253 
 
 Through England’s unexpected action, then, the 
 Bourbon cousins had forever lost their opportunity 
 ‘to dominate the young but spent and war-weak- 
 med Republic, or to use America as a caispaw to 
 }snatch English commerce for France. It wasplam, 
 too, that any frank move of the sort would range 
 the English alongside of their American kinsmen. 
 Since American Independence was an accomplished 
 )fact and therefore could no longer be prevented. 
 “the present object of the Bourbon cousins was to 
 Testrict it. The Appalachian Mountains should 
 “be the western limits of the new nation. There- 
 | fore the settlements in Kentucky and Tennessee 
 
 be be broken up, or the settlers must be induced 
 | banner. The laiier alternative was held to be 
 preferable. To bring it about the same methods 
 | were to be continued which had been used prior 
 ‘to and during the war — namely, the use of agents 
 ‘provocateurs to corrupt the ignorant and incite the _ 
 lawless. the instigation of Indian massacres to 
 
 As her final and supreme means of coercion, 
 “Spain refused to America the righ t_of navigation 
 on the issippi and so deprived the Westerners 
 
 zi 
 ~- 
 
 & 
 
TE eae 
 254 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 ofa market f or their produce. The Northern State s, 
 
 having no immediate use for the Mississippi, 
 
 were willing to placate Spain by acknowledging 
 her monopoly of the great waterway. But Vir- 
 ginia and North Carolina were determined that 
 America should not, by congressional enactment, 
 surrender her “natural right”’; and they cited the 
 proposed legislation as their reason for refusing 
 to ratify the Constitution. “‘The act which aban- 
 dons it [the right of navigation] is an act of separa- 
 tion between the eastern and western country,” 
 Jefferson realized at last. “An act of separation , 
 — that point had long been very clear to the Latin 
 sachems of the Mississippi Valley! 
 
 Bounded as they were on one side by the pre- 
 cipitous mountains and on the other by the south- 
 ward flow of the Mississippi and its tributary, the 
 Ohio, the trappers and growers of corn in Kentuc 
 and western Tennessee regarded New Orleans as 
 their logical market, as the wide waters were their 
 natural route. If market and route were to be 
 closed to them, their commercial advancement was 
 something less than a dream. . 
 
 In 1785, Don Estevan Miré,-a gentleman—of 
 artful and winning address, became Goyernor of 
 Louisiana and fountainhead of the propaganda. 
 
 _ 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 255 
 
 He wrote benign and brotherly epistles to James 
 
 Robertson of the Cumberland and to His Excel- 
 lency of Franklin, suggesting that to be of service 
 to them was his dearest aim in life; and at the same 
 
 _ time he kept the southern Indians continually on 
 
 the warpath. When Robertson wrote to him of the 
 Creek and Cherokee depredations, with a hint that 
 
 the Spanish might have some responsibility in the 
 matter, Miré replied by offering the Cumberlander 
 
 _asafe home on Spanish territory with freedom of 
 
 religion and no taxes. He disclaimed stirring up 
 the Indians. He had, in fact, advised Mr. Mc- 
 
 Gillivray, chief of the Creeks, to make peace. He 
 
 _ would try again what he could do with Mr. McGil- 
 
 livray. As to the Cherokees, they resided in a very 
 distant territory and he was not acquainted with 
 them; he might have added that he did not need 
 to be: his friend McGillivray was the potent 
 personality among the Southern tribes. 
 
 In Alexander McGillivray, Miro found a weapon 
 fashioned to his hand: If the Creek chieftain’s 
 figure might stand as the symbol of treachery, it is 
 none the less one of the most picturesque and pa- 
 thetic in our early annals. McGillivr ray, it will be 
 remembered, was the son of Adair’s s friend Lachlan 
 
 ad 
 
 McGillivray,the trader, anda Creek woman whose 
 
AE ee oe ee 
 : A’ " 
 
 256 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 sire had been a French officer. A brilliant and 
 beautiful youth, he had given his father a pride in 
 him which is generally denied to the fathers of sons 
 with Indian blood in them. The Highland trader 
 had spared nothing in his son’s education and had 
 placed him, after his school days, in the business 
 office of the large trading establishment of which 
 he himself was a member. At about the age of 
 seventeen. Alexander had become a chieftain in his 
 
 mother’s nation; and doubtless it is he who appear: 
 
 shortly afterwards in the Colonial Records as the 
 White Leader whose influence is seen to have been 
 ati work for friendship between the colonists and 
 _ the tribes. When the Revolutionary War broke 
 Xout, Lachlan McGillivray, like many of the old 
 traders who had served British interests so long 
 and so faithfully, held tothe British-cause: Geor- 
 gia confiscated all his property and Lachlan fled to 
 Scotland. For this, his son hated the people of 
 
 Georgia with a perfect hatred. He remembered 
 how often his father’s courage alone had stood be- 
 tween those same people and the warlike Creeks. — 
 He could recall the few days in 1760 when Lachlan ~ 
 and his fellow trader, Galphin, at the risk of their 
 lives had braved the Creek warriors — already |! 
 painted for war and on the march —and so had 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 257 
 
 saved the settlements of the Back Country from 
 extermination. Helooked upon the men of Georgia 
 as an Indian regards those who forget either a 
 blood gift or a blood vengeance. And he em- 
 braced the whole American nation in his hatred for 
 their sakes. 
 _ In 1776 Alexander McGillivray was in his early 
 thirties — the exact date of his birth is uncertain.* 
 ‘He had, we are told, the tall, sturdy, but t spare 
 : physique of of the Gael, with a countenance of Indian 
 color though not of Indian cast. His overhang- 
 jing b brows made more striking, hi his very large and 
 Tuminous dark eyes. He bore himself with great 
 entity: his voice was soft, his manner gentle. He 
 might have been supposed to be some Latin court- 
 ier but for the barbaric display of his dress and his 
 ornaments. He possessed extraordinary personal 
 magnetism, and his power extended beyond the 
 Creek nation to the Choctaws and Chickasaws and 
 the Southern Cherokees. He had long been wooed 
 by the Louisiana authorities, but there is no evi- 
 dence that he had made alliance with them prior to 
 
 the Revolution. 
 
 t Probably about 1741 or 1742. Some writers give 1739 and others 
 1746. His father landed in Charleston, Pickett (History of Alabama) 
 Says, in 1735, and was then only sixteen. 
 
 I7 
 
hae Lian hah dais) dies. 
 
 258 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Early in the war he joined the British, received 
 a colonel’s commission, and led his formidable 
 Creeks against the people.of-Georgia. When the 
 British were driven from the Back Countries, Me 
 Gillivray, in his British uniform, went on with thi 
 war. When the British made peace, McGillivray 
 exchanged his British uniform for a Spanish one 
 and went on with the war. In later days, when he 
 had forced Congress to pay him for his father’s con 
 fiscated property and had made peace, he wore the 
 uniform of an American Brigadier General; but he 
 did not keep the peace, never having intended 
 keep it. It was not until he had seen the Spanish 
 plots collapse and had realized that the Americans 
 were to dominate the land, that the White Leader 
 ceased from war and urged the.youths-of-his-tribe 
 
 to adopt American civilization. 
 
 Spent from hate and wasted with dissipation, he 
 retired at last to the spot where Lachlan had set up 
 his first-Creek home. Here he lived his few re- 
 maining days in a house which he built on the site 
 of the old ruined cabin about which still stood the 
 little grove of apple trees his father had planted. 
 He died at the age of fifty of a fever contracted 
 while he was on a business errand in Pensa ‘Ola. 
 Among those who visited him in his last years, 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 259 © 
 
 2as left this description of him: “Dissipation has 
 sapped a constitution originally delicate and feeble. 
 He possesses an atticism of diction aided by a 
 liberal education, a great fund of wit and humor 
 aeliorated by a perfect good nature and polite- 
 ness.” Set beside that kindly picture this rough 
 etching by James Robertson: “The biggest devil 
 among them [the Spaniards] is the half Spaniard, 
 half Frenchman, half Scotchman and altogether 
 Creek scoundrel, McGillivray.” 
 
 _ How indefatigably McGillivray did his work we 
 know from the bloody annals of the years which 
 followed the British-American peace, when the 
 men of the Cumberland and of Franklin were 
 on the defensive continually. How cleverly Mird. 
 played his personal réle we discover in the letters 
 addressed to him by Sevier and Robertson. These 
 letters show that, as far as words go at any rate, 
 the founders of Tennessee were willing to negotiate 
 with Spain. In a letter dated September 12, 1788, 
 Sevier offered himself and his tottering State of 
 Franklin to the Spanish King. This offer may have 
 been made to gain a respite, or it may have been 
 genuine. ‘The situation in the Tennessee settle- 
 ments was truly desperate, for neither North Caro- 
 lina nor Congress apparently cared in the least 
 
260 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 what befell them or how soon. North Carolina in- 
 deed was in an anomalous position, as she had no 
 yet ratified the Federal Constitution. If Frank- 
 lin went out of existence and the territory which © 
 it included became again part of North Caro- 
 lina, Sevier knew that a large part of the newly. 
 settled country would, under North Carolina’s trea- 
 ties, reyert to the Indians. That meant ruin to’ 
 large numbers of those who had put their faith in 
 his star, or else it meant renewed conflict either 
 with the Indians or with the parent State. The 
 probabilities are that Sevier hoped to play the 
 Spaniards against the Easterners who, even while 
 denying the Westerners’ contention that the moun- 
 tains were a “natural” barrier between them, were 
 making of them a barrier of indifference. It would 
 seem so, because, although this was the very aim > 
 of all Mird’s activities so that, had he been assured 
 of the sincerity of the offer, he must have grasped 
 at it, yet nothing definite was done. And Sevier 
 was presently informing Shelby, now in Kentucky, 
 that there was a Spanish plot afoot to seize the 
 western country. 
 
 Miré had other agents besides MeGilli —_— 
 who, by the way, was costing Spain, for his own 
 services and those of four tribes aggregating over - 
 
. 
 
 jf 
 
 Pi 
 be 
 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 261 
 
 six thousand warriors, a sum of fifty-five thousand 
 
 dollars a year. McGillivray did very well as super- 
 _ intendent of massacres; but the Spaniard required 
 _a different type of man, an American who enjoyed 
 his country’s trust, to bring the larger plan to 
 
 fruition. Miré found that man in General James 
 Wilkinson, lately of the Continental_Army and 
 
 now a resident of Kentucky, which territory Wil- 
 
 -kinson undertook to deliver to Spain, for a price. 
 
 In 1787 Wilkinson secretly took the oath of alle- - 
 giance to Spain and is listed in the files of the 
 
 Spanish secret service, appropriately, as “‘ Number 
 
 Thirteen.”’ He was indeed the thirteenth at table, 
 the Judas at the feast. Somewhat under middle 
 height, Wilkinson was handsome, graceful, and 
 remarkably magnetic. Of a good, if rather im- 
 poverished, Maryland family, he was well educated 
 and widely read for the times. With a brilliant 
 and versatile intellectuality and ready gifts as a 
 speaker, he swayed men easily. He was a bold 
 soldier and was endowed with physical courage, 
 
 though when engaged in personal contests he 
 
 seldom exerted it — preferring the red tongue of 
 slander or the hired assassin’s shot from behind 
 cover. His record fails to disclose one commend- 
 able trait. He was inordinately avaricious, but 
 
262 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 love of money was not his whole motive force: he 
 had a spirit so jealous and malignant that he hated 
 to the death another man’s good. He seemed to 
 divine instantly wherein other men were weak 
 and to understand the speediest and best means 
 of suborning them to his own interests — or of 
 destroying them. . 
 
