diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/20090327-2390-h.htm | 7740 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/20090327-2390-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 149150 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/20090327-2390.txt | 6813 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/20090327-2390.zip | bin | 0 -> 147383 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/cnqsw10.txt | 6694 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/cnqsw10.zip | bin | 0 -> 145721 bytes |
6 files changed, 21247 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/20090327-2390-h.htm b/old/20090327-2390-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2bcf87b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/20090327-2390-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7740 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of The Conquest of the Old Southwest, +by Archibald Henderson +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.intro {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.footnote {font-size: small ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The Conquest of the Old Southwest, by Archibald Henderson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net + + +Title: The Conquest of the Old Southwest + The Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers into Virginia, + the Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky, 1740-1790 + +Author: Archibald Henderson + +Posting Date: March 27, 2009 [EBook #2390] +Release Date: November, 2000 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST *** + + + + +Produced by Dianne Bean. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST: +</H1> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> + THE ROMANTIC STORY OF THE EARLY PIONEERS INTO VIRGINIA,<BR> + THE CAROLINAS, TENNESSEE, AND KENTUCKY 1740-1790<BR> +</H4> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +BY +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +ARCHIBALD HENDERSON, Ph.D., D.C.L. +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Some to endure and many to fail,<BR> + Some to conquer and many to quail<BR> + Toiling over the Wilderness Trail.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +NEW YORK +<BR> +THE CENTURY CO. +<BR> +1920 +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> + TO THE HISTORIAN OF<BR> + OLD WEST AND NEW WEST<BR> + FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER<BR> + WITH ADMIRATION AND REGARD<BR> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P> +The country might invite a prince from his palace, merely for the +pleasure of contemplating its beauty and excellence; but only add +the rapturous idea of property, and what allurements can the +world offer for the loss of so glorious a prospect?—Richard +Henderson. +</P> + +<P> +The established Authority of any government in America, and the +policy of Government at home, are both insufficient to restrain +the Americans.... They acquire no attachment to Place: But +wandering about Seems engrafted in their Nature; and it is a +weakness incident to it, that they Should for ever imagine the +Lands further off, are Still better than those upon which they +are already settled.—Lord Dunmore, to the Earl of Dartmouth. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="introduction"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +INTRODUCTION +</H3> + +<P> +The romantic and thrilling story of the southward and westward +migration of successive waves of transplanted European peoples +throughout the entire course of the eighteenth century is the +history of the growth and evolution of American democracy. Upon +the American continent was wrought out, through almost superhuman +daring, incredible hardship, and surpassing endurance, the +formation of a new society. The European rudely confronted with +the pitiless conditions of the wilderness soon discovered that +his maintenance, indeed his existence, was conditioned upon his +individual efficiency and his resourcefulness in adapting himself +to his environment. The very history of the human race, from the +age of primitive man to the modern era of enlightened +civilization, is traversed in the Old Southwest throughout the +course of half a century. +</P> + +<P> +A series of dissolving views thrown upon the screen, picturing +the successive episodes in the history of a single family as it +wended its way southward along the eastern valleys, resolutely +repulsed the sudden attack of the Indians, toiled painfully up +the granite slopes of the Appalachians, and pitched down into the +transmontane wilderness upon the western waters, would give to +the spectator a vivid conception, in miniature, of the westward +movement. But certain basic elements in the grand procession, +revealed to the sociologist and the economist, would perhaps +escape his scrutiny. Back of the individual, back of the family, +even, lurk the creative and formative impulses of colonization, +expansion, and government. In the recognition of these social and +economic tendencies the individual merges into the group; the +group into the community; the community into a new society. In +this clear perspective of historic development the spectacular +hero at first sight seems to diminish; but the mass, the +movement, the social force which he epitomizes and interprets, +gain in impressiveness and dignity. +</P> + +<P> +As the irresistible tide of migratory peoples swept ever +southward and westward, seeking room for expansion and economic +independence, a series of frontiers was gradually thrust out +toward the wilderness in successive waves of irregular +indentation. The true leader in this westward advance, to whom +less than his deserts has been accorded by the historian, is the +drab and mercenary trader with the Indians. The story of his +enterprise and of his adventures begins with the planting of +European civilization upon American soil. In the mind of the +aborigines he created the passion for the fruits, both good and +evil, of the white man's civilization, and he was welcomed by the +Indian because he also brought the means for repelling the +further advance of that civilization. The trader was of +incalculable service to the pioneer in first spying out the land +and charting the trackless wilderness. The trail rudely marked by +the buffalo became in time the Indian path and the trader's +"trace"; and the pioneers upon the westward march, following the +line of least resistance, cut out their roads along these very +routes. It is not too much to say that had it not been for the +trader—brave, hardy, and adventurous however often crafty, +unscrupulous, and immoral—the expansionist movement upon the +American continent would have been greatly retarded. +</P> + +<P> +So scattered and ramified were the enterprises and expeditions of +the traders with the Indians that the frontier which they +established was at best both shifting and unstable. Following far +in the wake of these advance agents of the civilization which +they so often disgraced, came the cattle-herder or rancher, who +took advantage of the extensive pastures and ranges along the +uplands and foot-hills to raise immense herds of cattle. Thus was +formed what might be called a rancher's frontier, thrust out in +advance of the ordinary farming settlements and serving as the +first serious barrier against the Indian invasion. The westward +movement of population is in this respect a direct advance from +the coast. Years before the influx into the Old Southwest of the +tides of settlement from the northeast, the more adventurous +struck straight westward in the wake of the fur-trader, and here +and there erected the cattle-ranges beyond the farming frontier +of the piedmont region. The wild horses and cattle which roamed +at will through the upland barrens and pea-vine pastures were +herded in and driven for sale to the city markets of the East. +</P> + +<P> +The farming frontier of the piedmont plateau constituted the real +backbone of western settlement. The pioneering farmers, with the +adventurous instincts of the hunter and the explorer, plunged +deeper and ever deeper into the wilderness, lured on by the +prospect of free and still richer lands in the dim interior. +Settlements quickly sprang up in the neighborhood of military +posts or rude forts established to serve as safeguards against +hostile attack; and trade soon flourished between these +settlements and the eastern centers, following the trails of the +trader and the more beaten paths of emigration. The bolder +settlers who ventured farthest to the westward were held in +communication with the East through their dependence upon salt +and other necessities of life; and the search for salt-springs in +the virgin wilderness was an inevitable consequence of the desire +of the pioneer to shake off his dependence upon the coast. +</P> + +<P> +The prime determinative principle of the progressive American +civilization of the eighteenth century was the passion for the +acquisition of land. The struggle for economic independence +developed the germ of American liberty and became the +differentiating principle of American character. Here was a vast +unappropriated region in the interior of the continent to be had +for the seeking, which served as lure and inspiration to the man +daring enough to risk his all in its acquisition. It was in +accordance with human nature and the principles of political +economy that this unknown extent of uninhabited transmontane +land, widely renowned for beauty, richness, and fertility, should +excite grandiose dreams in the minds of English and Colonials +alike. England was said to be "New Land mad and everybody there +has his eye fixed on this country." Groups of wealthy or +well-to-do individuals organized themselves into land companies +for the colonization and exploitation of the West. The pioneer +promoter was a powerful creative force in westward expansion; and +the activities of the early land companies were decisive factors +in the colonization of the wilderness. Whether acting under the +authority of a crown grant or proceeding on their own authority, +the land companies tended to give stability and permanence to +settlements otherwise hazardous and insecure. +</P> + +<P> +The second determinative impulse of the pioneer civilization was +wanderlust—the passionately inquisitive instinct of the hunter, +the traveler, and the explorer. This restless class of nomadic +wanderers was responsible in part for the royal proclamation of +1763, a secondary object of which, according to Edmund Burke, was +the limitation of the colonies on the West, as "the charters of +many of our old colonies give them, with few exceptions, no +bounds to the westward but the South Sea." The Long Hunters, +taking their lives in their hands, fared boldly forth to a fabled +hunter's paradise in the far-away wilderness, because they were +driven by the irresistible desire of a Ponce de Leon or a De Soto +to find out the truth about the unknown lands beyond. +</P> + +<P> +But the hunter was not only thrilled with the passion of the +chase and of discovery; he was intent also upon collecting the +furs and skins of wild animals for lucrative barter and sale in +the centers of trade. He was quick to make "tomahawk claims" and +to assert "corn rights" as he spied out the rich virgin land for +future location and cultivation. Free land and no taxes appealed +to the backwoodsman, tired of paying quit-rents to the agents of +wealthy lords across the sea. Thus the settler speedily followed +in the hunter's wake. In his wake also went many rude and lawless +characters of the border, horse thieves and criminals of +different sorts, who sought to hide their delinquencies in the +merciful liberality of the wilderness. For the most part, +however, it was the salutary instinct of the homebuilder—the man +with the ax, who made a little clearing in the forest and built +there a rude cabin that he bravely defended at all risks against +continued assaults—which, in defiance of every restraint, +irresistibly thrust westward the thin and jagged line of the +frontier. The ax and the surveyor's chain, along with the rifle +and the hunting-knife, constituted the armorial bearings of the +pioneer. With individual as with corporation, with explorer as +with landlord, land-hunger was the master impulse of the era. +</P> + +<P> +The various desires which stimulated and promoted westward +expansion were, to be sure, often found in complete conjunction. +The trader sought to exploit the Indian for his own advantage, +selling him whisky, trinkets, and firearms in return for rich +furs and costly peltries; yet he was often a hunter himself and +collected great stores of peltries as the result of his solitary +and protracted hunting-expeditions. The rancher and the herder +sought to exploit the natural vegetation of marsh and upland, the +cane-brakes and pea-vines; yet the constantly recurring need for +fresh pasturage made him a pioneer also, drove him ever nearer to +the mountains, and furnished the economic motive for his westward +advance. The small farmer needed the virgin soil of the new +region, the alluvial river-bottoms, and the open prairies, for +the cultivation of his crops and the grazing of his cattle; yet +in the intervals between the tasks of farm life he scoured the +wilderness in search of game "and spied out new lands for future +settlement". +</P> + +<P> +This restless and nomadic race, says the keenly observant Francis +Baily, "delight much to live on the frontiers, where they can +enjoy undisturbed, and free from the control of any laws, the +blessings which nature has bestowed upon them." Independence of +spirit, impatience of restraint, the inquisitive nature, and the +nomadic temperament—these are the strains in the American +character of the eighteenth century which ultimately blended to +create a typical democracy. The rolling of wave after wave of +settlement westward across the American continent, with a +reversion to primitive conditions along the line of the farthest +frontier, and a marked rise in the scale of civilization at each +successive stage of settlement, from the western limit to the +eastern coast, exemplifies from one aspect the history of the +American people during two centuries. This era, constituting the +first stage in our national existence, and productive of a +buoyant national character shaped in democracy upon a free soil, +closed only yesterday with the exhaustion of cultivable free +land, the disappearance of the last frontier, and the recent +death of "Buffalo Bill". The splendid inauguration of the period, +in the region of the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and +Kentucky, during the second half of the eighteenth century, is +the theme of this story of the pioneers of the Old Southwest. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#introduction">INTRODUCTION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">THE MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">THE CRADLE OF WESTWARD EXPANSION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">THE BACK COUNTRY AND THE BORDER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">THE INDIAN WAR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">IN DEFENSE OF CIVILIZATION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">CRUSHING THE CHEROKEES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">THE LAND COMPANIES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">THE LONG HUNTERS IN THE TWILIGHT ZONE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">DANIEL BOONE AND WILDERNESS EXPLORATION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">DANIEL BOONE IN KENTUCKY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">THE REGULATORS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">WATAUGA—HAVEN OF LIBERTY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">OPENING THE GATEWAY—DUNMORE'S WAR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">RICHARD HENDERSON AND THE TRANSYLVANIA COMPANY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">TRANSYLVANIA—A WILDERNESS COMMONWEALTH</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">THE REPULSE OF THE RED MEN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">THE COLONIZATION OF THE CUMBERLAND</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">KING'S MOUNTAIN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap19">THE STATE OF FRANKLIN</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">THE LURE OF SPAIN—THE HAVEN OF STATEHOOD</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST +</H1> + +<BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER I. The Migration of the Peoples +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Inhabitants flock in here daily, mostly from Pensilvania and +other parts of America, who are over-stocked with people and Mike +directly from Europe, they commonly seat themselves towards the +West, and have got near the mountains.