 Wilkinson was able to lure a number of.Ken- 
 tuckians into the separatist mowement. George 
 Rogers Clark.seriously disturbed the arch plotter 
 by seizing a Spanish trader’s store wherewith to 
 pay his_soldiers, whom Virginia had omitted to 
 recompense. This act aroused the suspicions of 
 the Spanish, either as to Number Thirteen’s per- 
 fect loyalty or as to his ability to deliver the west- 
 ern country. In 1786, when Clark led two thousand 
 men against the Ohio Indians in his last and his 
 only unsuccessful campaign, Wilkinson had al- 
 ready settled himself near the Falls (Louisyille) and 
 had looked about for mischief which he might 
 do for profit. Whether his influence had anything 
 to do with what amounted virtually to a mutiny — 
 among Clark’s forces is not ascertainable; but, for 
 a disinterested onlooker, he was overswiit to spread 
 the news of Clark’s debacle and to declare gleefully 
 
 that Clark’s sun of military glory had now forever 
 
 bd 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 263 
 
 It is also known that he later served other 
 generals treacherously in Indian expeditions and 
 that he intrigued with Mad Anthony Wayne’s 
 I Se swine canines 
 # Spain did not wish to see the Indians crushed; 
 and Wilkinson himself both | hated and feared | d any 
 ‘ott ther officer’s prestige. How long he had been in 
 foreign pay we can only conjecture, for, several 
 "years before he transplanted his activities to Ken- 
 tucky, he had been one of a cabal against Wash- 
 ‘ington. Not only his ambitions but his nature 
 “must inevitably have brought him to the death- 
 paitle with George Rogers Clark. As a military 
 Resider, Clark had genius, and soldiering was his 
 “passion. In nature, he was open, frank, and bold 
 sto make foes if he scorned a man’s way as ignoble 
 or dishorrest. Wilkinson suavely set about schem- 
 
 oa ’ 
 
 ‘ing for in. His communication or memo- 
 ‘rial to the Virginia Assembly — signed by himself 
 and a number of his friends — villifying Clark, 
 -endedClark’s chances for the commission in the 
 _ Continental Army which he craved. It was Wil- 
 _kinson who made public an incriminating letter 
 which had Clark’s signature attached and which 
 
 f Clark said he had never seen. It is to be supposed 
 a Number Thirteen was responsible also for 
 
264 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 the malevolent ie i accusing Clark 
 
 found its way into the Colegeed of State Papers of 
 
 Virginia.t As aresult, Clark was censured by Vir- 
 ginia. Thereupon he petiaemad for a Court of In- 
 
 quiry, but this was not granted. Wilkinson had to — 
 
 get rid of Clark; for if Clark, with his military gifts 
 and his power over men, had been elevated to a 
 
 position of command under the smile of the Govern- © 
 
 ment, there would have been small opportunity 
 for James Wilkinson to lead the Kentuckians and 
 to gather in Spanish gold. So the machinations of 
 
 one of the vilest traitors who ever sold his country — 
 
 were employed to bring about the stultification — 
 
 and hence the downfall of a great servant. 
 
 Wilkinson’s chief aids were-thetrishmen, O’Fal- 
 lon, Nolan, and Powers. Through Nolan, he also 
 
 Yended Spanish secrets. He sold, indeed, what- 
 
 ever and whomever he could get his price for. So 
 
 clever was he that he escaped detection, though © 
 
 he was obliged to remove some suspicions. He 
 succeeded Wayne as commander of the regular 
 army in 1796. He was one of the commissioners 
 
 t See Thomas M. Greene’s The Spanish Conspiracy, p. 72, footnote. 
 It is possible that Wilkinson’s intrigues provide data for a new biog- 
 raphy of Clark which may recast in some measure the accepted view 
 of Clark at this period. 
 
SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER 265 
 
 | to receive Louisiana when the Purchase was ar- 
 ranged in 1803. He was still on the Spanish pay 
 roll at that time. ‘Wilkinson’ s true record came to 
 Saght only when the Spanish archives were opened 
 
 to investigators. 
 
 There were British agents also in the Qld South- 
 west, for the dissatisfaction of the Western men 
 inspired in Englishmen the hope of recovering the 
 
 ‘Mississippi Basin. Lord Dorchester, Governor of 
 Canada, wrote to the British Government that he 
 had been approached by important Westerners; but 
 
 _ he received advice from England to move slowly. 
 For complicity in the British schemes, William 
 Blount, who was first territorial Governor of Ten- 
 nessee and later a senator from that State, was 
 
 expelled from the Senate. 
 
 Surely there was never a more elaborate network 
 of plots that came to nothing! The concession to 
 Americans in 1796 of the right of navigation on the 
 Mississippi brought an end to the scheming. _ 
 
 In the same year Tennessee was admitted to the 
 Union, and John Sevier was elected Governor. Se- 
 vier’s popularity was undiminished, though there 
 were at this time some sixty—thousand souls in 
 Tennessee, many of whom were late comers who 
 
f 
 
 266 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 had not known him in his heyday. His old powell 
 to win men to him must have been as strong as 
 ever, for it is recorded that he had only to enter 
 a political meeting — no matter whose — for the 
 crowd to cheer him and shout for him to “give 
 them a talk.” 
 
 This adulation of Sevier still annoyed a few men 
 who had ambitions of their own. Among these was 
 Andrew Jackson, who had come to Jonesborough 
 in 1788, just after the collapse of the State of 
 Franklin. He was twenty-one at that time, and 
 he is said to have entered Jonesborough riding 
 a fine racer and leading another, with a pack of 
 hunting dogs baying or nosing along after him. A 
 court record dated May 12, 1788, avers that “An- 
 drew Jackson, Esq. came into Court and produced 
 
 to said office and Was admitted to Practiss as an 
 Attorney in the County Courts.”~ “Jackson made 
 no history in old Watauga during that year. Next 
 year he moved to Nashville, and one year later, : 
 when the Superior Court was established (1790), 
 he became prosecuting attorney. | 
 The feud between Jackson and Sevier began 
 
 about the time that Tennessee entered the Union. 
 
 7 
 
 — 
 
] SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER © 267 
 
 Jackson, then twenty-nine, was defeated for the 
 : post of Major General of the Militia through the 
 influence which Sévier exercised against him, and_ 
 it see seems ‘that Jackson never forgave this opposi- 
 tion to ) his ambitions. By the close of Sevier’s third 
 term, Boeever i in 1802, when Archibald Roane e be- 
 came Governor, the post of Major General was again 
 yacant. Both Sevier and Jackson offered them- 
 “selves for it, and Jackson was elected by the decid- 
 ing vote of the Governor, the military vote having 
 “resulted in a tie. A strong current of influence 
 had now set in against Sevier and involved charges 
 against his honor. His old enemy Tipton was 
 still active. The basis of the charges was a file of 
 papers from the entry-taker’s office which a friend 
 of Tipton’s had laid before the Governor, with 
 an affidavit to the effect that the papers were 
 fraudulent. Both the Governor and Jackson be- 
 lieved the charges. When we consider what sys- 
 tem or lack of system of land laws and land entries 
 obtained in Watauga and such primitive com- 
 munities — when a patch of corn sealed a right 
 and claims were made by notching trees with toma- 
 hawks: — we may imagine that a file from the land 
 office might appear easily enough to smirch a land- 
 holder’s integrity. The scandal was, of course, 
 
268 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 used in an attempt to ruin Sevier’s candida 
 a fourth-term-as-Gevernor and to make cert 
 Roane’s _Teélection. To this end Jackson be 
 all his energies . but without success. Nolichuc 
 Jack was.elected, for the fourth time, as Goven 
 of Tennessee. * 
 
 Not long after his inauguration, Sevie Fac 
 son in-Knoxville, where Jackson was holding cou 
 The charges against Sevier were then being ma 
 the subject of legislative investigation institut 
 by Tipton, and Jackson had published a letter 
 the KnoxvilleGazetfesupportingthem. Atthesig 
 of Jackson, Sevier flew into a rage, and a fie 
 altercation ensued. The two men were only 
 strained from leaping on each other by the int 
 vention of friends. The next day Jackson se 
 Sevier a challenge which Sevier accepted, but wi 
 the stipulation that the duel take place outside t 
 State. Jackson insisted on fighting in Knoxvill 
 where the insult had been offered. Sevier refuse 
 “*T have some respect,”’ he wrote, “for the laws 
 the State over which I have the honor to presic¢ 
 although you, a judge, appear to have none.” N 
 duel followed; but, after some further billets-d 
 Jackson published Sevier as “‘a base coward ai 
 poltroon. He will basely insult but has not t 
 
\ MM) MM ae, I 
 
 purage to repair the wound.” Again they met, 
 pyaccident, and Jackson rushed upon Sevier with 
 is cane. Sevier dismounted and drew his pistol 
 ut made no move to fire. Jackson, thereupon, 
 so drew his weapon. Once more friends inter- 
 = It is erable = neither really de- 
 would al ended Baas own career in s Tennenee 
 —if Sevier’s tribe of sons had not, by a swifter 
 eans, ended it for him. At this date Jackson 
 as thirty-six. Sevier was fifty-eight; and he had 
 eventeen children. 
 | The charges against Sevier, though pressed with 
 ull the force that his enemies could bring to bear, 
 pee to nothing. He Gea the Governor of 
 
 ars — the three terms 
 eight years allowed by the constitution. In 1811 
 € was sent to Congress for the second time, as he 
 ad represented the Territory there twenty years 
 earlier. He wasreturned again in 1813. Atthecon- 
 usion of his term in 1815 he went into the Creek 
 untry as commissioner to determine the Creek 
 boundaries, and here, far from his Bonnie Kate and 
 his tribe, he died of fever at the age of seventy. His 
 body was buried with full military honors at Tucka- 
 batchee, one of the Creek towns. In 1889, Sevier’s 
 
 srk 
 
270 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 remains were removed to Knoxville and a hi 
 marble spire was raised above them. 
 
 His Indian enemies forgave the chastisement 
 had inflicted on them and honored him. In tim 
 of peace they would come to him frequently - 
 advice. And in his latter days, the chiefs wou 
 make state visits to his home on the Nolichuel 
 River. “John Sevier is a good man” —so ¢ 
 clared the Cherokee, Old Fassel, making hims 
 the spokesman of history. 
 
 Sevier had survived his old friend, co-foun J 
 with him of Watauga, by one year. James Rol 
 ertson had died in 1814 at the age of seventy-tw 
 among the Chickasaws, and his body, like that of 
 his fellow pioneer, was buried in an Indian towr 
 and lay there until 1825, —— it was removed 
 to Nashville. RE : 
 
 What of the red tribes who had fought these 
 great pioneers for the wide land of the Old South 
 west and who in the end had received their dust 
 and treasured it with honor in the little soil re 
 maining tothem? Always the new boundary lines 
 drew closer in, and the red men’s foothold nar 
 rowed before the pushing tread of the whites. The 
 day came soon when there was no longer room for 
 
MAMAW ) MNES OE 
 SEVIER, THE STATEMAKER a7] 
 
 yem in the land of their fathers. But far off across 
 pe great river there was a land the white men did 
 ot covet yet. Thither at last the tribes—€ | 
 vhoctaw, Chickasaw, and Creek — took eee 
 — al 
 
 ray. With wives and children, maids and youths, 
 
 xe old and the young, with all their goods, their 
 attle and horses, in the company of a regiment 
 f American troops, they—like the white men 
 rho had superseded them — turned westward. In 
 neir faces also was the red color of the west, but 
 jot newly there. From the beginning of their race, 
 Jestiny had painted them with the hue of the brief 
 jour of the dying sun. 
 
She. ald 6 See 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 BOONE’S LAST DAYS 
 
 One spring day in 1799, there might have bee 
 observed a great stir through the valley of 
 Kanawha. With the dawn, men were ahorse, 2 
 women, too. Wagons crowded with human freigh 
 wheeled over the rough country, and boats, large 
 and small, were afloat on the streams which pour 
 into the Great Kanawha and at length mingle with 
 the Ohio at-Point Pleasant, where the battle wa § 
 fought which opened the gates of Kentucky. _ 
 Some of the travelers poured into the little settle. 
 
 ment at the junction of he Elk and the k wha 
 later in putin or had come from a greater dis 
 tance, gathered along the banks of the Kanawhe 
 At last shouts from those stationed farthest up the 
 stream echoed down the valley and told the res 
 that what they had come out to see was at hand 
 
 Several pirogues drifted into view on the river, 
 272 
 
if 
 
 (3 
 (ho 
 
 .BOONE’S LAST DAYS 273 
 
 iow brightening in the sunshine. In the vessels 
 ere men and their families; bales and bundles and 
 pieces of household furnishings, heaped to the gun- 
 wale; a few cattle and horses standing patiently. 
 But it was for one man above all that the eager 
 
 yes of the settlers were watching, and him they 
 saw Clearly as his boat swung by — a tall-figure, 
 srect and powerful, his keen friendly blue eyes un- 
 dimmed and his ruddy face unlined by time, though 
 sixty-five winters had frosted his black hair. 
 
 “For a decade these settlers had known Daniel 
 Boone, as storekeeper, as surveyor, as guide and 
 soldier. They had eaten of the game he killed and 
 lavishly distributed. And they too — like the folk 
 of Clinch Valley in the year of Dunmore’s War — 
 had petitioned Virginia to bestow military rank 
 upon their protector. ‘‘Lieutenant Colonel’? had 
 been his title among them, by their demand. Once 
 indeed he had represented them in the Virginia 
 
 Assembly and, for that purpose, trudged_to Rich- 
 mond with-rifle-end-hunting dog. Not interested 
 
 in the Legislature’s proceedings, he left early in the 
 session and tramped home again. 
 
 But not even the esteem of friends and neighbors 
 could hold the great hunter when the deer had fled. 
 So Daniel Boone was now on his way westward to 
 
 18 
 
274 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST — 
 
 Missouri, to a new land of fabled herds and wid 
 spaces, where the hunter’s gun might speak it 
 one word with authority and where the soul of 
 silent and fearless man might find its true abo d 
 in Nature’s solitude. Waving his last farewells, h 
 floated past the little groups — till their shouts o 
 good will were long silenced, and his fleet swung 
 out upon the Qhio. 
 
 As Boone sailed on down the Beautiful River 
 which forms the northern boundary g ate 
 old friends and newcomers who had only ee his 
 fame rode from far and near to greet and godspeed 
 him on his way. Sometimes he paused for a day 
 with them. Once at least — this was in Cincinnati 
 where he was taking on supplies — some one asked 
 him why, at his age, he was leaving the settled coun- 
 try to dare the frontier once more. ; 
 
 “Too crowded,” he answered; Hilbo want more 
 
 eigen -room!”’ 
 
 Boone settled at the Femme baa Creek on the 
 Missouri River, twenty-five milesaboveSt,.Ch 
 
 where the Missouri flows into the Mississippi. n oa 
 were four other Kentucky families at La Charette, 
 as the French inhabitants called the post, but these 
 were the only Americans. The Spanish authorities 
 granted Boone 840 acres of land, and here Danie el 
 
 \ ‘ MA Ak wn 
 La 
 
 / 
 
BOONE’S LAST DAYS Q75 
 puilt the last cabin home he was to erect for himself 
 and his s Rebecca. 
 
 } “The region pleased him immensely. The gov- 
 lernmental system, for instance, was wholly to his 
 mind. Taxes were infinitesimal. There were no 
 elections, assemblies, or the like. A single magis- 
 trate, or Syndic, decided all disputes and made the 
 few regulations and enforced them. There were 
 no land speculators, no dry-mouthed sons of the 
 commercial Tantalus, athirst for profits. Boone 
 used to say that his first years in Missouri were the 
 happiest of his life, with the exception of his first 
 - hunt in Kentucky. 
 
 In 1800 he was appointed Syndic of the dis- 
 triet of Femme Osage, which office he filled for four 
 years, until Louisiana became American territory. 
 
 He was held in high esteem as a magistrate because 
 
 yt . 
 
 of his just and wise treatment of his flock, who 
 brought him all their small bickerings to settle. 
 He had no use for legal procedure, would not listen 
 to any nice subtleties, saying that he did not care 
 anything at all about the evidence, what he wanted 
 was the truth. His favorite penalty for offenders 
 was the hickory rod “well laid on.” Often he de- 
 cided that both parties in a suit were equally to 
 blame and chastised them both alike. When in 
 
276 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 March, 1804, the American Commissioner recei le 
 Louisiana for the United States, Delassus, Lieuten | 
 ant Governor of Upper Louisiana, a a on 
 the various officials in the territory, wrote of th 
 Femme Osage Syndic: “Mr. Boone, a respectable 
 old man, just and impartial, he has already, since 
 I appointed him, offered his resignation owing to 
 his infirmities. Believing I know his probity, I 
 have induced him to remain, in view of my confi- 
 dence in him, for the public good.”’? 
 
 Daniel, no doubt supposing that a Syndic’s 
 rights were inviolable, had neglected to apply to 
 the Governor at New Orleans for a ratification 
 of his grant. He was therefore dispossessed. Not 
 until 1810, and after he had enlisted the Kentucky 
 Legislature in his behalf, did he succeed in indue 
 ing Congress to restore his land. The Kentucky 
 Legislature’s resolution was adopted because of 
 
 “the many eminent services rendered by Colon e] 
 Boone in exploring and settling the western coun- 
 try, from which great advantages havé resulte d 
 not only to the State but to the country in general, 
 and that from circumstances over which he had no 
 
 t Thwaites, Daniel Boone. To this and other biographies of Boone, 
 cited in the Bibliographical Note at the end of this volume, the 
 author is indebted for the material contained in this chapter. 
 
i BOONE’S LAST DAYS 277 
 
 mtrol he is now reduced to poverty; not having so 
 a as appears an acre of land out of the vast terri- 
 cory | he has been a great instrument in peopling.” 
 aniel was seventy-six then; so it was late in the 
 Jay for him to have his first experience of justice 
 in the matter of land. Perhaps it pleased him, 
 however, to hear that, in confirming his grant, 
 Congress had designated him as “the man who has 
 opened the way for millions of his fellow-men.” 
 _ The “infirmities” which had caused the good 
 
 adic to seek relief from political cares must have 
 cy magisterial. The hunter could have 
 been very little affected by them, for as soon as he 
 was freed from his duties Boone took up again the 
 silent challenge of the forest. Usually one or two 
 of his sons or his son-in-law, Flanders Calloway, 
 accompanied him, but_sometimes his. only com- 
 panions were an old Indian and his hunting dog. 
 On « one of his hunting trips he explored a part of 
 Kansas; and in 1814, when he was eighty, he hunted 
 hig_gamein-the Yellowstone where again his heart 
 rejoiced over great herds as in the days.of his first 
 lone wanderings-in_the Blue Grass country. At 
 last, with the proceeds of these expeditions he was 
 able to pay the debts he had left behind in Ken- 
 tucky thirty years before. The story runs that 
 
978 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 Daniel had only fifty cents remaining when | 
 the claims had been settled, but so contented WwW 
 he to be able to look an honest man in ‘the. a 
 that he was in no disposition to murmur ee 
 his poverty. 
 
 When after a long and happy life his wife di 
 in 1813, Boone lived with one or other of his son: | 
 and sometimes with Flanders ~ Calloway. 
 than Boone, with whom Daniel chiefly : made k 
 home, built what is said to have been the first st if 
 housein Missouri. Evidently the old pioneer disay 
 ' proved of stone houses and of the “luxuries” 
 furnishings which were then becoming possib! 
 to the new generation, for one of his biographe 
 speaks of visiting him in a log addition to his so 2 
 house; and when Chester Harding, the painter 
 visited him in 1819 for the purpose of doing ni 
 portrait, he found Boone dwelling in a small lo 
 cabin in Nathan’s yard. When Harding entered 
 Boone was broiling a venison steak on the end a 
 hisramrod. During the sitting, one day, Hardin; 
 
 x Boone’s son Nathan won distinction in the War of 1812 and en 
 tered the regular army, rising to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel 
 Daniel Morgan Boone is said to have been the first settler in Kans: 
 (1827). One of Daniel's grandsons, bearing the name of Albe 
 Gallatin Boone, was a pioneer of Colorado and was to the forefront 
 in Rocky Mountain exploration. Another grandson was the scout 
 Kit Carson, who led Frémont to California. 
 
BOONE’S LAST DAYS 279 
 
 when on his long hunts in the wilderness. 
 ' “No, I never got lost,’’ Boone replied reflec- 
 1 tively, “but I was bewildered once for three days.” 
 Though now having reached the age of eighty- 
 ive, Daniel was intensely interested in California, 
 ar d was enthusiastic to make the journey thither 
 next spring and so to flee once more from the 
 tivilization which had crept westward along his 
 path. The resolute opposition of his sons, how- 
 ev er, prevented the attempt. 
 A few men who sought out Boone in his old age 
 have left us brief accounts of their impressions. 
 Among these was Audubon. “The stature and gen- 
 eral appearance of this wanderer of the western 
 forests, ” the naturalist wrote, “approached the 
 igantic. His chest was broad, and prominent; his 
 = powers displayed themselves in every 
 limb; his countenance gave indication of his great 
 courage, “enterprise and perseverance; and, when 
 he spoke, the very motion of his lips brought the 
 impression that whatever he gies could not be 
 otherwise than strictly true.’ 
 ‘pen “Audubon spent.a night under Boone’s roof. He 
 related afterwards that the old hunter, having r re- 
 moved his hunting shirt, spread his blankets on the 
 
 — 
 
 io 
 
280 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 floor and lay down there to sleep, saying that he 
 found it more comfortable than a bed. A striking 
 sketch of Boone is contained in a few lines penned. 
 by one of his earliest biographers: “He had what 
 phrenologists would have considered a a model hea qd 
 — with a forehead peculiarly high, noble anc and be bold fi 
 thin compressed lips, a mild clear blue eye, a larg 
 and prominent chin and a general expression of 
 countenance in which fearlessness and « courage sat 
 enthroned and which told the beholder at a glance 
 what he had been and was formed to be.” In 
 criticizing the various portraits of Daniel, the same 
 writer says: ‘“They want the high port and nobl . 
 daring of his countenance. ... Never was ol | 
 
 as? more green, or gray hairs more graceful. His 
 
 years into iron.” q 
 » Although we are indebted to these and othe 7 
 early chroniclers for many details of Boone’s life, 
 there was one event which none of his biographers. 
 has related; yet we know that it must have take vi, 
 place. Even the bare indication of it is found 
 only in the narrative of the adventures of tw 7 
 other explorers. fe 
 It was in the winter of 1803 that these two men 
 came to Boone’s Settlement, as La Charette was’ 
 
J jut BOONE’S LAST DAYS 281 
 . generally called. They had planned to make 
 winter camp there, for in the spring, when the 
 fissouri rose to the flood, they and their company 
 'frontiersmen were to take their way up that un- 
 arted stream and over plains and mountains 
 quest of the Pacific Ocean. They were refused 
 srmission by the “Spanish authorities to camp at 
 oone’s Settlement: so they lay through the winter 
 me forty miles distant on the Illinois side of the 
 lississippi, across from the mouth of the Missouri. 
 ince the records are silent, we are free to picture 
 ; we choose their coming to the settlement during 
 le winter and again in the spring, for we know 
 lat they came. 
 We can imagine, for instance, the stir they made 
 Mf a Charette on some sparkling day when the 
 ost bit and the crusty snow sent up a dancing 
 ze of diamond points. We can see the friendly 
 rench habitants staring after the two young 
 aders and their men — all mere boys, though 
 uey were also husky, seasoned frontiersmen — 
 ith their bronzed faces of English cast, as in their 
 ayly fringed deerskins they swaggered through the 
 amlet to pay their respects to the Syndic. We 
 ay think of that dignitary as smoking his pipe be- 
 re his fireplace, perhaps; or making out, in his 
 
 Bi, 
 
ey te! ‘i 
 ERs Oe 33) 
 7 
 
 982 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST ~ 
 
 fantastic spelling, a record of his primitive court — 
 for instance, that he had on that day given Pier, 
 a dozen hickory thwacks, “well laid on,”’ for start 
 ing a brawl with Antoine, and had bestowed th 
 
 same upon Antoine for continuing the brawl with) 
 Pierre. A knock at the door would bring the ami= 
 able invitation to enter, and the two young mel 
 would step across his threshold, while their fol 
 lowers crowded about the open door and haile¢ 
 the old pathfinder. d 
 
 One of the two leaders — the dark slender mat 
 with a subtle touch of the dreamer in his resolut 
 face — was a stranger; but the other, with the mor 
 practical mien and the shock of hair that gave hin 
 the name of Red Head among the tribes, Boon | 
 had known as a lad in Kentucky. To Daniel a ne | 
 this young visitor the encounter would be a simple 
 meeting of friends, heightened in pleasure and 
 interest somewhat, naturally, by the adventur 
 in prospect. But to us there is something vas 
 in the thought of Daniel Boone, on his last fron 
 tier, grasping the hands of William Clark ane 
 Meriwether Lewis. | 4 
 
 As for the rough and hearty mob at the door 
 Daniel must have known not a few of them well 
 though they had been children in the days when) 
 
| BOONE’S LAST DAYS 288 
 he and William Clark’s brother strove for Ken- 
 tucky. It seems fitting that the soldiers with this 
 expedition should have come from the garrison at 
 Kaskaskia; since the taking of that fort in 1778 by 
 George Rogers ( Clark had opened the western way 
 from the Botadarics es Kentucky to the Missis- 
 sippi. And among the young Kentuckians enlisted 
 by William Clark were sons of the sturdy fighters 
 of still an earlier border line, Clinch and Holston Val- 
 ley men who had adventured under another Lewis 
 at Point Pleasant. Daniel would recognize in these 
 — such as Charles Floyd — the young kinsmen of 
 his old-time comrades whom he had preserved from 
 starvation in the Kentucky wilderness by the kill 
 from his rifle as they made their long march home 
 after Dunmore’s War. 
 