—Gabriel Johnston, +Governor of North Carolina, to the Secretary of the Board of +Trade, February 15, 1751. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +At the opening of the eighteenth century the tide of population +had swept inland to the "fall line", the westward boundary of the +established settlements. The actual frontier had been advanced by +the more aggressive pioneers to within fifty miles of the Blue +Ridge. So rapid was the settlement in North Carolina that in the +interval 1717-32 the population quadrupled in numbers. A map of +the colonial settlements in 1725 reveals a narrow strip of +populated land along the Atlantic coast, of irregular +indentation, with occasional isolated nuclei of settlements +further in the interior. The civilization thus established +continued to maintain a close and unbroken communication with +England and the Continent. As long as the settlers, for economic +reasons, clung to the coast, they reacted but slowly to the +transforming influences of the frontier.. Within a triangle of +continental altitude with its apex in New England, bounded on the +east by the Atlantic, and on the west by the Appalachian range, +lay the settlements, divided into two zones—tidewater and +piedmont. As no break occurred in the great mountain system south +of the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, the difficulties of cutting a +passage through the towering wall of living green long proved an +effective obstacle to the crossing of the grim mountain barrier. +</P> + +<P> +In the beginning the settlements gradually extended westward from +the coast in irregular outline, the indentations taking form +around such natural centers of attraction as areas of fertile +soil, frontier posts, mines, salt-springs, and stretches of +upland favorable for grazing. After a time a second advance of +settlement was begun in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, +running in a southwesterly direction along the broad terraces to +the east of the Appalachian Range, which in North Carolina lies +as far as two hundred and fifty miles from the sea. The Blue +Ridge in Virginia and a belt of pine barrens in North Carolina +were hindrances to this advance, but did not entirely check it. +This second streaming of the population thrust into the long, +narrow wedge of the piedmont zone a class of people differing in +spirit and in tendency from their more aristocratic and +complacent neighbors to the east. +</P> + +<P> +These settlers of the Valley of Virginia and the North Carolina +piedmont region—English, Scotch-Irish, Germans, Scotch, Irish, +Welsh, and a few French—were the first pioneers of the Old +Southwest. From the joint efforts of two strata of population, +geographically, socially, and economically distinct—tidewater +and piedmont, Old South and New South—originated and flowered +the third and greatest movement of westward expansion, opening +with the surmounting of the mountain barrier and ending in the +occupation and assumption of the vast medial valley of the +continent. +</P> + +<P> +Synchronous with the founding of Jamestown in Virginia, +significantly enough, was the first planting of Ulster with the +English and Scotch. Emigrants from the Scotch Lowlands, sometimes +as many as four thousand a year (1625), continued throughout the +century to pour into Ulster. "Those of the North of Ireland...," +as pungently described in 1679 by the Secretary of State, +Leoline Jenkins, to the Duke of Ormond, "are most Scotch and +Scotch breed and are the Northern Presbyterians and phanatiques, +lusty, able bodied, hardy and stout men, where one may see three +or four hundred at every meeting-house on Sunday, and all the +North of Ireland is inhabited by these, which is the popular +place of all Ireland by far. They are very numerous and greedy +after land." During the quarter of a century after the English +Revolution of 1688 and the Jacobite uprising in Ireland, which +ended in 1691 with the complete submission of Ireland to William +and Mary, not less than fifty thousand Scotch, according to +Archbishop Synge, settled in Ulster. Until the beginning of the +eighteenth century there was no considerable emigration to +America; and it was first set up as a consequence of English +interference with trade and religion. Repressive measures passed +by the English parliament (1665 1699), prohibiting the +exportation from Ire land to England and Scotland of cattle, +beef, pork, dairy products, etc., and to any country whatever of +manufactured wool, had aroused deep resentment among the +Scotch-Irish, who had built up a great commerce. This discontent +was greatly aggravated by the imposition of religious +disabilities upon the Presbyterians, who, in addition to having +to pay tithes for the support of the established church, were +excluded from all civil and military office (1704), while their +ministers were made liable to penalties for celebrating +marriages. +</P> + +<P> +This pressure upon a high-spirited people resulted inevitably in +an exodus to the New World. The principal ports by which the +Ulsterites entered America were Lewes and Newcastle (Delaware), +Philadelphia and Boston. The streams of immigration steadily +flowed up the Delaware Valley; and by 1720 the Scotch-Irish began +to arrive in Bucks County. So rapid was the rate of increase in +immigration that the number of arrivals soon mounted from a few +hundred to upward of six thousand, in a single year (1729); and +within a few years this number was doubled. According to the +meticulous Franklin, the proportion increased from a very small +element of the population of Pennsylvania in 1700 to one fourth +of the whole in 1749, and to one third of the whole (350,000) in +1774. Writing to the Penns in 1724, James Logan, Secretary of the +Province, caustically refers to the Ulster settlers on the +disputed Maryland line as "these bold and indigent strangers, +saying as their excuse when challenged for titles, that we had +solicited for colonists and they had come accordingly." The +spirit of these defiant squatters is succinctly expressed in +their statement to Logan that it "was against the laws of God and +nature that so much land should be idle while so many Christians +wanted it to work on and to raise their bread." +</P> + +<P> +The rising scale of prices for Pennsylvania lands, changing from +ten pounds and two shillings quit-rents per hundred acres in 1719 +to fifteen pounds ten shillings per hundred acres with a +quit-rent of a halfpenny per acre in 1732, soon turned the eyes +of the thrifty Scotch-Irish settlers southward and southwestward. +In Maryland in 1738 lands were offered at five pounds sterling +per hundred acres. Simultaneously, in the Valley of Virginia free +grants of a thousand acres per family were being made. In the +North Carolina piedmont region the proprietary, Lord Granville, +through his agents was disposing of the most desirable lands to +settlers at the rate of three shillings proclamation money for +six hundred and forty acres, the unit of land-division; and was +also making large free grants on the condition of seating a +certain proportion of settlers. "Lord Carteret's land in +Carolina," says North Carolina's first American historian, "where +the soil was cheap, presented a tempting residence to people of +every denomination. Emigrants from the north of Ireland, by the +way of Pennsylvania, flocked to that country; and a considerable +part of North Carolina ... is inhabited by those people or +their descendants." From 1740 onward, attracted by the rich lure +of cheap and even free lands in Virginia and North Carolina, a +tide of immigration swept ceaselessly into the valleys of the +Shenandoah, the Yadkin, and the Catawba. The immensity of this +mobile, drifting mass, which sometimes brought "more than 400 +families with horse waggons and cattle" into North Carolina in a +single year (1752-3), is attested by the fact that from 1732 to +1754, mainly as the result of the Scotch-Irish inundation, the +population of North Carolina more than doubled. +</P> + +<P> +The second important racial stream of population in the +settlement of the same region was composed of Germans, attracted +to this country from the Palatinate. Lured on by the highly +colored stories of the commercial agents for promoting +immigration—the "newlanders," who were thoroughly unscrupulous +in their methods and extravagant in their representations—a +migration from Germany began in the second decade of the +eighteenth century and quickly assumed alarming proportions. +Although certain of the emigrants were well-to-do, a very great +number were "redemptioners" (indentured servants), who in order +to pay for their transportation were compelled to pledge +themselves to several years of servitude. This economic condition +caused the German immigrant, wherever he went, to become a +settler of the back country, necessity compelling him to pass by +the more expensive lands near the coast. +</P> + +<P> +For well-nigh sixty years the influx of German immigrants of +various sects was very great, averaging something like fifteen +hundred a year into Pennsylvania alone from 1727 to 1775. Indeed, +Pennsylvania, one third of whose population at the beginning of +the Revolution was German, early became the great distributing +center for the Germans as well as for the Scotch-Irish. Certainly +by 1727 Adam Miller and his fellow Germans had established the +first permanent white settlement in the Valley of Virginia. By +1732 Jost Heydt, accompanied by sixteen families, came from York, +Pennsylvania, and settled on the Opeckon River, in the +neighborhood of the present Winchester. There is no longer any +doubt that "the portion of the Shenandoah Valley sloping to the +north was almost entirely settled by Germans." +</P> + +<P> +It was about the middle of the century that these pioneers of the +Old Southwest, the shrewd, industrious, and thrifty Pennsylvania +Germans (who came to be generally called "Pennsylvania Dutch" +from the incorrect translation of Pennsylvanische Deutsche), +began to pour into the piedmont region of North Carolina. In the +autumn, after the harvest was in, these ambitious Pennsylvania +pioneers would pack up their belongings in wagons and on beasts +of burden and head for the southwest, trekking down in the manner +of the Boers of South Africa. This movement into the fertile +valley lands of the Yadkin and the Catawba continued unabated +throughout the entire third quarter of the century. Owing to +their unfamiliarity with the English language and the solidarity +of their instincts, the German settlers at first had little share +in government. But they devotedly played their part in the +defense of the exposed settlements and often bore the brunt of +Indian attack. +</P> + +<P> +The bravery and hardihood displayed by the itinerant missionaries +sent out by the Pennsylvania Synod under the direction of Count +Zinzendorf (1742-8), and by the Moravian Church (1748-53), are +mirrored in the numerous diaries, written in German, happily +preserved to posterity in religious archives of Pennsylvania and +North Carolina. These simple, earnest crusaders, animated by pure +and unselfish motives, would visit on a single tour of a thousand +miles the principal German settlements in Maryland and Virginia +(including the present West Virginia). Sometimes they would make +an extended circuit through North Carolina, South Carolina, and +even Georgia, everywhere bearing witness to the truth of the +gospel and seeking to carry the most elemental forms of the +Christian religion, preaching and prayer, to the primitive +frontiersmen marooned along the outer fringe of white +settlements. These arduous journeys in the cause of piety place +this type of pioneer of the Old Southwest in alleviating contrast +to the often relentless and bloodthirsty figure of the rude +borderer. +</P> + +<P> +Noteworthy among these pious pilgrimages is the Virginia journey +of Brothers Leonhard Schnell and John Brandmuller (October 12 to +December 12, 1749). At the last outpost of civilization, the +scattered settlements in Bath and Alleghany counties, these +courageous missionaries—feasting the while solely on bear meat, +for there was no bread—encountered conditions of almost +primitive savagery, of which they give this graphic picture: +"Then we came to a house, where we had to lie on bear skins +around the fire like the rest.... The clothes of the people +consist of deer skins, their food of Johnny cakes, deer and bear +meat. A kind of white people are found here, who live like +savages. Hunting is their chief occupation." Into the valley of +the Yadkin in December, 1752, came Bishop Spangenberg and a party +of Moravians, accompanied by a surveyor and two guides, for the +purpose of locating the one hundred thousand acres of land which +had been offered them on easy terms the preceding year by Lord +Granville. This journey was remarkable as an illustration of +sacrifices willingly made and extreme hardships uncomplainingly +endured for the sake of the Moravian brotherhood. In the back +country of North Carolina near the Mulberry Fields they found the +whole woods full of Cherokee Indians engaged in hunting. A +beautiful site for the projected settlement met their delighted +gaze at this place; but they soon learned to their regret that it +had already been "taken up" by Daniel Boone's future +father-in-law, Morgan Bryan. +</P> + +<P> +On October 8, 1753, a party of twelve single men headed by the +Rev. Bernhard Adam Grube, set out from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, +to trek down to the new-found haven in the Carolina +hinterland—"a corner which the Lord has reserved for the +Brethren"—in Anson County. Following for the most part the great +highway extending from Philadelphia to the Yadkin, over which +passed the great throng sweeping into the back country of North +Carolina—through the Valley of Virginia and past Robert Luhny's +mill on the James River—they encountered many hardships along +the way. Because of their "long wagon," they had much difficulty +in crossing one steep mountain; and of this experience Brother +Grube, with a touch of modest pride, observes: "People had told +us that this hill was most dangerous, and that we would scarcely +be able to cross it, for Morgan Bryan, the first to travel this +way, had to take the wheels off his wagon and carry it piecemeal +to the top, and had been three months on the journey from the +Shanidore [Shenandoah] to the Etkin [Yadkin]." +</P> + +<P> +These men were the highest type of the pioneers of the Old +Southwest, inspired with the instinct of homemakers in a land +where, if idle rumor were to be credited, "the people lived like +wild men never hearing of God or His Word." In one hand they bore +the implement of agriculture, in the other the book of the gospel +of Jesus Christ. True faith shines forth in the simply eloquent +words: "We thanked our Saviour that he had so graciously led us +hither, and had helped us through all the hard places, for no +matter how dangerous it looked, nor how little we saw how we +could win through, everything always went better than seemed +possible." The promise of a new day—the dawn of the heroic +age—rings out in the pious carol of camaraderie at their +journey's end: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + We hold arrival Lovefeast here,<BR> + In Carolina land,<BR> + A company of Brethren true,<BR> + A little Pilgrim-Band,<BR> + Called by the Lord to be of those<BR> + Who through the whole world go,<BR> + To bear Him witness everywhere,<BR> + And nought but Jesus know.