 In May, Lewis and Clark’s pirogues ascended 
 the Missouri and the leaders and men of the ex- 
 pedition spent another day in La Charette. Once 
 again, at least, Daniel was to watch the westward 
 departure of pioneers. In 1811,-when the Astorians 
 passed, one of their number pointed to the im- 
 mobile figure of “an old man on the bank, who, 
 he said, was Daniel Boone.”’ 
 
 Sometimes the aged pioneer’s mind cast forward 
 
284 PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST 
 
 to his last journey, for which his advancing yea 
 were preparing him. He wrote on the subject to 
 sister, in 1816, revealing in a few simple lines th 
 the faith whereby he had crossed, if not more lite 
 ally removed, mountains was a fixed star, and th 
 he looked ahead fearlessly to the dark trail he mu 
 tread by its single gleam. Autumn was tinting tl 
 forest and the tang he loved was in the air when t] 
 great hunter passed. The date of Boone’s death 
 given as September 26, 1820. He) was ‘im'his eight 
 sixth year . Unburdened. by the pangs o qisea 
 he went out serenely, by the apie, mathe of slee 
 into the new country. | 
 The convention for drafting the constit ‘ 
 Missouri, in session at, St.Louis, adjourned for 
 day, and for twenty days thereafter the membe 
 wore crape on their arms as a further mark 
 respect for the great pioneer. Daniel was: laid 
 Rebecca’s side, on the bank be Teugue e 
 about a mile from the Missouri River.) In 1845, 1 
 Missouri legislators hearkened to oft-repeated ple 
 from Kentucky and surrendered the remains of i 
 pioneer couple. Their bones lie now in Frankfol 
 the capital of the once Dark and Bloody Grou 
 and in 1880 a monument was raised oe 
 
 To us it seems -rather, that Kentucky itse 
 
BOONE’S LAST DAYS 285 
 
 e’s monument; even as-those.other a corn 
 Tllinois and Indiana, a are Clark’: s. There, 
 tese two servants unafraid, who sacrificed with- 
 1t measure in the wintry winds of man’s ingrati- 
 de, are each year memorialized anew; when the 
 th in summer — the season when the red man 
 
 ghtered — lifts u up the full grain in the ear, the 
 eiing com; and when autumn smiles in gold- 
 
 ce over the stubble fields, where the reaping 
 ad binding machines have hummed a nation’s 
 
 arvest song. 
 
Bs We Hel ian ‘ade 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 
 
 Tue Racks AND THEIR MIGRATION 
 
 _. C. A. Hanna, The Scotch-Irish, 2 vols. New York, 
 1902. A very full if somewhat over-enthusiastic study. 
 _ H.J. Ford, The Scotch-Irish in America. Princeton, 
 1915. Excellent. 
 DA. G. Spangenberg, Extracts from his Journal of 
 travels in North Carolina, 1752. Publication of the 
 Southern History Association. Vol. 1, 1897. 
 ‘ A.B. Faust, The German Element in the United States, 
 2 vols. (1909). 
 
 J. P. MacLean, An Historical Account of the Settle- 
 ments of Scotch Highlanders in America (1900). 
 _ $. H. Cobb, The Story of the Palatines (1897). 
 _N. D. Mereness (editor), Travels in the American 
 Colonies. New York, 1916. This collection contains 
 the diary of the Moravian Brethren cited in the first 
 chapter of the present volume. 
 
 Lire IN THE Back Country 
 
 _ Joseph Doddridge, Notes on the Settlements and Indian 
 Wars of the Western Parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania, 
 from 1763 to 1783. Albany, 1876. An intimate descrip- 
 tion of the daily life of the early settlers in the Back 
 Country by one of themselves. 
 
 287 
 
288 BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 
 
 J. F. D. Smyth, Tour in the United States of America, 
 2vols. London, 1784. Minute descriptions of the Back 
 Country and interesting pictures of the life of the set- 
 tlers; biased as to political views by Royalist sympathies. 
 
 William H. Foote, Sketches of North Carolina, New 
 York, 1846. See Foote also for history of the first 
 Presbyterian ministers in the Back Country. As to 
 political history, inaccurate. 
 
 Earty History AND EXPLORATION 
 
 J.S. Bassett (editor), The Writings of Colonel William 
 Byrd of Westover. New York, 1901. A contemporary 
 record of early Virginia. 
 
 Thomas Walker, Journal of an Exploration in the 
 Spring of the Year 1750. Boston, 1888. The record of 
 his travels by the discoverer of Cumberland Gap. 
 
 William M. Darlington (editor), Christopher Gist’s 
 Journals. Pittsburgh, 1893. Contains Gist’s account 
 of his surveys for the Ohio Company, 1750. 
 
 C. A. Hanna, The Wilderness Trail, 2 vols. New 
 York, 1911. An exhaustive work of research, with full 
 accounts of Croghan and Findlay. See also Croghan’s 
 and Johnson’s correspondence in vol. vu, New York 
 Colonial Records. 
 
 James Adair, The History of the American Indians, etc. 
 London, 1775. The personal record of a trader who was 
 one of the earliest explorers of the Alleghanies and of the 
 Mississippi region east of the river; a many-sided work, 
 intensely interesting. 
 
 C. W. Alvord, The Genesis of the Proclamation of 17 63. 
 Reprinted from Canadian Archives Report, 1906. A 
 new and authoritative interpretation. In this connec- 
 tion see also the correspondence between Sir Willia 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 289 
 
 Johnson and the Lords of Trade in vol. vit of New York 
 Colonial Records. 
 
 Justin Winsor, The Mississippi Basin. The Struggle 
 in ‘America between England and France. Cambridge, 
 1895. Presents the results of exhaustive research and 
 the codrdination of tacts by an historian of broad in- 
 tellect and vision. 
 
 Colonial and State Records of North Carolina. 30 vols. 
 The chief fountain source of the early history of North 
 Carolina and Tennessee. 
 
 W. H. Hoyt, The Mecklenburg Declaration of In- 
 dependence. New York, 1907. This book presents the 
 view generally adopted by historians, that the alleged 
 Declaration of May 20, 1775, is spurious. 
 
 Justin Winsor (editor), Narrative and Critical History 
 of America. 8 vols. (1884-1889). Also The Westward 
 Movement. Cambridge, 1897. Both works of incalcu- 
 lable value to the student. 
 
 C. W. Alvord, The Mississippi Valley in British Poli- 
 tics. 2 vols. Cleveland, 1917. A profound work of 
 great value to students. 
 
 KENTUCKY 
 
 R. G. Thwaites and L. P. Kellogg (editors), Docu- 
 mentary History of Dunmore’s War, 1774. Compiled 
 from the Draper Manuscripts in the library of the 
 Wisconsin Historical Society. Madison, 1905. A col- 
 lection of interesting and valuable decuments with a 
 suggestive introduction. 
 
 R. G. Thwaites, Daniel Boone. New York, 1902. 
 A short and accurate narrative of Boone’s life and ad- 
 ventures compiled from the Draper Manuscripts and 
 from earlier printed biographies. 
 
 rg 
 
290 BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 
 
 John P. Hale, Daniel Boone, Some Facts and Inci-— 
 dents not Hitherto Published. A pamphlet giving an ac- 
 count of Boone in West Virginia. Printed at Wheeling, — 
 West Virginia. Undated. ‘ 
 
 Timothy Flint, The First White Man of the West or ; 
 the Life and Exploits of Colonel Dan’l Boone. Cincin- q 
 nati, 1854. Valuable only as regards Boone’s later years. — 
 
 John S. C. Abbott, Daniel Boone, the Pioneer of Ken- ; 
 tucky. New York, 1872. Fairly accurate throughout. — 
 
 J. M. Peck, Daniel Boone (in Sparks, Library of § 
 American Biography. Boston, 1847). 
 
 William Henry Bogart. Daniel Boone and the H: inten 
 of Kentucky. New York, 1856. 
 
 William Hayden English, Conquest of the Country — 
 Northwest of the River Ohio, 1778-1783, and Life of Gen- 
 eral George Rogers Clark, 2 vols. Indianapolis, 1896. 
 An accurate and valuable work for which the author 
 has made painstaking research among printed and un- 
 printed documents. Contains Clark’s own account of 
 his campaigns, letters he wrote on public and personal 
 
 matters, and also letters from contemporaries in defense 
 of his reputation. 
 
 Theodore Roosevelt, The Winning of the West, 4 vols. 
 New York, 1889-1896. A vigorous and spirited narrative. 
 
 TENNESSEE 
 
 J. G. M. Ramsey, The Annals of Tennessee. Charles- 
 ton, 1853. John Haywood, The Civil and Political 
 History of the State of Tennessee. Nashville, 1891. 
 (Reprint from 1828.) These works, with the North 
 Carolina Colonial Records, are the source books of 
 early Tennessee. In statistics, such as numbers of In- 
 dians and other foes defeated by Tennessee heroes, not — 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 291 
 
 reliable. Incorrect as to causes of Indian wars during the 
 Revolution. On this subject see letters and reports by 
 John and Henry Stuart in North Carolina Colonial Rec- 
 ords, vol. x; and letters by General Gage and letters and 
 proclamation by General Ethan Allen in American Ar- 
 chives, Fourth Series, vol. 11, and by President Rutledge 
 of South Carolina in North Carolina Colonial Records, 
 
 _yol.x. Seealso.Justin Winsor, The Westward Movement. 
 
 J. Allison, Dropped Stitches in Tennessee History. 
 Nashville, 1897. Contains interesting matter relative 
 
 "to Andrew Jackson in his younger days as well as about 
 
 other striking figures of the time. 
 
 F. M. Turner, The Life of General John Sevier. New 
 York, 1910. A fairly accurate narrative of events in 
 which Sevier participated, compiled from the Draper 
 
 — Manuscripts. 
 
 A. W. Putnam, History of Middle Tennessee, or Life 
 and Times of General James Robertson. Nashville, 1859. 
 A rambling lengthy narrative containing some interest- 
 ing material and much that is unreliable. Its worst 
 fault is distortion through sentimentality, and indul- 
 gence in the habit of putting the author’s rodomontades 
 into the mouths of Robertson and other characters. 
 
 J.S. Bassett, Regulators of North Carolina, in Report 
 of the American Historical Association, 1894. 
 
 L. C. Draper, King’s Mountain and its Heroes. Cin- 
 cinnati, 1881. The source book on this event. Con- 
 tains interesting biographical material about the men 
 engaged in the battle. 
 
 FRENCH AND SPANISH INTRIGUES 
 
 Henry Doniol, Histoire de la participation de la France 
 « Pétablissement des Etats-Unis d Amérique, 5 vols. 
 
292 BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE 
 
 Paris, 1886-1892. A complete exposition of the — 
 French and Spanish policy towards America during theq 
 Revolutionary Period. 
 
 Manuel Serrano y Sanz, El brigadier Jaime Wilkinson . 
 y sus tratos con a para la independencia del Ken- i 
 tucky, afios 1787 & 1797. Madrid, 1915. A’ Spanish — 
 view of Wilkinson’s intrigues with Spain, based on — ; 
 letters and reports in the Spanish Archives. 
 
 Thomas Marshall Green, The Spanish Conspiracy. 
 Cincinnati, 1891. A good local account, from American 
 sources. The best material on this subject is found in — 
 Justin Winsor’s The Westward Movement and Narrative 
 and Critical History because there viewed against a 
 broad historical background. See Winsor also for the 
 Latin intrigues in Tennessee. For material on Alexan- 
 der McGillivray see the American Archives and the 
 Colonial Records of Georgia. 
 
 Edward S. Corwin, French Policy and the American 
 Alliance of 1778. Princeton, 1916. Deals chiefly with 
 the commercial aspects of French policy and should be 
 read in conjunction with Winsor, Jay, and Fitzmaurice’s 
 Life of William, Earl of Shelburne. 3 vols. London, — 
 1875. 
 
 John Jay, On the Peace Negotiations of 1782-83 as 
 Illustrated by the Secret Correspondence of France and 
 England. New York, 1888. A paper read before the 
 American Historical Association, May 23, 1887. 
 
 ity ple “gor 
 
INDEX 
 
 Abingdon (Penn.), Boone family 
 at, 25 
 
 Adair, James, pioneer trader, 
 
 , 59-74, 158 (note) 
 
 Alabama, Creek nation in, 57 
 
 Alabama, Fort, French at, 57, 
 
 —6«668 
 
 Alamance, Battle of the, 104 
 
 Allaire, Lieutenant, officer under 
 Ferguson, 200, 213 
 
 Allen, General Ethan, tries to 
 enlist Indian aid in Canada, 
 176 (note) 
 
 Alvord, C. W., The Mississippi 
 Valley in British Politics, cited, 
 110 (note), 113 (note) 
 
 American Archives, cited, 8 
 (mote), 123 (note), 176 (note) 
 
 Anne, Queen, invites Palatines to 
 England, 15 
 
 “Apostle, The,’’ Count Zinzen- 
 dorf, Moravian leader, 16-17 
 
 Attakullakulla, Cherokee states- 
 man, 133 
 
 Audubon, J. J., and Boone, 279- 
 280 
 
 Avery, Waightstill, 162 
 
 Baker, John, 
 Boone, 95 
 Bean (or Been), William, erects 
 
 first cabin on Watauga River, 
 159 
 Beautiful River, 125, 274 
 Big Bone Lick, Boone finds, 
 102 
 Big Turtle, name given Boone 
 _ by Indians, 145 
 
 companion to 
 
 Black Fish, Shawanoe chief, 
 145, 146, 147, 148 
 
 Bledsoe, Captain Anthony, 121, 
 125 (note), 149 
 
 Blount, William, Governor of 
 Tennessee, 265 
 
 Blue Licks (Ky.), 97, 102, 143; 
 battle at, 152 
 
 Bluff Hector, nickname for Hec- 
 tor MacNeill, 12 
 
 Bogart, W. H., Daniel Boone and 
 the Hunters of Kentucky, cited, 
 135 (note) 
 
 Boone, Albert Gallatin, grand- 
 son of Daniel, 278 (note) 
 
 Boone, Daniel, nationality, 24— 
 25; family, 24-26, 27-28; born 
 (1734), 26; early life, 26-27; 
 journey to North Carolina, 
 29-30; home on the Yadkin, 
 48; Findlay and, 52-53, 83, 
 90, 97, 98, 100, 131-32; in 
 Braddock’s campaign, 83; 
 marriage, 90-91; in Virginia, 
 92; removes to North Carolina, 
 92; carving on tree, 93; with 
 Waddell’s rangers, 93; travels 
 to Florida, 94; first expedition 
 into Kentucky, 95-97; second 
 Kentucky expedition, 97-103; 
 lonely explorations, 101-02; 
 personal characteristics, 105- 
 106; removes family to Powell’s 
 Valley, 106-09; part in Dun- 
 more’s war, 120-22, 128; and 
 Henderson’s venture, 129, 130 
 (note), 131, 133, 134-36; at 
 Boonesborough, 140-41, 143, 
 
 293 
 
294 
 
 Boone, Daniel—Continued 
 147-49; captured by Indians, 
 144-47; adopted by Indian 
 chief, 145; and Hamilton, 
 145-46; goes to West Virginia, 
 156; last days, 273 et seq. 
 
 Boone, Daniel Morgan, son of 
 Daniel, 278 (note) 
 
 Boone, Edward, brother of Dan- 
 jel, 152 
 
 Boone, George, grandfather of 
 Daniel, 24-25 
 
 Boone, George, Jr., uncle of Dan- 
 iel, 25 
 
 Boone, Israel, second son of 
 Daniel, 152 
 Boone, James, eldest son of 
 
 Daniel, 93, 107-08 
 
 Boone, Jemima, daughter of 
 Daniel, 141 
 
 Boone, John, son of Daniel, 
 106 
 
 Boone, Nathan, son of Daniel, 
 278 
 
 Boone, Rebecca, wife of Daniel, 
 91, 107, 278 
 
 Boone, Sam, brother of Daniel, 
 
 27 
 Boone, Sarah, daughter of 
 George, 25 
 
 Boone, Sarah Morgan, mother 
 of Daniel, 26, 28-29 
 
 Boone, Squire, brother of Daniel, 
 100, 102 
 
 Boone, Squire, father of Daniel, 
 25, 91; marriage, 26; expelled 
 from Society of Friends, 28; 
 leaves Pennsylvania, 28-29 
 
 Boone’s Fort, 137 
 
 Boone’s Settlement (La Char- 
 ette), 280-81; see also La 
 Charette 
 
 Boonesborough, ‘Transylvania 
 settlement, 138, 142, 245; 
 Boone in, 140-41, 143, 147- 
 149; Indian attacks on, 146-48; 
 Robertson goes to, 246 
 
 Bowman, John, 149 
 
 “Braddock’s Defeat,” 82 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Branching Oak of the Forest — 
 (Tach-nech-dor-us), Indian © 
 chief, 119 4 
 
 Brandywine, Battle of, Fergu- 
 son in, 197 i 
 
 Broglie, Comte de, French agent — 
 in America, 249 ‘| 
 
 Brown, Widow, at whose inn — 
 Sevier is arrested, 241 ; 
 
 Brown, Dr. Samuel, Clark’s 
 letter to, 127 (note) 
 
 Bryan, Joseph, father of Rel 
 becca Boone, 91 q 
 
 Bryan, Rebecca, marries Daniel ~ 
 Boone, 91; see also Boone, — 
 Rebecca 
 
 Bryan party on expedition to 
 Kentucky, 107, 108 
 
 Buffalo (Tenn.), Court at, 257 
 
 Bull, Colonel William, pioneer 
 trader, 55 
 
 Bullitt, Captain Thomas, 113, 
 121 
 
 Caldwell, David, Presbyterian 
 minister, 162 
 Calloway, Flanders, son-in-law 
 of Daniel Boone, 277, 278 
 Calloway, Richard, daughters 
 captured by Indians, 141; 
 accuses Boone of treachery, 
 146 (note) 
 Cameron, Alexander, British 
 agent to Cherokees, 170, 174, 
 176 (note) 
 Camp Union (Lewisburg), ren- 
 dezvous for expedition 
 Dunmore’s War, 115 
 Campbell, Major Arthur, 121-22, 
 125 (note), 236 
 Campbell, David, judge i in Ten- 
 nessee, 237, 240 
 Campbell, Rev. James, 50 i 
 Campbell, Colonel William, at 
 battle of Point Pleasant, 124 
 (note); and King’s Moun: ain, 
 205, 211, 219, 222 
 Carolinas, Cherokees in, 57; 
 Regulation Movement in, 159- 
 
INDEX 
 
 ‘Carolinas—Continued 
 
 ’ 164; see also North Carolina, 
 South Carolina 
 
 Carson, Kit, grandson of Daniel 
 Boone, 278 (note) 
 
 Catawba Indians, 36, 57 
 
 Céloron de Blainville, '77 
 
 Chads Ford, Ferguson’s account 
 of incident at, 198-99 
 
 Charleston (S. C.), Scotch-Irish 
 ‘in, 6 
 
 Cherokee Indians, in the Yadkin, 
 86; location and number, 57; 
 and Adair, 58-74; customs, 
 
 _ 62; and French, 66-68; Priber 
 compiles dictionary, 69; in 
 French and Indian Wars, 83- 
 87; Indian policy of South Car- 
 olina, 84-86; treaty with Eng- 
 lish (1761), 87, 118; trouble 
 in Kentucky, 114; Henderson 
 purchases land from, 130-33; 
 in Tennessee, 158, 228, 255; 
 South Carolina sends ammuni- 
 tion to, 177; peace made 
 (1777), 183; attack Watauga, 
 926-27, 228; North Carolina 
 and, 232; McGillivray and, 
 957; forced westward, 271 
 
 Chickamaugan Indians, 173 
 
 Chickasaw Indians, location, 57; 
 Adair and, 58, 59, 62, ‘72-73, 
 946; in Tennessee, 158; Mc- 
 Gillivray and, 257; forced 
 westward, 271 
 
 Chillicothe, Indian town, 146, 
 
 - 153 
 
 Choctaw Indians, location, 57; 
 and French, 58; Adair and, 
 63; McGillivray and, 257; 
 forced westward, 271 
 
 Choiseul, Etienne Francois, Duc 
 de, French Minister, 249 
 
 Chota, deputation of Indians at, 
 178; Robertson as Indian 
 agent at, 183 
 
 ‘Chronicle, Colonel, 209 
 
 Civil War, part of mountaineers 
 in, 224 
 
 295 
 
 Clark, G. R., 283, 285; in ‘“‘ Cre- 
 sap’s War,” 116-17; with 
 Dunmore’s forces, 125 (note); 
 and Chief Logan, 127 (note); 
 at Harrodsburg, 129, 139, 151- 
 152; and Harrodsburg Remon- 
 strance, 140; brings ammuni- 
 tion from Virginia, 142; made 
 a major, 149; founds Louis- 
 ville, 150; builds Fort Jeffer- 
 son, 150; war on Indians, 153, 
 262; letter to Governor of Vir- 
 ginia, 154; later life, 155; 
 death (1818), 155; and Wilkin- 
 son, 262-64; personal char- 
 acteristics, 263 
 
 Clark, William, brother of G. R., 
 155; Lewis and, 282 
 
 Clark, Elijah, 212 
 
 Cleveland, Colonel, at King’s 
 Mountain, 209, 220, 222 
 
 Cocke, William, 238 
 
 Colbert, white leader of Indians, 
 150-51 
 
 Connolly, Dr. John, Dunmore’s 
 agent, 113 (note) 
 
 Cooley, William, accompanies 
 Boone to Kentucky, 98, 100 
 Cooper, J. F., on Ferguson’s 
 story of Washington, 199 
 
 (note) 
 
 Cornstalk, Shawanoe chief, 118, 
 123-24, 126 
 
 Cornwallis, Edward, 195, 196, 
 202, 213, 214, 222, 228, 229 
 
 Corporation Acts, 4 
 
 Cowpens, frontiersmen at, 215; 
 Morgan’s victory at, 222 
 
 Craighead, Rev. Alexander, Pres- 
 byterian minister, 8, 162 
 
 Creek Indians, disclose Spanish 
 plot, 55; location, 57; and 
 McGillivray, 58-59, 255-56; 
 forced westward, 271 
 
 Cresap, Captain Michael, of 
 Maryland, 116,117, 127 
 
 “Cresap’s War,”’ 117 
 
 Croghan, George, “King of 
 Traders,’ 58, 112-13, 115, 118 
 
296 
 
 Cross Creek (Fayetteville), Mac- 
 Neill at, 12 
 
 Culloden, victory of, 9, 11 
 
 Cumberland, Duke of, directs 
 extermination of Gaels, 11 
 
 Cumberland Gap, Findlay leads 
 Boone through, 52-53; Boone 
 robbed in, 103 
 
 Cutbirth .(or Cutbird), Benja- 
 min, nephew of Daniel Boone, 
 95 
 
 Dartmouth, Lord, Secretary for 
 the Colonies, letters to, 6, 175, 
 176 (note) 
 
 Day, Sarah, marries Sam Boone, 
 Q7 
 
 De Lancey, Major, father-in- 
 law of J. F. Cooper, 199 
 (note) 
 
 De Peyster, Captain, officer un- 
 der Ferguson, 200, 218, 219 
 Delassus, Lieutenant Governor 
 
 of Upper Louisiana, 276 
 
 Delaware Indians, 178; location, 
 57; and French, 58; and Dun- 
 more’s War, 114, 118 
 
 Dequindre, French Canadian 
 leader of Indian band, 143, 
 147-48 
 
 Detroit, in hands of English, 87; 
 Boone at, 145-46 
 
 Dinwiddie, Robert, Lieutenant 
 Governor of Virginia, 77-80, 81 
 
 Doak, Rev. Samuel, 207, 235 
 
 Dobbs, Arthur, Governor of 
 North Carolina, 79, 86 
 
 Dobbs, E. D., son of Governor, 
 83 
 
 Monelson, Captain John, 186; 
 Journal, 187-93 
 
 Dorchester, Lord, Governor of 
 Canada, 265 
 
 Dragging Canoe, Chickamau- 
 gan chief, 133-34, 173, 179, 
 180, 181, 183, 206, 229 
 
 Draper, L. C., King’s Mountain 
 and its Heroes, cited, 199 
 (note), 204 (note), 213 (note) 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Dunmore, Lord, Governor of 
 Virginia, 112 (mote), 113, 114- 
 116, 118, 120, 123, 125, 1926, 
 176 (note) 
 
 Dunmore’s War, 114 e¢ seq. 
 