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II. The Cradle of Westward Expansion +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +In the year 1746 I was up in the country that is now Anson, +Orange and Rowan Counties, there was not then above one hundred +fighting men there is now at least three thousand for the most +part Irish Protestants and Germans and dailey increasing.—Matthew +Rowan, President of the North Carolina Council, to the +Board of Trade, June 28, 1753. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The conquest of the West is usually attributed to the ready +initiative, the stern self-reliance, and the libertarian instinct +of the expert backwoodsmen. These bold, nomadic spirits were +animated by an unquenchable desire to plunge into the wilderness +in search of an El Dorado at the outer verge of civilization, +free of taxation, quit-rents, and the law's restraint. They +longed to build homes for themselves and their descendants in a +limitless, free domain; or else to fare deeper and deeper into +the trackless forests in search of adventure. Yet one must not +overlook the fact that behind Boone and pioneers of his stamp +were men of conspicuous civil and military genius, constructive +in purpose and creative in imagination, who devoted their best +gifts to actual conquest and colonization. These men of large +intellectual mold-themselves surveyors, hunters, and +pioneers—were inspired with the larger vision of the +expansionist. Whether colonizers, soldiers, or speculators on the +grand scale, they sought to open at one great stroke the vast +trans-Alleghany regions as a peaceful abode for mankind. +</P> + +<P> +Two distinct classes of society were gradually drawing apart from +each other in North Carolina and later in Virginia—the pioneer +democracy of the back country and the upland, and the planter +aristocracy of the lowland and the tide-water region. From the +frontier came the pioneer explorers whose individual enterprise +and initiative were such potent factors in the exploitation of +the wilderness. From the border counties still in contact with +the East came a number of leaders. Thus in the heart of the Old +Southwest the two determinative principles already referred to, +the inquisitive and the acquisitive instincts, found a fortunate +conjunction. The exploratory passion of the pioneer, directed in +the interest of commercial enterprise, prepared the way for the +great westward migration. The warlike disposition of the hardy +backwoodsman, controlled by the exercise of military strategy, +accomplished the conquest of the trans-Alleghany country. +</P> + +<P> +Fleeing from the traditional bonds of caste and aristocracy in +England and Europe, from economic boycott and civil oppression, +from religious persecution and favoritism, many worthy members of +society in the first quarter of the eighteenth century sought a +haven of refuge in the "Quackerthal" of William Penn, with its +trustworthy guarantees of free tolerance in religious faith and +the benefits of representative self-government. From East +Devonshire in England came George Boone, the grandfather of the +great pioneer, and from Wales came Edward Morgan, whose daughter +Sarah became the wife of Squire Boone, Daniel's father. These +were conspicuous representatives of the Society of Friends, drawn +thither by the roseate representations of the great Quaker, +William Penn, and by his advanced views on popular government and +religious toleration. Hither, too, from Ireland, whither he had +gone from Denmark, came Morgan Bryan, settling in Chester County, +prior to 1719; and his children, William, Joseph, James, and +Morgan, who more than half a century later gave the name to +Bryan's Station in Kentucky, were destined to play important +roles in the drama of westward migration. In September, 1734, +Michael Finley from County Armagh, Ireland, presumably +accompanied by his brother Archibald Finley, settled in Bucks +County, Pennsylvania. According to the best authorities, +Archibald Finley was the father of John Finley, or Findlay as he +signed himself, Boone's guide and companion in his exploration of +Kentucky in 1769-71. To Pennsylvania also came Mordecai Lincoln, +great grandson of Samuel Lincoln, who had emigrated from England +to Hingham, Massachusetts, as early as 1637. This Mordecai +Lincoln, who in 1720 settled in Chester County, Pennsylvania, the +great-great-grandfather of President Lincoln, was the father of +Sarah Lincoln, who was wedded to William Boone, and of Abraham +Lincoln, who married Anne Boone, William's first cousin. Early +settlers in Pennsylvania were members of the Hanks family, one of +whom was the maternal grandfather of President Lincoln. +</P> + +<P> +No one race or breed of men can lay claim to exclusive credit for +leadership in the hinterland movement and the conquest of the +West. Yet one particular stock of people, the Ulster Scots, +exhibited with most completeness and picturesqueness a group of +conspicuous qualities and attitudes which we now recognize to be +typical of the American character as molded by the conditions of +frontier life. Cautious, wary, and reserved, these Scots +concealed beneath a cool and calculating manner a relentlessness +in reasoning power and an intensity of conviction which glowed +and burned with almost fanatical ardor. Strict in religious +observance and deep in spiritual fervor, they never lost sight of +the main chance, combining a shrewd practicality with a wealth of +devotion. It has been happily said of them that they kept the +Sabbath and everything else they could lay their hands on. In the +polity of these men religion and education went hand in hand; and +they habitually settled together in communities in order that +they might have teachers and preachers of their own choice and +persuasion. +</P> + +<P> +In little-known letters and diaries of travelers and itinerant +ministers may be found many quaint descriptions and faithful +characterizations of the frontier settlers in their habits of +life and of the scenes amidst which they labored. In a letter to +Edmund Fanning, the cultured Robin Jones, agent of Lord Granville +and Attorney-General of North Carolina, summons to view a piquant +image of the western border and borderers: "The inhabitants are +hospitable in their way, live in plenty and dirt, are stout, of +great prowess in manly athletics; and, in private conversation, +bold, impertinent, and vain. In the art of war (after the Indian +manner) they are well-skilled, are enterprising and fruitful of +strategies; and, when in action, are as bold and intrepid as the +ancient Romans. The Shawnese acknowledge them their superiors +even in their own way of fighting.... [The land] may be truly +called the land of the mountains, for they are so numerous that +when you have reached the summit of one of them, you may see +thousands of every shape that the imagination can suggest, +seeming to vie with each other which should raise his lofty head +to touch the clouds.... It seems to me that nature has been +wanton in bestowing her blessings on that country." +</P> + +<P> +An excellent pen-picture of educational and cultural conditions +in the backwoods of North Carolina, by one of the early settlers +in the middle of the century, exhibits in all their barren +cheerlessness the hardships and limitations of life in the +wilderness. The father of William Few, the narrator, had trekked +down from Maryland and settled in Orange County, some miles east +of the little hamlet of Hillsborough. "In that country at that +time there were no schools, no churches or parsons, or doctors or +lawyers; no stores, groceries or taverns, nor do I recollect +during the first two years any officer, ecclesiastical, civil or +military, except a justice of the peace, a constable and two or +three itinerant preachers.... These people had few wants, and +fewer temptations to vice than those who lived in more refined +society, though ignorant. They were more virtuous and more happy.... +A schoolmaster appeared and offered his services to teach +the children of the neighborhood for twenty shillings each per +year.... In that simple state of society money was but little +known; the schoolmaster was the welcome guest of his pupil, fed +at the bountiful table and clothed from the domestic loom.... +In that country at that time there was great scarcity of books." +</P> + +<P> +The journals of itinerant ministers through the Valley of +Virginia and the Carolina piedmont zone yield precious mementoes +of the people, their longing after the things of the spirit, and +their pitiful isolation from the regular preaching of the gospel. +These missionaries were true pioneers in this Old Southwest, +ardent, dauntless, and heroic—carrying the word into remote +places and preaching the gospel beneath the trees of the forest. +In his journal (1755-6), the Rev. Hugh McAden, born in +Pennsylvania of Scotch-Irish parentage, a graduate of Nassau Hall +(1753), makes the unconsciously humorous observation that +wherever he found Presbyterians he found people who "seemed +highly pleased, and very desirous to hear the word"; whilst +elsewhere he found either dissension and defection to Baptist +principles, or "no appearance of the life of religion." In the +Scotch-Irish Presbyterian settlements in what is now Mecklenburg +County, the cradle of American liberty, he found "pretty serious, +judicious people" of the stamp of Moses, William, and James +Alexander. While traveling in the upper country of South +Carolina, he relates with gusto the story of "an old gentleman +who said to the Governor of South Carolina, when he was in those +parts, in treaty with the Cherokee Indians that 'he had never +seen a shirt, been in a fair, heard a sermon, or seen a minister +in all his life.' Upon which the governor promised to send him up +a minister, that he might hear one sermon before he died." The +minister came and preached; and this was all the preaching that +had been heard in the upper part of South Carolina before Mr. +McAden's visit. +</P> + +<P> +Such, then, were the rude and simple people in the back country +of the Old Southwest—the deliberate and self-controlled English, +the aggressive, landmongering Scotch-Irish, the buoyant Welsh, +the thrifty Germans, the debonair French, the impetuous Irish, +and the calculating Scotch. The lives they led were marked by +independence of spirit, democratic instincts, and a forthright +simplicity. In describing the condition of the English settlers +in the backwoods of Virginia, one of their number, Doddridge, +says: "Most of the articles were of domestic manufacture. There +might have been incidentally a few things brought to the country +for sale in a primitive way, but there was no store for general +supply. The table furniture usually consisted of wooden vessels, +either turned or coopered. Iron forks, tin cups, etc., were +articles of rare and delicate luxury. The food was of the most +wholesome and primitive kind. The richest meat, the finest +butter, and best meal that ever delighted man's palate were here +eaten with a relish which health and labor only know. The +hospitality of the people was profuse and proverbial." +</P> + +<P> +The circumstances of their lives compelled the pioneers to become +self-sustaining. Every immigrant was an adept at many trades. He +built his own house, forged his own tools, and made his own +clothes. At a very early date rifles were manufactured at the +High Shoals of the Yadkin; Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, was an +expert gunsmith. The difficulty of securing food for the +settlements forced every man to become a hunter and to scour the +forest for wild game. Thus the pioneer, through force of sheer +necessity, became a dead shot—which stood him in good stead in +the days of Indian incursions and bloody retaliatory raids. +Primitive in their games, recreations, and amusements, which not +infrequently degenerated into contests of savage brutality, the +pioneers always set the highest premium upon personal bravery, +physical prowess, and skill in manly sports. At all public +gatherings, general musters, "vendues" or auctions, and even +funerals, whisky flowed with extraordinary freedom. It is worthy +of record that among the effects of the Rev. Alexander Craighead, +the famous teacher and organizer of Presbyterianism in +Mecklenburg and the adjoining region prior to the Revolution, +were found a punch bowl and glasses. +</P> + +<P> +The frontier life, with its purifying and hardening influence, +bred in these pioneers intellectual traits which constitute the +basis of the American character. The single-handed and successful +struggle with nature in the tense solitude of the forest +developed a spirit of individualism, restive under control. On +the other hand, the sense of sharing with others the arduous +tasks and dangers of conquering the wilderness gave birth to a +strong sense of solidarity arid of human sympathy. With the lure +of free lands ever before them, the pioneers developed a +restlessness and a nervous energy, blended with a buoyancy of +spirit, which are fundamentally American. Yet this same +untrammeled freedom occasioned a disregard for law and a defiance +of established government which have exhibited themselves +throughout the entire course of our history. Initiative, +self-reliance, boldness in conception, fertility in resource, +readiness in execution, acquisitiveness, inventive genius, +appreciation of material advantages—these, shot through with a +certain fine idealism, genial human sympathy, and a high romantic +strain—are the traits of the American national type as it +emerged from the Old Southwest. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III. The Back Country and the Border +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Far from the bustle of the world, they live in the most +delightful climate, and richest soil imaginable; they are +everywhere surrounded with beautiful prospects and sylvan scenes; +lofty mountains, transparent streams, falls of water, rich +valleys, and majestic woods; the whole interspersed with an +infinite variety of flowering shrubs, constitute the landscape +surrounding them; they are subject to few diseases; are generally +robust; and live in perfect liberty; they are ignorant of want +and acquainted with but few vices. Their inexperience of the +elegancies of life precludes any regret that they possess not the +means of enjoying them, but they possess what many princes would +give half their dominion for, health, content, and tranquillity +of mind.—Andrew Burnaby: Travels Through North America. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The two streams of Ulstermen, the greater through Philadelphia, +the lesser through Charleston, which poured into the Carolinas +toward the middle of the century, quickly flooded the back +country. The former occupied the Yadkin Valley and the region to +the westward, the latter the Waxhaws and the Anson County region +to the northwest. The first settlers were known as the +"Pennsylvania Irish," because they had first settled in +Pennsylvania after migrating from the north of Ireland; while +those who came by way of Charleston were known as the +"Scotch-Irish." The former, who had resided in Pennsylvania long +enough to be good judges of land, shrewdly made their settlements +along the rivers and creeks. The latter, new arrivals and less +experienced, settled on thinner land toward the heads of creeks +and water courses. +</P> + +<P> +Shortly prior to 1735, Morgan Bryan, his wife Martha, and eight +children, together with other families of Quakers from +Pennsylvania, settled upon a large tract of land on the northwest +side of the Opeckon River near Winchester. A few years later they +removed up the Virginia Valley to the Big Lick in the present +Roanoke County, intent upon pushing westward to the very +outskirts of civilization. In the autumn of 1748, leaving behind +his brother William, who had followed him to Roanoke County, +Morgan Bryan removed with his family to the Forks of the Yadkin +River. The Morgans, with the exception of Richard, who emigrated +to Virginia, remained in Pennsylvania, spreading over +Philadelphia and Bucks counties; while the Hanks and Lincoln +families found homes in Virginia—Mordecai Lincoln's son, John, +the great-grandfather of President Lincoln, removing from Berks +to the Shenandoah Valley in 1765. On May 1, 1750, Squire Boone, +his wife Sarah (Morgan), and their eleven children—a veritable +caravan, traveling like the patriarchs of old—started south; and +tarried for a space, according to reliable tradition, on Linville +Creek in the Virginia Valley. In 1752 they removed to the Forks +of the Yadkin, and the following year received from Lord +Granville three tracts of land, all situated in Rowan County. +About the hamlet of Salisbury, which in 1755 consisted of seven +or eight log houses and the court house, there now rapidly +gathered a settlement of people marked by strong individuality, +sturdy independence, and virile self-reliance. The Boones and the +Bryans quickly accommodated themselves to frontier conditions and +immediately began to take an active part in the local affairs of +the county. Upon the organization of the county court Squire +Boone was chosen justice of the peace; and Morgan Bryan was soon +appearing as foreman of juries and director in road improvements. +</P> + +<P> +The Great Trading Path, leading from Virginia to the towns of the +Catawbas and other Southern Indians, crossed the Yadkin at the +Trading Ford and passed a mile southeast of Salisbury. Above +Sapona Town near the Trading Ford was Swearing Creek, which, +according to constant and picturesque tradition, was the spot +where the traders stopped to take a solemn oath never to reveal +any unlawful proceedings that might occur during their sojourn +among the Indians. In his divertingly satirical "History of the +Dividing Line" William Byrd in 1728 thus speaks of this locality: +"The Soil is exceedingly rich on both sides the Yadkin, abounding +in rank Grass and prodigiously large Trees; and for plenty of +Fish, Fowl and Venison, is inferior to No Part of the Northern +Continent. There the Traders commonly lie Still for some days, to +recruit their Horses' Flesh as well as to recover their own +spirits." In this beautiful country happily chosen for settlement +by Squire Boone—who erected his cabin on the east side of the +Yadkin about a mile and a quarter from Alleman's, now Boone's, +Ford—wild game abounded. Buffaloes were encountered in eastern +North Carolina by Byrd while running the dividing line; and in +the upper country of South Carolina three or four men with their +dogs could kill fourteen to twenty buffaloes in a single day." +Deer and bears fell an easy prey to the hunter; wild turkeys +filled every thicket; the watercourses teemed with beaver, otter, +and muskrat, as well as with shad and other delicious fish. +Panthers, wildcats, and wolves overran the country; and the +veracious Brother Joseph, while near the present Wilkesboro, +amusingly records: "The wolves wh. are not like those in Germany, +Poland and Lifland (because they fear men and don't easily come +near) give us such music of six different cornets the like of wh. +I have never heard in my life." So plentiful was the game that +the wild deer mingled with the cattle grazing over the wide +stretches of luxuriant grass. +</P> + +<P> +In the midst of this sylvan paradise grew up Squire Boone's son, +Daniel Boone, a Pennsylvania youth of English stock, Quaker +persuasion, and Baptist proclivities. Seen through a glorifying +halo after the lapse of a century and three quarters, he rises +before us a romantic figure, poised and resolute, simple, +benign—as naive and shy as some wild thing of the primeval +forest—five feet eight inches in height, with broad chest and +shoulders, dark locks, genial blue eyes arched with fair +eyebrows, thin lips and wide mouth, nose of slightly Roman cast, +and fair, ruddy countenance. Farming was irksome to this +restless, nomadic spirit, who on the slightest excuse would +exchange the plow and the grubbing hoe for the long rifle and +keen-edged hunting knife. In a single day during the autumn +season he would kill four or five deer; or as many bears as would +snake from two to three thousand pounds weight of bear-bacon. +Fascinated with the forest, he soon found profit as well as +pleasure in the pursuit of game; and at excellent fixed prices he +sold his peltries, most often at Salisbury, some thirteen miles +away, sometimes at the store of the old "Dutchman," George +Hartman, on the Yadkin, and occasionally at Bethabara, the +Moravian town sixty odd miles distant. Skins were in such demand +that they soon came to replace hard money, which was incredibly +scarce in the back country, as a medium of exchange. Upon one +occasion a caravan from Bethabara hauled three thousand pounds, +upon another four thousand pounds, of dressed deerskins to +Charleston. So immense was this trade that the year after Boone's +arrival at the Forks of Yadkin thirty thousand deerskins were +exported from the province of North Carolina. We like to think +that the young Daniel Boone was one of that band of whom Brother +Joseph, while in camp on the Catawba River (November 12, 1752) +wrote: "There are many hunters about here, who live like Indians, +they kill many deer selling their hides, and thus live without +much work." +</P> + +<P> +In this very class of professional hunters, living like Indians, +was thus bred the spirit of individual initiative and strenuous +leadership in the great westward expansionist movement of the +coming decade. An English traveler gives the following minute +picture of the dress and accoutrement of the Carolina +backwoodsman. +</P> + +<P> +"Their whole dress is very singular, and not very materially +different from that of the Indians; being a hunting shirt, +somewhat resembling a waggoner's frock, ornamented with a great +many fringes, tied round the middle with a broad belt, much +decorated also, in which is fastened a tomahawk, an instrument +that serves every purpose of defence and convenience; being a +hammer at one side and a sharp hatchet at the other; the shot bag +and powderhorn, carved with a variety of whimsical figures and +devices, hang from their necks over one shoulder; and on their +heads a flapped hat, of a reddish hue, proceeding from the +intensely hot beams of the sun. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes they wear leather breeches, made of Indian dressed elk, +or deer skins, but more frequently thin trowsers. +</P> + +<P> +On their legs they have Indian boots, or leggings, made of coarse +woollen cloth, that either are wrapped round loosely and tied +with garters, or laced upon the outside, and always come better +than half-way up the thigh. +</P> + +<P> +On their feet they sometimes wear pumps of their own manufacture, +but generally Indian moccossons, of their own construction also, +which are made of strong elk's, or buck's skin, dressed soft as +for gloves or breeches, drawn together in regular plaits over the +toe, and lacing from thence round to the fore part of the middle +of the ancle, without a seam in them, yet fitting close to the +feet, and are indeed perfectly easy and pliant. +</P> + +<P> +Their hunting, or rifle shirts, they have also died in a variety +of colours, some yellow, others red, some brown, and many wear +them quite white." +</P> + +<P> +No less unique and bizarre, though less picturesque, was the +dress of the women of the region—in particular of Surry County, +North Carolina, as described by General William Lenoir: +</P> + +<P> +"The women wore linses [flax] petticoats and 'bedgowns' [like a +dressing-sack], and often went without shoes in the summer. Some +had bonnets and bedgowns made of calico, but generally of linsey; +and some of them wore men's hats. Their hair was commonly +clubbed. Once, at a large meeting, I noticed there but two women +that had on long gowns. One of these was laced genteelly, and the +body of the other was open, and the tail thereof drawn up and +tucked in her apron or coat-string." +</P> + +<P> +While Daniel Boone was quietly engaged in the pleasant pursuits +of the chase, a vast world-struggle of which he little dreamed +was rapidly approaching a crisis. For three quarters of a century +this titanic contest between France and England for the interior +of the continent had been waged with slowly accumulating force. +The irrepressible conflict had been formally inaugurated at Sault +Ste. Marie in 1671, when Daumont de Saint Lusson, swinging aloft +his sword, proclaimed the sovereignty of France over "all +countries, rivers, lakes, and streams ... both those which have +been discovered and those which may be discovered hereafter, in +all their length and breadth, bounded on the one side by the seas +of the North and of the West, and on the other by the South Sea." +Just three months later, three hardy pioneers of Virginia, +despatched upon their arduous mission by Colonel Abraham Wood in +behalf of the English crown, had crossed the Appalachian divide; +and upon the banks of a stream whose waters slipped into the Ohio +to join the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico, had carved the +royal insignia upon the blazed trunk of a giant of the forest, +the while crying: "Long live Charles the Second, by the grace of +God, King of England, Scotland, France, Ireland and Virginia and +of the territories thereunto belonging." +</P> + +<P> +La Salle's dream of a New France in the heart of America was +blotted out in his tragic death upon the banks of the River +Trinity (1687). Yet his mantle was to fall in turn upon the +square shoulders of Le Moyne d'Iberville and of his brother—the +good, the constant Bienville, who after countless and arduous +struggles laid firm the foundations of New Orleans. In the +precious treasury of Margry we learn that on reaching Rochelle +after his first voyage in 1699 Iberville in these prophetic words +voices his faith: "If France does not immediately seize this part +of America which is the most beautiful, and establish a colony +which is strong enough to resist any which England may have, the +English colonies (already considerable in Carolina) will so +thrive that in less than a hundred years they will be strong +enough to seize all America." But the world-weary Louis Quatorze, +nearing his end, quickly tired of that remote and unproductive +colony upon the shores of the gulf, so industriously described in +Paris as a "terrestrial paradise"; and the "paternal providence +of Versailles" willingly yielded place to the monumental +speculation of the great financier Antoine Crozat. In this Paris +of prolific promotion and amazed credulity, ripe for the colossal +scheme of Law, soon to blow to bursting-point the bubble of the +Mississippi, the very songs in the street echoed flamboyant, +half-satiric panegyrics upon the new Utopia, this Mississippi +Land of Cockayne: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +It's to-day no contribution<BR> +To discuss the Constitution<BR> +And the Spanish war's forgot<BR> +For a new Utopian spot;<BR> +And the very latest phase<BR> +Is the Mississippi craze.<BR> +</P> + +<P> +Interest in the new colony led to a great development of +southwesterly trade from New France. Already the French coureurs +de bois were following the water route from the Illinois to South +Carolina. Jean Couture, a deserter from the service in New +France, journeyed over the Ohio and Tennessee rivers to that +colony, and was known as "the greatest Trader and Traveller +amongst the Indians for more than Twenty years." In 1714 young +Charles Charleville accompanied an old trader from Crozat's +colony on the gulf to the great salt-springs on the Cumberland, +where a post for trading with the Shawanoes had already been +established by the French. But the British were preparing to +capture this trade as early as 1694, when Tonti warned Villermont +that Carolinians were already established on a branch of the +Ohio. Four years later, Nicholson, Governor of Maryland, was +urging trade with the Indians of the interior in the effort to +displace the French. At an early date the coast colonies began to +trade with the Indian tribes of the back country: the Catawbas of +the Yadkin Valley; the Cherokees, whose towns were scattered +through Tennessee; the Chickasaws, to the westward in northern +Mississippi; and the Choctaws farther to the southward. Even +before the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the South +Carolina settlements extended scarcely twenty miles from the +coast, English traders had established posts among the Indian +tribes four hundred miles to the west of Charleston. Following +the sporadic trading of individuals from Virginia with the inland +Indians, the heavily laden caravans of William Byrd were soon +regularly passing along the Great Trading Path from Virginia to +the towns of the Catawbas and other interior tribes of the +Carolinas, delighting the easily captivated fancy and provoking +the cupidity of the red men with "Guns, Powder, Shot, Hatchets +(which the Indians call Tomahawks), Kettles, red and blue Planes, +Duffields, Stroudwater blankets, and some Cutlary Wares, Brass +Rings and other Trinkets." In Pennsylvania, George Croghan, the +guileful diplomat, who was emissary from the Council to the Ohio +Indians (1748), had induced "all-most all the Ingans in the +Woods" to declare against the French; and was described by +Christopher Gist as a "meer idol among his countrymen, the Irish +traders." +</P> + +<P> +Against these advances of British trade and civilization, the +French for four decades had artfully struggled, projecting tours +of exploration into the vast medial valley of the continent and +constructing a chain of forts and trading-posts designed to +establish their claims to the country and to hold in check the +threatened English thrust from the east. Soon the wilderness +ambassador of empire, Celoron de Bienville, was despatched by the +far-visioned Galissoniere at Quebec to sow broadcast with +ceremonial pomp in the heart of America the seeds of empire, +grandiosely graven plates of lasting lead, in defiant yet futile +symbol of the asserted sovereignty of France. Thus threatened in +the vindication of the rights of their colonial sea-to-sea +charters, the English threw off the lethargy with which they had +failed to protect their traders, and in grants to the Ohio and +Loyal land companies began resolutely to form plans looking to +the occupation of the interior. But the French seized the English +trading-house at Venango which they converted into a fort; and +Virginia's protest, conveyed by a calm and judicious young man, a +surveyor, George Washington, availed not to prevent the French +from seizing Captain Trent's hastily erected military post at the +forks of the Ohio and constructing there a formidable work, named +Fort Duquesne. Washington, with his expeditionary force sent to +garrison Captain Trent's fort, defeated Jumonville and his small +force near Great Meadows (May, 1754); but soon after he was +forced to surrender Fort Necessity to Coulon de Villiers. +</P> + +<P> +The titanic struggle, fittingly precipitated in the backwoods of +the Old Southwest, was now on—a struggle in which the resolute +pioneers of these backwoods first seriously measured their +strength with the French and their copper-hued allies, and +learned to surpass the latter in their own mode of warfare. The +portentous conflict, destined to assure the eastern half of the +continent to Great Britain, is a grim, prophetic harbinger of the +mighty movement of the next quarter of a century into the +twilight zone of the trans-Alleghany territory: +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV. The Indian War +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +All met in companies with their wives and children, and set about +building little fortifications, to defend themselves from such +barbarian and inhuman enemies, whom they concluded would be let +loose upon them at pleasure.