 Duquesne, Fort, 81, 82, 87, 88 
 
 English, W. H., Conquest of the 
 Country Northwest of the River 
 Ohio, cited, 127 (note) 
 
 Falling, William, 173 
 
 Fanning, Edmund, 
 Lord Granville, 160 
 
 Femme Osage Creek, Boone 
 settles at, 274-75. 
 
 Femme Osage Syndic, 275-77 
 
 Ferguson, Dr.Adam, letter to, 198 
 
 Ferguson, Major Patrick, as a 
 soldier, 196-98; as a man, 
 198-200; commands loyalists 
 in Back Country, 200-06, 211; 
 at King’s Mountain, 212-20; 
 death, 219-20, 221 
 
 Findlay, John, pioneer trader, 
 and Daniel Boone, 52, 83, 90, 
 97, 98, 100, 131-32; in Brad- 
 dock’s campaign, 83; capt: 
 by Shawanoes, 97, 131 
 
 Fitzherbert, letter quoted, 25: 
 (note) 
 
 Fleming, William, 124 
 
 Florida, Spanish and Indians in, 
 55, 56; Boone explores, 94 
 
 Floridablanca, Spanish Minister, 
 250 
 
 Floyd, John, Washington’s agent, 
 113-14; and Boone, 121, 141 
 
 Forbes, General, expedition i 
 1759, 87 
 
 France, Highlanders flee to, 9 
 and Indians, 53, 54, 58, 178- 
 179; possessions in Ameri 
 56, 57; Adair’s account o 
 struggles with French, 63 
 Priber sent by, 66-70; Fren 
 and Indian Wars, 75 et seq. 
 attitude toward American i 
 dependence, 248-53 
 
 agent of 
 
INDEX 
 
 Frankfort (Ky.), Daniel Boone’s 
 grave in, 284 
 
 Frankland, State of, 234-38; 
 see also Franklin, State of 
 
 Franklin, Benjamin, 238 
 
 Franklin, State of, 238, 240, 
 259, 260, 266; see also Frank- 
 land, State of 
 
 Frémont, J. C., 278 (note) 
 
 French and Indian Wars, 75 et 
 
 seq. 
 Friends, Society of, expel Squire 
 Boone, 28 ’ 
 Furniture of the pioneers, 45- 
 46 
 
 Gaels, see Highlanders 
 
 Gage, General Thomas, quoted, 
 176 (note) 
 
 Galphin, pioneer trader, 59, 256 
 
 Gates, General, 202, 210, 221 
 
 Gazette, Knoxville, Jackson’s let- 
 ter in, 268 
 
 Georgia, Creek nation in, 57; 
 Tories in, 195; and State of 
 Franklin, 238; and McGilli- 
 vray, 256-57, 258 
 
 Germain, Lord, and Stuart, 176 
 (note), 177 
 
 German Palatinate, persecution 
 of Protestants in, 15 
 
 German Reformed Church, 15 
 
 Germans, in Virginia and North 
 Carolina, 14-15; as immigrants, 
 16 
 
 Gibson, Major, 126 
 
 Gibson, Colonel John, 117-18 
 
 Girty, George, 143 
 
 Girty, James, 143 
 
 Gist, Christopher, 77, 78 
 
 Glen, Governor of South Caro- 
 lina, 63, 64; Indian policy, 
 
 84 
 
 Gottlob, Brother, Moravian 
 leader, 19, 21, 23, 24 
 
 Gower, Fort, 123 
 
 Grant, Colonel James, 94 
 
 Grantham, Lord, letter to, 252 
 (note) 
 
 | 
 
 297 
 
 Granville, Lord, Proprietor in 
 North Carolina, Moravians 
 purchase land from, 18; agents 
 oppress people, 104, 159 
 
 Great Meadows, Washington at, 
 81 
 
 Great Telliko, Cherokee town, 
 62, 66, 69, 158 
 
 Great War, part of mountaineers 
 in, 224-25 
 
 Greathouse, trader, 117 
 
 Greene, General Nathanael, 221- 
 222 
 
 Greene, T. M., The Spanish 
 Conspiracy, cited, 264 (note) 
 
 Grube, Adam, Moravian Broth- 
 er, 18; Journal, 19-24 
 
 Guilford Court House, battle of, 
 222 
 
 Hamilton, Henry, British Gov- 
 ernor at Detroit, 139, 145— 
 146 
 
 Hampbright, Colonel, 209 
 
 Hanna, C. A., The Wilderness 
 Trail, cited, 97 (note) 
 
 Harding, Chester, and Boone, 
 278-79 
 
 Harrod, James, 139; establishes 
 first settlement in Kentucky, 
 110, 114, 121, 129; as surveyor, 
 113; and MHenderson, 138; 
 goes to Watauga for supplies, 
 141-42; made a Captain, 149; 
 accompanies Clark, 153 
 
 Harrodsburg, 136, 142, 149, 
 153, 245, 246; founded, 114, 
 129; Remonstrance, 140, 151; 
 Indian attacks on, 146 
 
 | Henderson, J udge Richard, leader 
 
 of Transylvania Company, 
 130-40, 160, 184-85; Donel- 
 son’s party meets, 193 
 
 Henry, Patrick, Preston writes 
 to, 125 
 
 Heydt, Joist, 16 
 
 Highlanders, in Revolutionary 
 War, 8, 13-14; in North 
 Carolina, 9; clan system, 10; 
 
298 
 
 Highlanders—Continued 
 characteristics, 10-12; and In- 
 dians, 54-55; see also ei 
 Trish 
 
 Hill, William, 96 
 
 Holden, Joseph, 98, 100 
 
 Holston River settlement, 141, 
 158, 159, 163, 176 
 
 Honeycut, pioneer at Watauga, 
 165 
 
 Hooper, William, 160 
 
 Houston, Rev. Samuel, 235 
 
 Hoyt, W. H., The Mecklenburg 
 Declaration of Independence, 
 cited, 8 (note) 
 
 Huguenots in America, 54 
 
 Hunter, James, 164 
 
 Husband, Hermon, 
 164 
 
 161, 163, 
 
 Illinois, Clark’s troops, 124, 125 
 (note), 283; Robertson jour- 
 neys to, 185; and Clark, 285 
 
 “Indian Summer,” origin of 
 term, 41 
 
 Indiana and Clark, 285 
 
 Indians, relation to white men in 
 West, 38-43; use of hickory, 
 45; and the traders, 52 et seq.; 
 and French, 53, 54, 58, 178- 
 179; and Spanish, 53, 54, 55, 
 255; Boone and, 101-02, 
 103; Dunmore’s War, 114 et 
 seg.; “‘Cresap’s War,” 117; 
 treachery toward, 117-18; 
 purchase of land from, 131- 
 134; trouble in Kentucky, 
 135-36, 139, 143, 152-53; 
 see also names of tribes 
 
 Treland, Scotch-Irish from, -6; 
 see also Ulster Plantation 
 
 Troquois Indians, location, 57; 
 loyalty to English, 58; Cro- 
 ghan and, 118; cede Kentucky 
 to British, 132; see also Six 
 Nations 
 
 Jackson, Andrew, 243, 266 
 Jay, John, On the Peace Negoti- 
 
 INDEX 
 
 ations of 1782-1783 as illus- 
 trated by the Secret Gnd 
 spondence of France and ; 
 land, cited, 252 (note) 
 Jefferson, Thomas, and navi 
 Seren dies of Mississippi River, 
 F : 
 Jefferson, Fort, 150, 151 
 Jennings, Mrs., Donelson’s ac- 
 count of, 188, 190, 191 be 
 Johnson, Sir William, and Iro- 
 quois Indians, 58, 179; an 
 sale of Indian Jand, 111 
 
 North Carolina, 9 
 Jonesborough (Tenn.), county 
 seat of Washington, 184; dele- 
 gates meet to form State, 233; 
 court at, 237; Andrew Jack- 
 son at, 266 
 
 Kalb, Johann, French agent in 
 America, 249 { 
 Kansas, Daniel Boone in, 277 
 Kenton, Simon, 125 (note), 
 
 143 i 
 Kentucky, meaning of name, 95 
 (note); Boone’s first expe 
 tion to, 95-97; expedition 
 Boone and Findlay into, 97- 
 103; settlement and Indian 
 troubles, 104-56; admitted as 
 State (1792), 156; and Miss 
 sippi River, 254; as Boone’s 
 monument, 284; bibliography y; 
 289-90 a 
 Keppoch, Laird of, legend con- 
 cerning, 11 oe 
 King, trader, 117, 118 . 
 King’s Mountain, Battle of, 
 214-21 
 Knoxville (Tenn.), Sevier and 
 Jackson in, 268; Sevier burie 
 in, 269-70 
 
 La Charette (Mo.), Boone at, 
 274-75, 281; see also spire 's 
 Settlement 
 
 Le Boeuf, Fort, 79 
 
Macdonald, Allan, 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Lewis, Colonel Andrew, 114-15, 
 122-23, 124 (note), 158 
 
 Lewis, Colonel Charles, 
 124 
 
 Lewis, Meriwether, 282, 283 
 
 Logan, Mingo chief Tach-nech- 
 dor-us, 119, 120, 126-27 
 
 Logan, Benjamin, 125 (note), 
 135, 136, 141-42, 149 
 
 Long Hunters, 103 
 
 Loudon, Fort, 158 
 
 Louisbourg in hands of English, 
 
 115, 
 
 87 
 
 Louisville, Findlay reaches site 
 of, 97; Clark founds, 150; 
 Wilkinson at, 262 
 
 Lulbegrud Creek, 100 
 
 Lutheran Church, 15 
 
 Luzerne, French Ambassador at 
 Philadelphia, 251 
 
 Lytle, Captain, 203-04 
 
 Lytle, Mrs., and Ferguson, 204 
 
 Lyttleton, Governor of South 
 Carolina, 85 
 
 McAden, Rev. Hugh, of Phila- 
 delphia, 50 
 
 McAfee, James, 136 
 
 MeAfee brothers, 113, 136 
 
 McDowell, Colonel Charles, 200- 
 201, 202, 206, 210, 211-12, 213, 
 9A3, 
 
 McDowell, Joseph, 243 
 
 McGillivray, Alexander, Creek 
 chief, 59, 255-61 
 
 McGillivray, Lachlan, father of 
 Alexander, 58-59, 256, 257 
 
 McGregor, William, 9 
 
 of Kings- 
 borough, 14 
 
 MacDonald, Flora, 14 
 
 MacLean, J. P., An Historical 
 Account of the Settlement of 
 Scotch Highlanders in America, 
 cited, 11 (note) 
 
 MacNeill, Hector, (Bluff Hec- 
 tor), 12 
 
 MacNeill, Neil, 
 12 
 
 of Kintyre, 
 
 299 
 
 Mansker, Gasper, 103, 185 
 
 Marion, General Francis, 229 
 
 Martin, Josiah, Royal Governor 
 of North Carolina, 13 
 
 Mecklenburg Declaration of In- 
 dependence, 8 
 
 Mereness, N. D., ed., Travels in 
 the American Colonies, cited, 
 18 (note) 
 
 Mingo Indians, 114, 117, 118, 
 119-20, 126 
 
 Miré, Don Estevan, Governor of 
 Louisiana, 254-55, 259, 260- 
 261 
 
 Mississippi (State), Choctaws in, 
 63 
 
 Mississippi River, French terri- 
 tory on, 56; Choctaws on, 57; 
 Stewart’s party reaches, 95; 
 Spain refuses right of navi- 
 gation of, 253-54 
 
 Missouri, Boone settles in, 274; 
 Boone dies in, 284 
 
 Mobile, French hold, 57 
 
 Mohawk Indians, 178, 179 
 
 Montgomery, John, 125 (note) 
 
 Montreal in hands of English, 
 87 
 
 Mooney, James, 98, 100 
 
 Moore’s Fort, Boone commands, 
 122 
 
 Moravians, 15, 16-24 
 
 Morgan, Daniel, 125 (note), 222 
 
 Morgan, Sarah, marries Squire 
 Boone, 26; see also Boone, 
 Sarah Morgan 
 
 Morgantown (N. C.), 
 sent to, 242-44 
 
 Mountain Leader (Opomingo), 
 Indian chief, 247 
 
 Mountaineers of the South, 223- 
 Q24 
 
 Miiller, Adam, 16 
 
 Musgrove’s Mill, 
 at, 202 
 
 Sevier 
 
 engagement 
 
 Nantuca Indians, deputation of 
 warriors from, arrive at Chota, 
 178 
 
300 
 
 Nash, General Francis, 163, 186 
 (note) 
 
 Nashborough, Nashville first 
 named, 186 
 
 Nashville, founded, 186; Andrew 
 Jackson at, 266; Robertson 
 buried at, 270 
 
 Nathanael, Brother, one of the 
 Moravian Brethren, 21 
 
 Navigation Acts and Ireland, 
 4 
 
 Necessity, Fort, 81 
 
 Neely, Alexander, 100 
 
 New France, 87, 88 
 
 New Market (Va.), Sevier founds, 
 167 
 
 Nolan, aids Wilkinson, 264 
 
 “Nolichucky Jack,” nickname 
 of John Sevier, 184; see also 
 Sevier 
 
 North Carolina, Scotch-Irish i in, 
 7; Craighead in, 8; Highland- 
 ers in, 12-13; Moravians in, 
 18; journey of Moravian Breth- 
 ren into, 19-24; rainfall, 43; 
 pioneer homes in, 45-47; in 
 French and Indian Wars, 82- 
 83, 86; Indian policy, 83-84; 
 Daniel Boone in, 92; Regu- 
 lation Movement, 104, 137, 
 159-64; Transylvania Com- 
 pany formed in, 129-30; emi- 
 grants go to Tennessee, 159; 
 Robertson from, 165; bound- 
 ary line, 170, 185, 186; Wa- 
 tauga petitions for annexation, 
 171-72; erects Washington 
 County, 172; Colonial Records, 
 cited, 176 (note), 177 (note); 
 sends out Robertson as Indian 
 agent, 183; Ferguson in, 203; 
 Ferguson’s proclamation to, 
 212-13; Cornwallis expected 
 to retreat through, 228; reso- 
 lution of gratitude to over- 
 
 mountain men, 230; cedes 
 overmountain territory to 
 United States, 231-33; and 
 
 State of Frankland, 234, 236- 
 
 INDEX 
 
 237, 238; and Sevier, 239, 240— 
 245; and State of Franklin, 
 240; and Tennessee settle- 
 ments, 259-60 
 
 North Wales (Penn.), Boone 
 family in, 25 
 
 Oconostota, Cherokee chief, 118, 
 132 
 
 O'Fallon aids Wilkinson, 264 
 
 Ohio, Clark against Indians of, 
 151, 153 
 
 Ohio Company, 77, 78, 81, 111- 
 112 
 
 Old Tassel, 
 270 
 
 Oley Township, Berks County 
 (Penn.), George Boone at, 
 25, 26 
 
 Opimingo (Mountain Leader), 
 Chickasaw chief, 247 
 
 Oswego in hands of English, 
 87 
 
 Ottawa Indians, 118, 178 
 
 Cherokee Indian, 
 
 Palatines, see Germans 
 
 Paris, Treaty of (1763), 94 
 
 Patrick Henry, Fort, 186 
 
 Penn, William, Boone seeks 
 information from, 25 
 
 Pennsylvania, Scotch-Irish in, 
 1, 6; Germans in, 15, 16; 
 Boone family in, 25-28; dis- 
 putes Fort Pitt with Virginia, 
 112 
 
 “Pennsylvania Dutch,” 15 
 
 “Pennsylvania Irish,” 6 
 
 Peyton, Ephraim, one of Donel- 
 son’s party, 189 
 
 Peyton, Mrs. Ephraim, Donel- 
 son’s account of, 188, 189, 190 
 
 Philadelphia, Boone family 
 reaches, 25 
 Pickett, History of Alabama, 
 
 cited, 257 (note) 
 Piqua, Indian town, 153 
 Pitfour, Lord, of Aberdeen, 
 
 196 : 
 Pitt, Fort, 88, 112-18, 115 
 
 r 
 ; 
 
 | 
 
INDEX 
 
 Pittsburgh site a crucial point 
 in 1754, 81 
 
 Point Pleasant, Battle of, 123-24, 
 164, 272 
 
 Pontleroy, French secret agent 
 in America, 249 
 
 Powell’s Valley, 135; Boone’s 
 journey to, 106, 107 
 
 “Powwowing Days,” 41 
 
 Presbyterian Church, and Scotch- 
 Irish, 3; Charles I suppresses, 4 
 
 Preston, Colonel William, 115, 
 
 _ 120, 125 
 
 Priber, French agent to Chero- 
 kees, 66-70 
 
 ‘ Proclamation of 1763, 110-11, 
 113, 170 
 
 Puck-e-shin-wa, Shawanoe chief, 
 125 
 
 Pulaski, Count, 199 (note) 
 
 Quaker Meadows, Sevier’s troops 
 at, 209 
 Quakers, see Friends, Society of 
 
 Red Shoe, Choctaw chief, 63 
 
 Regulation Movement, 104, 137, 
 159-64 
 
 Revolutionary War, Highlanders 
 in, 13-14; Indian raids in 
 Kentucky, 139; King’s Moun- 
 tain, 195 et seq.; attitude of 
 France and Spain in, 248 et 
 
 seq. 
 som Archibald, Governor of 
 
 Tennessee, 267 
 
 Robertson, James, “father of 
 Tennessee,” 124-25 (note), 
 133; at Watauga, 165-66, 170, 
 181; personal characteristics, 
 165; and Sevier, 167, 239; 
 commands Wataugans, 172; 
 Indian agent at Chota, 183; 
 leads settlers into middle 
 Tennessee, 185; founds Nash- 
 ville, 186; and Ferguson, 195; 
 and Indian war, 246, 255; 
 characterizes McGillivray, 259; 
 death (1814), 270 
 
 301 
 
 Robertson, Mrs. James, 246 
 
 Robertson, Mark, 185 
 
 Robinson, Colonel David, 149 
 
 Rogers, John, 88 
 
 Rogers, Joseph, 153 
 
 Roosevelt, Theodore, The Win- 
 ning of the West, cited, 134 
 (note) 
 
 Russell, William, 107, death of 
 his son, 108 
 
 Rutherford, Griffith, 163 
 
 Rutledge, John, President of 
 South Carolina, 176 (note) 
 
 St. Asaph’s Station founded, 
 136 
 
 St. Augustine, Spanish at, 55, 56 
 
 St. Vincent, Island of, Ferguson 
 on, 197 
 
 Sapperton, trader, 117 
 
 Scotch-Irish, as immigrants, 1-2, 
 6; characteristics, 2-3, 5-6; 
 religion, 3, 4; persecution of, 
 4-5; and American Independ- 
 ence, 7-8; bibliography, 287; 
 see also Highlanders 
 
 Seven Years’ War, casus belli, 
 76; in Europe, 82; land prom- 
 ised to soldiers of, 113; 
 Ferguson in, 196 
 
 Sevier, John, 133; probably seen 
 by Brother Grube, 20-21; 
 marriage, 48; at Watauga, 
 166-67, 169, 170, 171; and 
 New Market, 167; and Robert- 
 son, 167, 168, 239; personal 
 characteristics, 168-69; writes 
 Virginia Committee, 173-74; 
 and Indian troubles, 174, 181— 
 183, 226-28; and “Bonnie 
 Kate,” 182; nicknamed “‘ Noli- 
 chucky Jack,”’ 184; and King’s 
 Mountain, 200-01, 205-06, 
 208 et seqg.; as a statesman, 
 226 et seq.; feud with Tipton, 
 227, 234, 239-40, 241, 267; 
 elected Governor of Tennessee, 
 265; and Jackson, 266-69; 
 death (1815), 269 
 
302 
 
 Sevier, John, Jr., 243 (note) 
 
 Sevier,. Valentine, 125 (note) 
 
 Shawanoe Indians, 178; location, 
 57; and French, 58; Findlay 
 a prisoner of, 97; and Boone, 
 98-99, 108, 143-48; war with, 
 114, 118, 123-26; relinquish 
 right to Kentucky, 131; cap- 
 ture girls from Boonesborough, 
 141 
 
 Shelby, Isaac, at battle of Point 
 Pleasant, 124 (note); Colonel 
 of Sullivan, 184; at King’s 
 Mountain, 200 et seg.; moves 
 to Kentucky, 230 
 
 Sheltowee (Big Turtle), name 
 given to Boone by Indians, 
 
 145 
 
 Sherrill, Bonnie Kate, wife of 
 John Sevier, 182 
 
 Six Nations, right to dispose of 
 territory, 76; see also Iroquois 
 Indians 
 
 Social customs, of seaboard 
 Sain 32; of pioneers, 32 et 
 
 South Carolina, Yamasi Indians 
 in, 56; and Cherokees, 177; 
 Tories in, 195; see also Caro- 
 linas 
 
 Spain, and Indians, 53, 54, 55; 
 attitude toward American in- 
 dependence, 248-55; plots 
 against United States, 255-65; 
 State of Franklin and, 259 
 
 Spangenburg, Bishop, 18 
 
 Spanish Succession, War of 
 (1701-13), 15 
 
 Spencer, Judge, issues warrant 
 for Sevier, 241 
 
 Stanwix, Fort, treaty of (1768), 
 132 
 
 Stephen, Adam, 125 (note) 
 
 Stewart, John, brother-in-law 
 of Daniel Boone, 95, 98, 
 100 
 
 Stoner, Michael, 120, 121 
 Stover, Jacob, husband of Sarah 
 Boone, 25 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Stuart, ps deputy Indian 
 
 agent, 1 
 
 Stuart, Jckn, with Dunmore’s 
 forces, 125 (note); British 
 agent, 174, 176 (note); in 
 Revolution, 229 
 
 Sullivan County, formed from 
 
 Washington County, 184; 
 troops from, 201 
 Sycamore Shoals, conference 
 
 with Indians at (1775), 132- 
 134, 170; troops mustered at, 
 206 
 
 Tach-nech-dor-us (Branching Oak 
 of the Forest), Mingo chief, 
 
 see Logan 
 Tarleton, Sir Banastre, British 
 officer, 218 
 
 Taylor, Hancock, 113, 12] 
 (note) 
 
 Tecumseh, 125 
 
 Tennessee, 157 et seq., 
 
 name, 158 (note); and Missle 
 sippi River navigation, 254; 
 admitted as State (1796), 265; 
 bibliography, 290-91; see also 
 Frankland, Franklin, Wa- 
 tauga 
 
 Test Acts, 4 
 
 Thomas, Isaac, trader, 173, 174, 
 177, 178, 228 
 
 Thwaites, R. G., Daniel Boone, 
 cited, 25 (note); 276 (note); 
 Documentary History of Dun- 
 more’s War, cited, 125 (note) 
 
 Tipton, Colonel John, feud with 
 Sevier, 227, 234, 239-40, 241, 
 267; judge for North Carolina, 
 237 
 
 Tipton, Jonathan, 226-27 
 
 Todd, John, 149 
 
 Tories, 195 
 
 Traders among the pioneers, 52 
 et seq. 
 