—The Reverend Hugh McAden—Diary, +July, 1755. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Long before the actual outbreak of hostilities powerful forces +were gradually converging to produce a clash between the +aggressive colonials and the crafty Indians. As the settlers +pressed farther westward into the domain of the red men, +arrogantly grazing their stock over the cherished hunting-grounds +of the Cherokees, the savages, who were already well disposed +toward the French, began to manifest a deep indignation against +the British colonists because of this callous encroachment upon +their territory. During the sporadic forays by scattered bands of +Northern Indians upon the Catawbas and other tribes friendly to +the pioneers the isolated settlements at the back part of the +Carolinas suffered rude and sanguinary onslaughts. In the summer +of 1753 a party of northern Indians warring in the French +interest made their appearance in Rowan County, which had just +been organized, and committed various depredations upon the +scattered settlements. To repel these attacks a band of the +Catawbas sallied forth, encountered a detached party of the +enemy, and slew five of their number. Among the spoils, +significantly enough, were silver crucifixes, beads, +looking-glasses, tomahawks and other implements of war, all of +French manufacture. +</P> + +<P> +Intense rivalry for the good will of the near-by southern tribes +existed between Virginia and South Carolina. In strong +remonstrance against the alleged attempt of Governor Dinwiddie of +Virginia to alienate the Cherokees, Catawbas, Muscogees, and +Chickasaws from South Carolina and to attach them to Virginia, +Governor Glen of South Carolina made pungent observations to +Dinwiddie: "South Carolina is a weak frontier colony, and in case +of invasion by the French would be their first object of attack. +We have not much to fear, however, while we retain the affection +of the Indians around us; but should we forfeit that by any +mismanagement on our part, or by the superior address of the +French, we are in a miserable situation. The Cherokees alone have +several thousand gunmen well acquainted with every inch of the +province ... their country is the key to Carolina." By a treaty +concluded at Saluda (November 24, 1753), Glen promised to build +the Cherokees a fort near the lower towns, for the protection of +themselves and their allies; and the Cherokees on their part +agreed to become the subjects of the King of Great Britain and +hold their lands under him. This fort, erected this same year on +the headwaters of the Savannah, within gunshot distance of the +important Indian town of Keowee, was named Fort Prince George. +"It is a square," says the founder of the fort (Governor Glen to +the Board of Trade, August 26, 1754), "with regular Bastions and +four Ravelins it is near Two hundred foot from Salient Angle to +Salient Angle and is made of Earth taken out of the Ditch, +secured with fachines and well rammed with a banquet on the +Inside for the men to stand upon when they fire over, the +Ravelins are made of Posts of Lightwood which is very durable, +they are ten foot in length sharp pointed three foot and a half +in the ground." The dire need for such a fort in the back country +was tragically illustrated by the sudden onslaught upon the +"House of John Gutry & James Anshers" in York County by a party +of sixty French Indians (December 16, 1754), who brutally +murdered sixteen of the twenty-one persons present, and carried +off as captives the remaining five." +</P> + +<P> +At the outbreak of the French and Indian War in 1754 North +Carolina voted twelve thousand pounds for the raising of troops +and several thousand pounds additional for the construction of +forts—a sum considerably larger than that voted by Virginia. A +regiment of two hundred and fifty men was placed under the +command of Colonel James Innes of the Cape Fear section; and the +ablest officer under him was the young Irishman from the same +section, Lieutenant Hugh Waddell. On June 3, 1754, Dinwiddie +appointed Innes, his close friend, commander-in-chief of all the +forces against the French; and immediately after the disaster at +Great Meadows (July, 1754), Innes took command. Within two months +the supplies for the North Carolina troops were exhausted; and as +Virginia then failed to furnish additional supplies, Colonel +Innes had no recourse but to disband his troops and permit them +to return home. Appointed governor of Fort Cumberland by General +Braddock, he was in command there while Braddock advanced on his +disastrous march. +</P> + +<P> +The lesson of Braddock's defeat (July 9, 1755) was memorable in +the history of the Old Southwest. Well might Braddock exclaim +with his last breath: "Who would have thought it? ... We shall +know better how to deal with them another time." Led on by the +reckless and fiery Beaujeu, wearing an Indian gorget about his +neck, the savages from the protection of trees and rough +defenses, a pre pared ambuscade, poured a galling fire into the +compact divisions of the English, whose scarlet coats furnished +ideal targets. The obstinacy of the British commanders in +refusing to permit their troops to fight Indian fashion was +suicidal; for as Herman Alriclis wrote Governor Morris of +Pennsylvania (July 22, 1755): "... the French and Indians had +cast an Intrenchment across the road before our Army which they +Discovered not Untill they came Close up to it, from thence and +both sides of the road the enemy kept a constant fireing on them, +our Army being so confused, they could not fight, and they would +not be admitted by the Genl or Sir John St. Clair, to break thro' +their Ranks and Take behind trees." Daniel Boone, who went from +North Carolina as a wagoner in the company commanded by Edward +Brice Dobbs, was on the battle-field; but Dobbs's company at the +time was scouting in the woods. When the fierce attack fell upon +the baggage a train, Boone succeeded in effecting his escape only +by cutting the traces of his team and fleeing on one of the +horses. To his dying day Boone continued to censure Braddock's +conduct, and reprehended especially his fatal neglect to employ +strong flank-guards and a sufficient number of Provincial scouts +thoroughly acquainted with the wilderness and all the wiles and +strategies of savage warfare. +</P> + +<P> +For a number of months following Braddock's defeat there was a +great rush of the frightened people southward. In a letter to +Dinwiddie, Washington expresses the apprehension that Augusta, +Frederick, and Hampshire County will soon be depopulated, as the +whole back country is in motion toward the southern colonies. +During this same summer Governor Arthur Dobbs of North Carolina +made a tour of exploration through the western part of the +colony, seeking a site for a fort to guard the frontier. The +frontier company of fifty men which was to garrison the projected +fort was placed under the command of Hugh Waddell, now promoted +to the rank of captain, though only twenty-one years old. In +addition to Waddell's company, armed patrols were required for +the protection of the Rowan County frontier; and during the +summer Indian alarms were frequent at the Moravian village of +Bethabara, whose inhabitants had heard with distress on March +31st of the slaughter of eleven Moravians on the Mahoni and of +the ruin of Gnadenhutten. Many of the settlers in the outlying +districts of Rowan fled for safety to the refuge of the little +village; and frequently every available house, every place of +temporary abode was filled with panic stricken refugees. So +persistent were the depredations of the Indians and so alarmed +were the scattered Rowan settlers by the news of the murders and +the destruction of Vaul's Fort in Virginia (June 25, 1756) that +at a conference on July 5th the Moravians "decided to protect our +houses with palisades, and make them safe before the enemy should +in vade our tract or attack us, for if the people were all going +to retreat we would be the last left on the frontier and the +first point of attack." By July 23d, they had constructed a +strong defense for their settlement, afterward called the "Dutch +Fort" by the Indians. The principal structure was a stockade, +triangular in plan, some three hundred feet on a side, enclosing +the principal buildings of the settlement; and the gateway was +guarded by an observation tower. The other defense was a stockade +embracing eight houses at the mill some distance away, around +which a small settlement had sprung up. +</P> + +<P> +During the same year the fort planned by Dobbs was erected upon +the site he had chosen—between Third and Fourth creeks; and the +commissioners Richard Caswell and Francis Brown, sent out to +inspect the fort, made the following picturesque report to the +Assembly (December 21, 1756): +</P> + +<P> +"That they had likewise viewed the State of Fort Dobbs, and found +it to be a good and Substantial Building of the Dimentions +following (that is to say) The Oblong Square fifty three feet by +forty, the opposite Angles Twenty four feet and Twenty-Two In +Height Twenty four and a half feet as by the Plan annexed +Appears, The Thickness of the Walls which are made of Oak Logs +regularly Diminished from sixteen Inches to Six, it contains +three floors and there may be discharged from each floor at one +and the same time about one hundred Musketts the same is +beautifully scituated in the fork of Fourth Creek a Branch of the +Yadkin River. And that they also found under Command of Cap' Hugh +Waddel Forty six Effective men Officers and Soldiers, the said +Officers and Soldiers Appearing well and in good Spirits." +</P> + +<P> +As to the erection of a fort on the Tennessee, promised the +Cherokees by South Carolina, difficulties between the governor of +that province and of Virginia in regard to matters of policy and +the proportionate share of expenses made effective cooperation +between the two colonies well-nigh impossible. Glen, as we have +seen, had resented Dinwiddie's efforts to win the South Carolina +Indians over to Virginia's interest. And Dinwiddie had been very +indignant when the force promised him by the Indians to aid +General Braddock did not arrive, attributing this defection in +part to Glen's negotiations for a meeting with the chieftains and +in part to the influence of the South Carolina traders, who kept +the Indians away by hiring them to go on long hunts for furs and +skinns. But there was no such contention between Virginia and +North Carolina. Dinwiddie and Dobbs arranged (November 6, 1755) +to send a commission from these colonies to treat with the +Cherokees and the Catawbas. Virginia sent two commissioners, +Colonel William Byrd, third of that name, and Colonel Peter +Randolph; while North Carolina sent one, Captain Hugh Waddell. +Salisbury, North Carolina, was the place of rendezvous. The +treaty with the Catawbas was made at the Catawba Town, presumably +the village opposite the mouth of Sugaw Creek, in York County, +South Carolina, on February 20-21, 1756; that with the Cherokees +on Broad River, North Carolina, March 13-17. As a result of the +negotiations and after the receipt of a present of goods, the +Catawbas agreed to send forty warriors to aid Virginia within +forty days; and the Cherokees, in return for presents and +Virginia's promise to contribute her proportion toward the +erection of a strong fort, undertook to send four hundred +warriors within forty days, "as soon as the said fort shall be +built." Virginia and North Carolina thus wisely cooperated to +"straighten the path" and "brighten the chain" between the white +and the red men, in important treaties which Have largely escaped +the attention of historians." +</P> + +<P> +On May 25, 1756, a conference was held at Salisbury between King +Heygler and warriors of the Catawba nation on the one side and +Chief Justice Henley, doubtless attended by Captain Waddell and +his frontier company, on the other. King Heygler, following the +lead set by the Cherokees, petitioned the Governor of North +Carolina to send the Catawbas some ammunition and to "build us a +fort for securing our old men, women and children when we turn +out to fight the Enemy on their coming." The chief justice +assured the King that the Catawbas would receive a necessary +supply of ammunition (one hundred pounds of gunpowder and four +hundred pounds of lead were later sent them) and promised to urge +with the governor their request to have a fort built as soon as +possible. Pathos not unmixed with dry humor tinges the eloquent +appeal of good old King Heygler, ever the loyal friend of the +whites, at this conference: +</P> + +<P> +"I desire a stop may be put to the selling of strong Liquors by +the White people to my people especially near the Indian nation. +IF THE WHITE PEOPLE MAKE STRONG DRINK, LET THEM. SELL IT TO ONE +ANOTHER, OR DRINK IT IN THEIR OWN FAMILIES. This will avoid a +great deal of mischief which otherwise will, happen from my +people getting drunk and quarrelling with the White people. I +have no strong prisons like you to confine them for it. Our only +way is to put them under ground and all these (pointing proudly +to his Warriors) will be ready to do that to those who shall +deserve it." +</P> + +<P> +In response to this request, the sum of four thousand pounds was +appropriated by the North Carolina Assembly for the erection of +"a Fort on our western frontier to protect and secure the +Catawbas" and for the support of two companies of fifty men each +to garrison this and another fort building on the sea coast. The +commissioners appointed for the purpose recommended (December 21, +1756) a site for the fort "near the 'Catawba nation"; and on +January 20, 1757, Governor Dobbs reported; "We are now building +a Fort in the midst of their towns at their own Request." The +fort thereupon begun must have stood near the mouth of the South +Fork of the Catawba River, as Dobbs says it was in the "midst" of +their towns, which are situated a "few miles north and south of +38 degrees" and might properly be included within a circle of +thirty miles radius." +</P> + +<P> +During the succeeding months many depredations were committed by +the Indians upon the exposed and scattered settlements. Had it +not been for the protection afforded by all these forts, by the +militia companies under Alexander Osborne of Rowan and Nathaniel +Alexander of Anson, and by a special company of patrollers under +Green and Moore, the back settlers who had been so outrageously +"pilfered" by the Indians would have "retired from the Frontier +into the inner settlements." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V. In Defense of Civilization +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +We give thanks and praise for the safety and peace vouchsafed us +by our Heavenly Father in these times of war. Many of our +neighbors, driven hither and yon like deer before wild beasts, +came to us for shelter, yet the accustomed order of our +congregation life was not disturbed, no, not even by the more +than 150 Indians who at sundry times passed by, stopping for a +day at a time and being fed by us.—Wachovia Community Diary, +1757 +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +With commendable energy and expedition Dinwiddie and Dobbs, +acting in concert, initiated steps for keeping the engagements +conjointly made by the two colonies with the Cherokees and the +Catawbas in the spring and summer of 1756. Enlisting sixty men, +"most of them Artificers, with Tools and Provisions," Major +Andrew Lewis proceeded in the late spring to Echota in the +Cherokee country. Here during the hot summer months they erected +the Virginia Fort on the path from Virginia, upon the northern +bank of the Little Tennessee, nearly opposite the Indian town of +Echota and about twenty-five miles southwest of Knoxville." While +the fort was in process of construction, the Cherokees were +incessantly tampered with by emissaries from the Nuntewees and +the Savannahs in the French interest, and from the French +themselves at the Alibamu Fort. So effective were these +machinations, supported by extravagant promises and doubtless +rich bribes, that the Cherokees soon were outspokenly expressing +their desire for a French fort at Great Tellico. +</P> + +<P> +Dinwiddie welcomed the departure from America of Governor Glen of +South Carolina, who in his opinion had always acted contrary to +the king's interest. From the new governor, William Henry +Lyttelton, who arrived in Charleston on June 1, 1756, he hoped to +secure effective cooperation in dealing with the Cherokees and +the Catawbas. This hope was based upon Lyttelton's recognition, +as stated in Dinwiddie's words, of the "Necessity of strict Union +between the whole Colonies, with't any of them considering their +particular Interest separate from the general Good of the whole." +After constructing the fort "with't the least assistance from +South Carolina," Major Lewis happened by accident upon a grand +council being held in Echota in September. At that time he +discovered to his great alarm that the machinations of the French +had already produced the greatest imaginable change in the +sentiment of the Cherokees. Captain Raymond Demere of the +Provincials, with two hundred English troops, had arrived to +garrison the fort; but the head men of all the Upper Towns were +secretly influenced to agree to write a letter to Captain Demere, +ordering him to return immediately to Charleston with all the +troops under his command. At the grand council, Atta-kulla-kulla, +the great Cherokee chieftain, passionately declared to the head +men, who listened approvingly, that "as to the few soldiers of +Captain Demere that was there, he would take their Guns, and give +them to his young men to hunt with and as to their clothes they +would soon be worn out and their skins would be tanned, and be of +the same colour as theirs, and that they should live among them +as slaves." With impressive dignity Major Lewis rose and +earnestly pleaded for the observance of the terms of the treaty +solemnly negotiated the preceding March. In response, the crafty +and treacherous chieftains desired Lewis to tell the Governor of +Virginia that "they had taken up the Hatchet against all Nations +that were Enemies to the English"; but Lewis, an astute student +of Indian Psychology, rightly surmised that all their glib +professions of friendship and assistance were "only to put a +gloss on their knavery." So it proved; for instead of the four +hundred warriors promised under the treaty for service in +Virginia, the Cherokees sent only seven warriors, accompanied by +three women. Al though the Cherokees petitioned Virginia for a +number of men to garrison the Virginia fort, Dinwiddie postponed +sending the fifty men provided for by the Virginia Assembly until +he could reassure himself in regard to the "Behaviour and +Intention" of the treacherous Indian allies. This proved to be a +prudent decision; for not long after its erection the Virginia +fort was destroyed by the Indians. +</P> + +<P> +Whether on account of the dissatisfaction expressed by the +Cherokees over the erection of the Virginia fort or because of a +recognition of the mistaken policy of garrisoning a work erected +by Virginia with troops sent from Charleston, South Carolina +immediately proceeded to build another stronghold on the southern +bank of the Tennessee at the mouth of Tellico River, some seven +miles from the site of the Virginia fort; and here were posted +twelve great guns, brought thither at immense labor through the +wilderness. To this fort, named Fort Loudoun in honor of Lord +Loudoun, then commander-in-chief of all the English forces in +America, the Indians allured artisans by donations of land; and +during the next three or four years a little settlement sprang up +there. +</P> + +<P> +The frontiers of Virginia suffered most from the incursions of +hostile Indians during the fourteen months following May 1, 1755. +In July, the Rev. Hugh McAden records that he preached in +Virginia on a day set apart for fasting and prayer "on account of +the wars and many murders, committed by the savage Indians on the +back inhabitants." On July 30th a large party of Shawano Indians +fell upon the New River settlement and wiped it out of existence. +William Ingles was absent at the time of the raid; and Mrs. +Ingles, who was captured, afterward effected her escape. The +following summer (June 25, 1756), Fort Vaux on the headwaters of +the Roanoke, under the command of Captain John Smith, was +captured by about one hundred French and Indians, who burnt the +fort, killed John Smith junior, John Robinson, John Tracey and +John Ingles, wounded four men, and captured twenty-two men, +women, and children. Among the captured was the famous Mrs. Mary +Ingles, whose husband, John Ingles, was killed; but after being +"carried away into Captivity, amongst whom she was barbarously +treated," according to her own statement, she finally escaped and +returned to Virginia." The frontier continued to be infested by +marauding bands of French and Indians; and Dinwiddie gloomily +confessed to Dobbs (July 22d): "I apprehend that we shall always +be harrass'd with fly'g Parties of these Banditti unless we form +an Expedit'n ag'st them, to attack 'em in y'r Towns." Such an +expedition, known as the Sandy River Expedition, had been sent +out in February to avenge the massacre of the New River settlers; +but the enterprise engaged in by about four hundred Virginians +and Cherokees under Major Andrew Lewis and Captain Richard +Pearis, proved a disastrous failure. Not a single Indian was +seen; and the party suffered extraordinary hardships and narrowly +escaped starvation. +</P> + +<P> +In conformity with his treaty obligations with the Catawbas, +Governor Dobbs commissioned Captain Hugh Waddell to erect the +fort promised the Catawbas at the spot chosen by the +commissioners near the mouth of the South Fork of the Catawba +River. This fort, for which four thousand pounds had been +appropriated, was for the most part completed by midsummer, 1757. +But owing, it appears, both to the machinations of the French and +to the intermeddling of the South Carolina traders, who desired +to retain the trade of the Catawbas for that province, Oroloswa, +the Catawba King Heygler, sent a "talk" to Governor Lyttelton, +requesting that North Carolina desist from the work of +construction and that no fort be built except by South Carolina. +Accordingly, Governor Dobbs ordered Captain Waddell to discharge +the workmen (August 11, 1757); and every effort was made for many +months thereafter to conciliate the Catawbas, erstwhile friends +of North Carolina. The Catawba fort erected by North Carolina was +never fully completed; and several years later South Carolina, +having succeeded in alienating the Catawbas from North Carolina, +which colony had given them the best possible treatment, built +for them a fort at the mouth of Line Creek on the east bank of +the Catawba River. +</P> + +<P> +In the spring and summer of 1758 the long expected Indian allies +arrived in Virginia, as many as four hundred by May—Cherokees, +Catawbas, Tuscaroras, and Nottaways. But Dinwiddie was wholly +unable to use them effectively; and in order to provide amusement +for them, he directed that they should go "a scalping" with the +whites—"a barbarous method of war," frankly acknowledged the +governor, "introduced by the French, which we are oblidged to +follow in our own defense." Most of the Indian allies +discontentedly returned home before the end of the year, but the +remainder waited until the next year, to take part in the +campaign against Fort Duquesne. Three North Carolina companies, +composed of trained soldiers and hardy frontiersmen, went through +this campaign under the command of Major Hugh Waddell, the +"Washington of North Carolina." Long of limb and broad of chest, +powerful, lithe, and active, Waddell was an ideal leader for this +arduous service, being fertile in expedient and skilful in the +employment of Indian tactics. With true provincial pride Governor +Dobbs records that Waddell "had great honor done him, being +employed in all reconnoitring parties, and dressed and acted as +an Indian; and his sergeant, Rogers, took the only Indian +prisoner, who gave Mr. Forbes certain intelligence of the forces +in Fort Duquesne, upon which they resolved to proceed." This +apparently trivial incident is remarkable, in that it proved to +be the decisive factor in a campaign that was about to be +abandoned. The information in regard to the state of the garrison +at Fort Duquesne, secured from the Indian, for the capture of +whom two leading officers had offered a reward of two hundred and +fifty pounds, emboldened Forbes to advance rather than to retire. +Upon reaching the fort (November 25th), he found it abandoned by +the enemy. Sergeant Rogers never received the reward promised by +General Forbes and the other English officer; but some time +afterward he was compensated by a modest sum from the colony of +North Carolina. +</P> + +<P> +A series of unfortunate occurrences, chiefly the fault of the +whites, soon resulted in the precipitation of a terrible Indian +outbreak. A party of Cherokees, returning home in May, 1758, +seized some stray horses on the frontier of Virginia—never +dreaming of any wrong, says an old historian, as they saw it +frequently done by the whites. The owners of the horses, hastily +forming a party, went in pursuit of the Indians and killed twelve +or fourteen of the number. The relatives of the slain Indians, +greatly incensed, vowed vengeance upon the whites. Nor was the +tactless conduct of Forbes calculated to quiet this resentment; +for when Atta-kulla-kulla and nine other chieftains deserted in +disgust at the treatment accorded them, they were pursued by +Forbes's orders, apprehended and disarmed. This rude treatment, +coupled with the brutal and wanton murder of some Cherokee +hunters a little earlier, by an irresponsible band of Virginians +under Captain Robert Wade, still further aggravated the Indians. +</P> + +<P> +Incited by the French, who had fled to the southward after the +fall of Fort Duquesne, parties of bloodthirsty young Indians +rushed down upon the settlements and left in their path death and +desolation along the frontiers of the Carolinas. On the upper +branch of the Yadkin and below the South Yadkin near Fort Dobbs +twenty-two whites fell in swift succession before the secret +onslaughts of the savages from the lower Cherokee towns. Many of +the settlers along the Yadkin fled to the Carolina Fort at +Bethabara and the stockade at the mill; and the sheriff of Rowan +County suffered siege by the Cherokees, in his home, until +rescued by a detachment under Brother Loesch from Bethabara. +While many families took refuge in Fort Dobbs, frontiersmen under +Captain Morgan Bryan ranged through the mountains to the west of +Salisbury and guarded the settlements from the hostile incursions +of the savages. So gravely alarmed were the Rowan settlers, +compelled by the Indians to desert their planting and crops, that +Colonel Harris was despatched post-haste for aid to Cape Fear, +arriving there on July 1st. With strenuous energy Captain +Waddell, then stationed in the east, rushed two companies of +thirty men each to the rescue, sending by water-carriage six +swivel guns and ammunition on before him; and these +reinforcements brought relief at last to the harassed Rowan +frontiers." During the remainder of the year, the borders were +kept clear by bold and tireless rangers-under the leadership of +expert Indian fighters of the stamp of Grifth Rutherford and +Morgan Bryan. +</P> + +<P> +When the Cherokee warriors who had wrought havoc along the North +Carolina border in April arrived at their town of Settiquo, they +proudly displayed the twenty-two scalps of the slain Rowan +settlers. Upon the demand for these scalps by Captain Demere at +Fort Loudon and under direction of Atta-kulla-kulla, the Settiquo +warriors surrendered eleven of the scalps to Captain Demere who, +according to custom in time of peace, buried them. New murders on +Pacolet and along the Virginia Path, which occurred shortly +afterward, caused gloomy forebodings; and it was plain, says a +contemporary gazette, that "the lower Cherokees were not +satisfied with the murder of the Rowan settlers, but intended +further mischief". On October 1st and again on October 31st, +Governor Dobbs received urgent requests from Governor Lyttelton, +asking that the North Carolina provincials and militia cooperate +to bring him assistance. Although there was no law requiring the +troops to march out of the province and the exposed frontiers of +North Carolina sorely needed protection, Waddell, now +commissioned colonel, assembled a force of five small companies +and marched to the aid of Governor Lyttelton. But early in +January, 1760, while on the march, Waddell received a letter from +Lyttelton, informing him that the assistance was not needed and +that a treaty of peace had been negotiated with the Cherokees. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI. Crushing the Cherokees +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Thus ended the Cherokee war, which was among the last humbling +strokes given to the expiring power of France in North America.—Hewatt: +An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the +Colonies of South Carolina and Georgia. 