 Traders’ Trace, 94 
 
 Transylvania Company, 
 140 
 
 Trent, Captain William, 81 
 
 130- 
 
 eS ae = 
 
INDEX 
 
 Tryon, William, Governor of 
 North Carolina, 104, 160 
 
 Tuckabatchee, Creek town, Se- 
 vier buried at, 269 
 
 Turner, F. M., Life of General 
 John Sevier, cited, 243 (note) 
 
 Ulster Plantation, 3-4 
 Ulstermen, see Scotch-Irish 
 
 Vergennes, Charles  Gravier, 
 Comte de, French Minister, 
 250, 251, 252 
 
 Virginia, =a to the Ohio, 76- 
 77; Indian policy, 83; Indians 
 apply for redress to, 85; Daniel 
 Boone in, 92; disputes Fort 
 Pitt with Pennsylvania, 112; 
 Harrodsburg Remonstrance, 
 140; Clark and, 140, 142; and 
 Boone, 141; and Mississippi 
 River navigation, 254 
 
 Virginia, Valley of, Miiller’s set- 
 tlement in, 16 
 
 Wachovia Tract, 18 
 
 Waddell, Hugh, of North Caro- 
 lina, in French and Indian 
 wars, 86, 87; erects fort on 
 Holston, 158; and Regulation 
 Movement, 163 
 
 Walpole Company, 112 
 
 War of 1812, part of mountain- 
 eers in, 224 
 
 Ward, James, 95 
 
 Ward, Nancy, half-caste Chero- 
 
 _ kee prophetess, 174, 177 
 
 Warriors’ Path, 107, 132, 134, 
 186 
 
 Washington, George, journeys 
 to Fort Le Beeuf, 79; at 
 Great Meadows, 81; “Brad- 
 dock’s Defeat,” 82; surveys 
 in Kentucky, 111; tries to 
 secure land patents for sol- 
 diers, 113; and Indian allies, 
 176 (note); Ferguson’s story 
 of, 199 
 
 303 
 
 Washington, District of, 233 
 
 Washington County, erected by 
 North Carolina, 172; divided, 
 184 
 
 Watauga Colony, lands leased to, 
 134; Harrod and Logan get 
 supplies from, 141-42; Wil- 
 liam Bean builds first cabin, 
 159; and Regulators, 163; 
 Robertson at, 165-66, 170, 
 181; Sevier at, 166-67, 169, 
 200; found to be on Indian 
 lands, 170; petitions North 
 Carolina for annexation, 171-— 
 172; made into Washington 
 County, 172; Indian attacks 
 on, 176, 181-83; and King’s 
 Mountain, 200-01, 205; see also 
 Frankland, Franklin, Tennes- 
 see 
 
 Wayne, Mad Anthony, 263 
 
 Welsh in America, 54 
 
 Wheeling (W. Va.), as rendez- 
 vous for troops, 115; Cresap 
 at, 116 
 
 White Eyes, 
 118 
 
 Wilkinson, General James, 261- 
 265 
 
 Williams, Colonel, 209 
 
 Williams, Jaret, 173 
 
 Winchester, German settlement 
 near, 16 
 
 Winsor, Justin, The Westward 
 Movement, quoted, 176 (note) 
 
 Winston, Major, 176 (note) 
 
 Woolwich, Ferguson studies at, 
 197 
 
 Wyandot Indians, 114 
 
 Delaware chief, 
 
 Yadkin Valley, Scotch-Irish in, 
 7; Craighead in, 8; High- 
 landers in, 12-13; Moravians 
 in, 23; life in, 36, 47; hunting, 
 43, 105; Boone’s home in, 48, 
 90, 97; Presbyterian ministers 
 in, 50 
 
 Yamasi, Indians, 56; Massacre, 
 55 
 
N OUTLINE OF THE PLAN OF 
 HE CHRONICLES OF AMERICA 
 
 The fifty titles of the Series fall into eight topical sequences or groups, 
 each with a dominant theme of its own— 
 
 ad 
 
 I. The Morning of America 
 TIME: 1492-1763 
 
 HE theme of the first sequence is the struggle of nations for the 
 possession of the New World. The mariners of four European king- 
 
 doms—Spain, Portugal, France, and England—are intent upon the 
 discovery of a new route to Asia. They come upon the American continent 
 which blocks the way. Spain plants colonies in the south, lured by gold. 
 France, in pursuit of the fur trade, plants colonies in the north. Englishmen, 
 in search of homes and of a wider freedom, occupy the Atlantic seaboard. 
 These Englishmen come in time to need the land into which the French 
 have penetrated by way of the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes, and a 
 mighty struggle between the two nations takes place in the wilderness, 
 ending in the expulsion of the French. This sequence comprises ten volumes: 
 
 I, THE RED MAN’S CONTINENT, by Ellsworth Huntington 
 
 2. THE SPANISH CONQUERORS, by Irving Berdine Richman 
 
 3. ELIZABETHAN SEA-DOGS, by William Wood 
 
 4- CRUSADERS OF NEW FRANCE, by William Bennett Munro 
 
 §. PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTH, by Mary Fohnston 
 
 6. THE FATHERS OF NEW ENGLAND, by Charles M. Andrews 
 
 7. DUTCH AND ENGLISH ON THE HUDSON, by Maud Wilder Goodwin 
 8. THE QUAKER COLONIES, by Sydney G. Fisher 
 
 9. COLONIAL FOLKWAYS, by Charles M. Andrews 
 10, THE CONQUEST OF NEW FRANCE, by George M. Wrong 
 
ica ae ee a 
 
 Il. The Winning of Independence 
 TIME: 1763-1815 
 
 The French peril has passed, and the great territory between the All 
 ghanies and the Mississippi is now open to the Englishmen on the seaboar« 
 
 this question the War of the Revolution is fought; the Union is born | 
 and the second war with England follows. Seven volumes: 
 
 11. THE EVE OF THE REVOLUTION, by Carl Becker 
 
 12, WASHINGTON AND HIS COMRADES IN ARMS, by George M. on 
 13. THE FATHERS OF THE CONSTITUTION, by Max Farrand 
 
 14. WASHINGTON AND HIS COLLEAGUES, by Henry Jones Ford 
 
 15. JEFFERSON AND HIS COLLEAGUES, by Allen Johnson 
 
 16, JOHN MARSHALL AND THE CONSTITUTION, by Edward S. Corwin 
 17. THE FIGHT FOR A FREE SEA, by Ralph D. Paine 
 
 III. The Vision of the West 
 
 TIME: 1750-1890 
 
 The theme of the third sequence is the American frontier—the conques' 
 of the continent from the Alleghanies to the Pacific Ocean. The story cover 
 nearly a century and a half, from the first crossing of the Alleghanies b 
 the backwoodsmen of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and the Carolinas (abou 
 1750) to the heyday of the cowboy on the Great Plains in the latter par 
 of the nineteenth century. This is the marvelous tale of the greatest migra 
 tions in- history, told in nine volumes as follows: 
 
 18, PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST, by Constance Lindsay Skinne 
 19. THE OLD NORTHWEST, by Frederic Austin Ogg 
 
 20, THE REIGN OF ANDREW JACKSON, dy Frederic Austin Ogg 
 21. THE PATHS OF INLAND COMMERCE, by Archer B. Hulbert 
 
 22, ADVENTURERS OF OREGON, by Constance Lindsay Skinner 
 23. THE SPANISH BORDERLANDS, by Herbert E. Bolton 
 
 24. TEXAS AND THE MEXICAN WAR, by Nathaniel W. Stephenson 
 25. THE FORTY-NINERS, by Stewart Edward White 
 
 26. THE PASSING OF THE FRONTIER, by Emerson Hough 
 
‘ 
 
 \ 
 “ IV. The Storm of Secession 
 TIME: 1830-1876 
 
 The curtain rises on the gathering storm of secession. The theme of the 
 fourth sequence is the preservation of the Union, which carries with it the 
 extermination of slavery. Six volumes as follows: 
 
 "97. 
 28. 
 29. 
 30. 
 31. 
 32. 
 
 THE COTTON KINGDOM, 4y William E. Dodd 
 
 THE ANTI-SLAVERY CRUSADE, by Fesse Macy 
 
 ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND THE UNION, by Nathaniel W. Stephenson 
 THE DAY OF THE CONFEDERACY, by Nathaniel W. Stephenson 
 CAPTAINS OF THE CIVIL wAR, by William Wood 
 
 THE SEQUEL OF APPOMATTOX, by Walter Lynwood Fleming 
 
 V. The Intellectual Life 
 
 Two volumes follow on the higher national life, telling of the nation’s great 
 teachers znd interpreters: 
 
 33- 
 34. 
 
 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT IN EDUCATION, by Edwin E. Slosson 
 THE AMERICAN SPIRIT IN LITERATURE, by Bliss Perry 
 
 VI. The Epic of Commerce and Industry 
 
 The sixth sequence is devoted to the romance of industry and business, 
 and the dominant theme is the transformation caused by the inflow of 
 immigrants and the development and utilization of mechanics on a great 
 scale. The long age of muscular power has passed, and the era of mechanical 
 power has brought with it a new kind of civilization. Eight volumes: 
 
 35. OUR FOREIGNERS, Jy Samuel P. Orth 
 36. THE OLD MERCHANT MARINE, by Ralph D. Paine 
 | 37- THE AGE OF INVENTION, by Holland Thompson 
 38. THE RAILROAD BUILDERS, by Fohn Moody 
 39. THE AGE OF BIG BUSINESS, by Burton F. Hendrick 
 40. THE ARMIES OF LABOR, by Samuel P. Orth 
 4l. THE MASTERS OF CAPITAL, by Fohn Moody 
 42. THE NEw souTH, by Holland Thompson 
 
VII. The Era of World Power 
 
 The seventh sequence carries on the story of government and diplomacy” 
 and political expansion from the Reconstruction (1876) to the present day, 
 in six volumes: 
 
 43- THE BOSS AND THE MACHINE, by Samuel P. Orth 
 
 44. THE CLEVELAND ERA, by Henry Fones Ford 
 
 45. THE AGRARIAN CRUSADE, by Solon F. Buck 
 
 46. THE PATH OF EMPIRE, by Carl Russell Fish 
 
 47. THEODORE ROOSEVELT AND HIS TIMES, by Harold Howland 
 48. WOODROW WILSON AND THE WORLD WAR, by Charles Seymour i 
 
 VIII. Our Neighbors 
 
 Now to round out the story of the continent, the Hispanic peoples on 
 the south and the Canadians on the north are taken up where they were 
 dropped further back in the Series, and these peoples are followed down 
 to the present day: 
 
 49. THE CANADIAN DOMINION, by Oscar D. Skelton 
 50. THE HISPANIC NATIONS OF THE NEW WORLD, by William R. Shepherd 
 
 The Chronicles of America is thus a great synthesis, giving a new projec- 
 tion and a new interpretation of American History. These narratives are 
 works of real scholarship, for every one is written after an exhaustive 
 examination of the sources. Many of them contain new facts; some of them 
 —such as those by Howland, Seymour, and Hough—are founded on inti- 
 mate personal knowledge. But the originality of the Series lies, not chiefly 
 in new facts, but rather in new ideas and new combinations of old facts. — 
 
 The General Editor of the Series is Dr. Allen Johnson, Chairman of the 
 Department of History of Yale University, and the entire work has been 
 planned, prepared, and published under the control of the Council's 
 Committee on Publications of Yale University. 
 
 YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 143 ELM STREET, NEW HAVEN 
 §22 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 
 
AP. 
 
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