1779. +</P> + +<P> +Governor Lyttelton's treaty of "peace", negotiated with the +Cherokees at the close of 1759, was worse than a crime: it was a +crass and hideous blunder. His domineering attitude and +tyrannical treatment of these Indians had aroused the bitterest +animosity. Yet he did not realize that it was no longer safe to +trust their word. No sooner did the governor withdraw his army +from the borders than the cunning Cherokees, whose passions had +been inflamed by what may fairly be called the treacherous +conduct of Lyttelton, rushed down with merciless ferocity upon +the innocent and defenseless families on the frontier. On +February 1, 1760, while a large party (including the family of +Patrick Calhoun), numbering in all about one hundred and fifty +persons, were removing from the Long Cane settlement to Augusta, +they were suddenly attacked by a hundred mounted Cherokees, who +slaughtered about fifty of them. After the massacre, many of the +children were found helplessly wandering in the woods. One man +alone carried to Augusta no less than nine of the pitiful +innocents, some horribly mutilated with the tomahawk, others +scalped, and all yet alive. +</P> + +<P> +Atrocities defying description continued to be committed, and +many people were slain. The Cherokees, under the leadership of +Si-lou-ee, or the Young Warrior of Estatoe, the Round O, Tiftoe, +and others, were baffled in their persistent efforts to capture +Fort Prince George. On February 16th the crafty Oconostota +appeared before the fort and under the pretext of desiring some +White man to accompany him on a visit to the governor on urgent +business, lured the commander, Lieutenant Coytomore, and two +attendants to a conference outside the gates. At a preconceived +signal a volley of shots rang out; the two attendants were +wounded, and Lieutenant Coytomore, riddled with bullets, fell +dead. Enraged by this act of treachery, the garrison put to death +the Indian hostages within. During the abortive attack upon the +fort, Oconostota, unaware of the murder of the hostages, was +heard shouting above the din of battle: "Fight strong, and you +shall be relieved." +</P> + +<P> +Now began the dark days along the Rowan border, which were so +sorely to test human endurance. Many refugees fortified +themselves in the different stockades; and Colonel Hugh Waddell +with his redoubtable frontier company of Indian-fighters awaited +the onslaught of the savages, who were reported to have passed +through the mountain defiles and to be approaching along the +foot-hills. The story of the investment of Fort Dobbs and the +splendidly daring sortie of Waddell and Bailey is best told in +Waddell's report to Governor Dobbs (February 29, 1760): +</P> + +<P> +"For several Days I observed a small party of Indians were +constantly about the fort, I sent out several parties after them +to no purpose, the Evening before last between 8 & 9 o'clock I +found by the Dogs making an uncommon Noise there must be a party +nigh a Spring which we sometimes use. As my Garrison is but +small, and I was apprehensive it might be a scheme to draw out +the Garrison, I took our Capt. Bailie who with myself and party +made up ten: We had not marched 300 yds. from the fort when we +were attacked by at least 60 or 70 Indians. I had given my party +Orders not to fire until I gave the word, which they punctually +observed: We rec'd the Indians' fire: When I perceived they had +almost all fired, I ordered my party to fire which We did not +further than 12 steps each loaded with a Bullet and 7 Buck Shot, +they had nothing to cover them as they were advancing either to +tomahawk us or make us Prisoners: They found the fire very hot +from so small a Number which a good deal confused them: I then +ordered my party to retreat, as I found the Instant our skirmish +began another party had attacked the fort, upon our reinforcing +the garrison the Indians were soon repulsed with I am sure a +considerable Loss, from what I myself saw as well as those I can +confide in they cou'd not have less than 10 or 12 killed and +wounded; The next Morning we found a great deal of Blood and one +dead whom I suppose they cou'd not find in the night. On my side +I had 2 Men wounded one of whom I am afraid will die as he is +scalped, the other is in way of Recovery, and one boy killed near +the fort whom they durst not advance to scalp. I expected they +would have paid me another visit last night, as they attack all +Fortifications by Night, but find they did not like their +Reception." +</P> + +<P> +Alarmed by Waddell's "offensive-defensive," the Indians abandoned +the siege. Robert Campbell, Waddell's ranger, who was scalped in +this engagement, subsequently recovered from his wounds and was +recompensed by the colony with the sum of twenty pounds. +</P> + +<P> +In addition to the frontier militia, four independent companies +were now placed under Waddell's command. Companies of volunteers +scoured the woods in search of the lurking Indian foe. These +rangers, who were clad in hunting-shirts and buckskin leggings, +and who employed Indian tactics in fighting, were captained by +such hardy leaders as the veteran Morgan Bryan, the intrepid +Griffith Ruthe ford, the German partisan, Martin Phifer +(Pfeiffer), and Anthony Hampton, the father of General Wade +Hampton. They visited periodically a chain of "forest castles" +erected by the settlers—extending all the way from Fort Dobbs +and the Moravian fortifications in the Wachau to Samuel +Stalnaker's stockade on the Middle Fork of the Holston in +Virginia. About the middle of March, thirty volunteer Rowan +County rangers encountered a band of forty Cherokees, who +fortified themselves in a deserted house near the Catawba River. +The famous scout and hunter, John Perkins, assisted by one of his +bolder companions, crept up to the house and flung lighted +torches upon the roof. One of the Indians, as the smoke became +suffocating and the flames burned hotter, exclaimed: "Better for +one to die bravely than for all to perish miserably in the +flames," and darting forth, dashed rapidly hither and thither, in +order to draw as many shots as possible. This act of superb +self-sacrifice was successful; and while the rifles of the +whites, who riddled the brave Indian with balls, were empty, the +other savages made a wild dash for liberty. Seven fell thus under +the deadly rain of bullets; but many escaped. Ten of the Indians, +all told, lost their scalps, for which the volunteer rangers were +subsequently paid one hundred pounds by the colony of North +Carolina. +</P> + +<P> +Beaten back from Fort Dobbs, sorely defeated along the Catawba, +hotly pursued by the rangers, the Cherokees continued to lurk in +the shadows of the dense forests, and at every opportunity to +fall suddenly upon way faring settlers and isolated cabins remote +from any stronghold. On March 8th William Fish, his son, and +Thompson, a companion, were riding along the "trace," in search +of provisions for a group of families fortified on the Yadkin, +when a flight of arrows hurtled from the cane-brake, and Fish and +his son fell dead. Although pierced with two arrows, one in the +hip and one clean through his body, Thompson escaped upon his +fleet horse; and after a night of ghastly suffering finally +reached the Carolina Fort at Bethabara. The good Dr. Bonn, by +skilfully extracting the barbed shafts from his body, saved +Thompson's life. The pious Moravians rejoiced over the recovery +of the brave messenger, whose sensational arrival gave them +timely warning of the close proximity of the Indians. While +feeding their cattle, settlers were shot from ambush by the +lurking foe; and on March 11th, a family barricaded within a +burning house, which they were defending with desperate courage, +were rescued in the nick of time by the militia. No episode from +Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales surpasses in melancholy +interest Harry Hicks's heroic defense of his little fort on Bean +Island Creek. Surrounded by the Indians, Hicks and his family +took refuge within the small outer palisade around his humble +home. Fighting desperately against terrific odds, he was finally +driven from his yard into his log cabin, which he continued to +defend with dauntless courage. With every shot he tried to send a +redskin to the happy hunting-grounds; and it was only after his +powder was exhausted that he fell, fighting to the last, beneath +the deadly tomahawk. So impressed were the Indians by his bravery +that they spared the life of his wife and his little son; and +these were afterward rescued by Waddell when he marched to the +Cherokee towns in 1761. +</P> + +<P> +The kindly Moravians had always entertained with generous +hospitality the roving bands of Cherokees, who accordingly held +them in much esteem and spoke of Bethabara as "the Dutch Fort, +where there are good people and much bread." But now, in these +dread days, the truth of their daily text was brought forcibly +home to the Moravians: "Neither Nehemiah nor his brethren put off +their clothes, but prayed as they watched." With Bible in one +hand and rifle in the other, the inhabitant of Wachovia sternly +marched to religious worship. No Puritan of bleak New England +ever showed more resolute courage or greater will to defend the +hard-won outpost of civilization than did the pious Moravian of +the Wachau. At the new settlement of Bethania on Easter Day, more +than four hundred souls, including sixty rangers, listened +devoutly to the eloquent sermon of Bishop Spangenberg concerning +the way of salvation—the while their arms, stacked without the +Gemein Haus, were guarded by the watchful sentinel. On March 14th +the watchmen at Bethania with well-aimed shots repelled the +Indians, whose hideous yells of baffled rage sounded down the +wind like "the howling of a hundred wolves". Religion was no +protection against the savages; for three ministers journeying to +the present site of Salem were set upon by the red men—one +escaping, another suffering capture, and the third, a Baptist, +losing his life. A little later word came to Fort Dobbs that John +Long and Robert Gillespie of Salisbury had been shot from ambush +and scalped—Long having been pierced with eight bullets and +Gillespie with seven. +</P> + +<P> +There is one beautiful incident recorded by the Moravians, which +has a truly symbolic significance. While the war was at its +height, a strong party of Cherokees, who had lost their chief, +planned in retaliation to attack Bethabara. "When they went +home," sets forth the Moravian Diary, "they said they had been to +a great town, where there were a great many people, where the +bells rang often, and during the night, time after time, a horn +was blown, so that they feared to attack the town and had taken +no prisoners." The trumpet of the watchman, announcing the +passing of the hour, had convinced the Indians that their plans +for attack were discovered; and the regular evening bell, +summoning the pious to prayer, rang in the stricken ears of the +red men like the clamant call to arms. +</P> + +<P> +Following the retirement from office of Governor Lyttelton, +Lieutenant-Governor Bull proceeded to prosecute the war with +vigor. On April 1, 1760, twelve hundred men under Colonel +Archibald Montgomerie arrived at Charleston, with instructions to +strike an immediate blow and to relieve Fort Loudon, then +invested by the Cherokees. With his own force, two hundred and +ninety-five South Carolina Rangers, forty picked men of the new +"levies," and "a good number of guides," Montgomerie moved from +Fort Ninety-Six on May 28th. On the first of June, crossing +Twelve-Mile River, Montgomerie began the campaign in earnest, +devastating and burning every Indian village in the Valley of +Keowee, killing and capturing more than a hundred of the +Cherokees, and destroying immense stores of corn. Receiving no +reply to his summons to the Cherokees of the Middle and Upper +Towns to make peace or suffer like treatment, Montgomerie took up +his march from Fort Prince George on June 24th, resolved to carry +out his threat. On the morning of the 27th, he was drawn into an +ambuscade within six miles of Et-chow-ee, eight miles south of +the present Franklin, North Carolina, a mile and a half below +Smith's Bridge, and was vigorously attacked from dense cover by +some six hundred and thirty warriors led by Si-lou-ee. Fighting +with Indian tactics, the Provincial Rangers under Patrick Calhoun +particularly distinguished themselves; and the bloodcurdling +yells of the painted savages were responded to by the wild huzzas +of the kilted Highlanders who, waving their Scotch bonnets, +impetuously charged the redskins and drove them again and again +from their lurking-places. Nevertheless Montgomerie lost from +eighty to one hundred in killed and wounded, while the loss of +the Indians was supposed to be about half the loss of the whites. +Unable to care for his wounded and lacking the means of removing +his baggage, Montgomerie silently withdrew his forces. In so +doing, he acknowledged defeat, since he was compelled to abandon +his original intention of relieving the beleaguered garrison of +Fort London. +</P> + +<P> +Captain Demere and his devoted little band, who had been +resolutely holding out, were now left to their tragic fate. After +the bread was exhausted, the garrison was reduced to the +necessity of eating dogs and horses; and the loyal aid of the +Indian wives of some of the garrison, who secretly brought them +supplies of food daily, enabled them to hold out still longer. +Realizing at last the futility of prolonging the hopeless +contest, Captain Demere surrendered the fort on August 8, 1760. +At daylight the next morning, while on the march to Fort Prince +George, the soldiers were set upon by the treacherous Cherokees, +who at the first onset killed Captain Demere and twenty-nine +others. A humane chieftain, Outassitus, says one of the gazettes +of the day, "went around the field calling upon the Indians to +desist, and making such representations to them as stopped the +further progress and effects of their barbarous and brutal rage," +which expressed itself in scalping and hacking off the arms and +legs of the defenseless whites. Atta-kulla-kulla, who was +friendly to the whites, claimed Captain Stuart, the second +officer, as his captive, and bore him away by stealth. After nine +days' journey through the wilderness they encountered an advance +party under Major Andrew Lewis, sent out by Colonel Byrd, head of +a relieving army, to rescue and succor any of the garrison who +might effect their escape. Thus Stuart was restored to his +friends. This abortive and tragic campaign, in which the victory +lay conclusively with the Indians, ended when Byrd disbanded his +new levies and Montgomerie sailed from Charleston for the north +(August, 1760). +</P> + +<P> +During the remainder of the year, the province of North Carolina +remained free of further alarms from the Indians. But the view +was generally entertained that one more joint Effort of North +Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia would have to be made in +order to humble the Cherokees. At the sessions of the North +Carolina Assembly in November and again in December, matters in +dispute between Governor Dobbs and the representatives of the +people made impossible the passage of a proposed aid bill, +providing for five hundred men to cooperate with Virginia and +South Carolina. Nevertheless volunteers in large numbers +patriotically marched from North Carolina to Charleston and the +Congaree (December, 1760, to April, 1761), to enlist in the +famous regiment being organized by Colonel Thomas Middleton. On +March 31, 1761, Governor Dobbs called together the Assembly to +act upon a letter received from General Amherst, outlining a more +vigorous plan of campaign appropriate to the succession of a +young and vigorous sovereign, George III. An aid bill was passed, +providing twenty thousand pounds for men and supplies; and one +regiment of five companies of one hundred men each, under the +command of Colonel Hugh Waddell, was mustered into service for +seven months' duty, beginning May 1, 1761. +</P> + +<P> +On July 7, 1761, Colonel James Grant, detached from the main army +in command of a force of twenty-six hundred men, took up his +march from Fort Prince George. Attacked on June 10th two miles +south of the spot where Montgomerie was engaged the preceding +year, Grant's army, after a vigorous engagement lasting several +hours, drove off the Indians. The army then proceeded at leisure +to lay waste the fifteen towns of the Middle Settlements; and, +after this work of systematic devastation was over, returned to +Fort Prince George. Peace was concluded in September as the +result of this campaign; and in consequence the frontier was +pushed seventy miles farther to the west. +</P> + +<P> +Meantime, Colonel Waddell with his force of five hundred North +Carolinians had acted in concert with Colonel William Byrd, +commanding the Virginia detachment. The combined forces went into +camp at Captain Samuel Stalnaker's old place on the Middle Fork +of Holston. Because of his deliberately dilatory policy, Byrd was +superseded in the command by Colonel Adam Stephen. Marching their +forces to the Long Island of Holston, Stephen and Waddell erected +there Fort Robinson, in compliance with the instructions of +Governor Fauquier, of Virginia. The Cherokees, heartily tired of +the war, now sued for peace, which was concluded, independent of +the treaty at Charleston, on November 19, 1761. +</P> + +<P> +The successful termination of this campaign had an effect of +signal importance in the development of the expansionist spirit. +The rich and beautiful lands which fell under the eye of the +North Carolina and Virginia pioneers under Waddell, Byrd, and +Stephen, lured them irresistibly on to wider casts for fortune +and bolder explorations into the unknown, beckoning West. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII. The Land Companies +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +It was thought good policy to settle those lands as fast as +possible, and that the granting them to men of the first +consequence who were likeliest and best able to procure large +bodies of people to settle on them was the most probable means of +effecting the end proposed.—Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia +to the Earl of Hillsborough: 1770. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Although for several decades the Virginia traders had been +passing over the Great Trading Path to the towns of the Cherokees +and the Catawbas, it was not until the early years of the +eighteenth century that Virginians of imaginative vision directed +their eyes to the westward, intent upon crossing the mountains +and locating settlements as a firm barrier against the +imperialistic designs of France. Acting upon his oft-expressed +conviction that once the English settlers had established +themselves at the source of the James River "it would not be in +the power of the French to dislodge them," Governor Alexander +Spotswood in 1716, animated with the spirit of the pioneer, led +an expedition of fifty men and a train of pack-horses to the +mountains, arduously ascended to the summit of the Blue Ridge, +and claimed the country by right of discovery in behalf of his +sovereign. In the journal of John Fontaine this vivacious account +is given of the historic episode: "I graved my name on a tree by +the river side; and the Governor buried a bottle with a paper +enclosed on which he writ that he took possession of this place +in the name and for King George the First of England. We had a +good dinner, and after it we got the men together and loaded all +their arms and we drank the King's health in Burgundy and fired a +volley, and all the rest of the Royal Family in claret and a +volley. We drank the Governor's health and fired another volley." +</P> + +<P> +By this jovial picnic, which the governor afterward commemorated +by presenting to each of the gentlemen who accompanied him a +golden horseshoe, inscribed with the legend, Sic juvat +transcendere montes, Alexander Spotswood anticipated by a third +of a century the more ambitious expedition on behalf of France by +Celoron de Bienville (see Chapter III), and gave a memorable +object-lesson in the true spirit of westward expansion. During +the ensuing years it began to dawn upon the minds of men of the +stamp of William Byrd and Joshua Gee that there was imperative +need for the establishment of a chain of settlements in the +trans-Alleghany, a great human wall to withstand the advancing +wave of French influence and occupation. By the fifth decade of +the century, as we have seen, the Virginia settlers, with their +squatter's claims and tomahawk rights, had pushed on to the +mountains; and great pressure was brought to bear upon the +council to issue grants for vast tracts of land in the uncharted +wilderness of the interior. +</P> + +<P> +At this period the English ministry adopted the aggressive policy +already mentioned in connection with the French and Indian war, +indicative of a determination to contest with France the right to +occupy the interior of the continent. This policy had been +inaugurated by Virginia with the express purpose of stimulating +the adoption of a similar policy by North Carolina and +Pennsylvania. Two land companies, organized almost +simultaneously, actively promoted the preliminaries necessary to +settlement, despatching parties under expert leadership to +discover the passes through the mountains and to locate the best +land in the trans-Alleghany. +</P> + +<P> +In June, 1749, a great corporation, the Loyal Land Company of +Virginia, received a grant of eight hundred thousand acres above +the North Carolina line and west of the mountains. Dr. Thomas +Walker, an expert surveyor, who in company with several other +gentlemen had made a tour of exploration through eastern +Tennessee and the Holston region in 1748, was chosen as the agent +of this company. Starting from his home in Albemarle County, +Virginia, March 6, 1750, accompanied by five stalwart pioneers, +Walker made a tour of exploration to the westward, being absent +four months and one week. On this journey, which carried the +party as far west as the Rockcastle River (May 11th) and as far +north as the present Paintsville, Kentucky, they named many +natural objects, such as mountains and rivers, after members of +the party. Their two principal achievements were the erection of +the first house built by white men between the Cumberland +Mountains and the Ohio River a feat, however, which led to no +important developments; and the discovery of the wonderful gap in +the Alleghanies to which Walker gave the name Cumberland, in +honor of the ruthless conqueror at Culloden, the "bloody duke." +</P> + +<P> +In 1748 the Ohio Company was organized by Colonel Thomas Lee, +president of the Virginia council, and twelve other gentlemen, of +Virginia and Maryland. In their petition for five hundred +thousand acres, one of the declared objects of the company was +"to anticipate the French by taking possession of that country +southward of the Lakes to which the French had no right...." +By the royal order of May 19, 1749, the company was awarded two +hundred thousand acres, free of quit-rent for ten years; and the +promise was made of an additional award of the remainder +petitioned for, on condition of seating a hundred families upon +the original grant and the building and maintaining of a fort. +Christopher Gist, summoned from his remote home on the Yadkin in +North Carolina, was instructed "to search out and discover the +Lands upon the river Ohio & other adjoining branches of the +Mississippi down as low as the great Falls thereof." In this +journey, which began at Colonel Thomas Cresap's, in Maryland, in +October, 1750, and ended at Gist's home on May 18, 1751, Gist +visited the Lower Shawnee Town and the Lower Blue Licks, ascended +Pilot Knob almost two decades before Find lay and Boone, from the +same eminence, "saw with pleasure the beautiful level of +Kentucky," intersected Walker's route at two points, and crossed +Cumberland Mountain at Pound Gap on the return journey. This was +a far more extended journey than Walker's, enabling Gist to +explore the fertile valleys of the Muskingum, Scioto, and Miami +rivers and to gain a view of the beautiful meadows of Kentucky. +</P> + +<P> +It is eminently significant of the spirit of the age, which was +inaugurating an era of land hunger unparalleled in American +history, that the first authentic records of the trans-Alleghany +were made by surveyors who visited the country as the agents of +great land companies. The outbreak of the French and Indian War +so soon afterward delayed for a decade and more any important +colonization of the West. Indeed, the explorations and findings +of Walker and Gist were almost unknown, even to the companies +they represented. But the conclusion of peace in 1763, which gave +all the region between the mountains and the Mississippi to the +British, heralded the true beginning of the westward expansionist +movement in the Old Southwest, and inaugurated the constructive +leadership of North Carolina in f he occupation and colonization +of the imperial domain of Kentucky and the Ohio Valley. +</P> + +<P> +In the middle years of the century many families of Virginia +gentry removed to the back country of North Carolina in the +fertile region ranging from Williamsborough on the east to +Hillsborough on the west. There soon arose in this section of the +colony a society marked by intellectual distinction, social +graces, and the leisured dignity of the landlord and the large +planter. So conspicuous for means, intellect, culture, and +refinement were the people of this group, having "abundance of +wealth and leisure for enjoyment," that Governor Josiah Martin, +in passing through this region some years later, significantly +observes: "They have great preeminence, as well with respect to +soil and cultivation, as to the manners and condition of the +inhabitants, in which last respect the difference is so great +that one would be led to think them people of another region." +This new wealthy class which was now turning its gaze toward the +unoccupied lands along the frontier was "dominated by the +democratic ideals of pioneers rather than by the aristocratic +tendencies of slave-holding planters." From the cross-fertilization +of the ideas of two social groups—this back-country +gentry, of innate qualities of leadership, democratic +instincts, economic independence, and expansive tendencies, and +the primitive pioneer society of the frontier, frugal in taste, +responsive to leadership, bold, ready, and thorough in +execution—there evolved the militant American expansion in the Old +Southwest. +</P> + +<P> +A conspicuous figure in this society of Virginia emigrants was a +young man named Richard Henderson, whose father had removed with +his family from Hanover County, Virginia, to Bute, afterward +Granville County, North Carolina, in 1742. Educated at home by a +private tutor, he began his career as assistant of his father, +Samuel Henderson, the High Sheriff of Granville County; and after +receiving a law-license, quickly acquired an extensive practice. +"Even in the superior courts where oratory and eloquence are as +brilliant and powerful as in Westminster hall," records an +English acquaintance, "he soon became distinguished and eminent, +and his superior genius shone forth with great splendour, and +universal applause." This young attorney, wedded to the daughter +of an Irish lord, often visited Salisbury on his legal circuit; +and here he became well acquainted with Squire Boone, one of the +"Worshipfull Justices," and often appeared in suits before him. +By his son, the nomadic Daniel Boone, conspicuous already for his +solitary wanderings across the dark green mountains to the +sun-lit valleys and boundless hunting-grounds beyond, Henderson +was from time to time regaled with bizarre and fascinating tales +of western exploration; and Boone, in his dark hour of poverty +and distress, when he was heavily involved financially, turned +for aid to this friend and his partner, who composed the law-firm +of Williams and Henderson. +</P> + +<P> +Boone's vivid descriptions of the paradise of the West stimulated +Henderson's imaginative mind and attracted his attention to the +rich possibilities of unoccupied lands there. While the Board of +Trade in drafting the royal proclamation of October 7, 1763, +forbade the granting of lands in the vast interior, which was +specifically reserved to the Indians, it was clearly not their +intention to set permanent western limits to the colonies. The +prevailing opinion among the shrewdest men of the period was well +expressed by George Washington, who wrote his agent for +preempting western lands: "I can never look upon that +proclamation in any other light (but I say this between +ourselves) than as a temporary expedient to quiet the minds of +the Indians." And again in 1767: "It (the proclamation of 1763) +must fall, of course, in a few years, especially when those +Indians consent to our occupying the lands. Any person, +therefore, who neglects the present opportunity of hunting out +good lands, and in some measure marking out and distinguishing +them for his own, in order to keep others from settling them, +will never regain it." Washington had added greatly to his +holdings of bounty lands in the West by purchasing at trivial +prices the claims of many of the officers and soldiers. Three +years later we find him surveying extensive tracts along the Ohio +and the Great Kanawha, and, with the vision of the expansionist, +making large plans for the establishment of a colony to be seated +upon his own lands. Henderson, too, recognized the importance of +the great country west of the Appalachians. He agreed with the +opinion of Benjamin Franklin, who in 1756 called it "one of the +finest in North America for the extreme richness and fertility of +the land, the healthy temperature of the air and the mildness of +the climate, the plenty of hunting, fishing and fowling, the +facility of trade with the Indians and the vast convenience of +inland navigation or water carriage." Henderson therefore +proceeded to organize a land company for the purpose of acquiring +and colonizing a large domain in the West. This partnership, +which was entitled Richard Henderson and Company, was composed of +a few associates, including Richard Henderson, his uncle and +law-partner, John Williams, and, in all probability, their close +friends Thomas and Nathaniel Hart of Orange County, North +Carolina, immigrants from Hanover County, Virginia. +</P> + +<P> +Seizing the opportunity presented just after the conclusion of +peace, the company engaged Daniel Boone as scout and surveyor. He +was instructed, while hunting and trapping on his own account, to +examine, with respect to their location and fertility, the lands +which he visited, and to report his findings upon his return. The +secret expedition must have been transacted with commendable +circumspection; for although in after years it became common +knowledge among his friends that he had acted as the company's +agent, Boone himself consistently refrained from betraying the +confidence of his employers. Upon a similar mission, Gist had +carefully concealed from the suspicious Indians the fact that he +carried a compass, which they wittily termed "land stealer"; and +Washington likewise imposed secrecy upon his land agent Crawford, +insisting that the operation be carried on under the guise of +hunting game." The discreet Boone, taciturn and given to keeping +his own counsel, in one instance at least deemed it advantageous +to communicate the purpose of his mission to some hunters, well +known to him, in order to secure the results of their information +in regard to the best lands they had encountered in the course of +their hunting expedition. Boone came among the hunters, known as +the "Blevens connection," at one of their Tennessee station camps +on their return from a long hunt in Kentucky, in order, as +expressed in the quaint phraseology of the period, to be +"informed of the geography and locography of these woods, saying +that he was employed to explore them by Henderson & Company." The +acquaintance which Boone on this occasion formed with a member of +the party, Henry Scaggs, the skilled hunter and explorer, was +soon to bear fruit; for shortly afterward Scaggs was employed as +prospector by the same land company. In 1764 Scaggs had passed +through Cumberland Gap and hunted for the season on the +Cumberland; and accordingly the following year, as the agent of +Richard Henderson and Company, he was despatched on an extended +exploration to the lower Cumberland, fixing his station at the +salt lick afterward known as Mansker's Lick. +</P> + +<P> +Richard Henderson thus, it appears, "enlisted the Harts and +others in an enterprise which his own genius planned," says Peck, +the personal acquaintance and biographer of Boone, "and then +encouraged several hunters to explore the country and learn where +the best lands lay." Just why Henderson and his associates did +not act sooner upon the reports brought back by the +hunters—Boone and Scaggs and Callaway, who accompanied Boone in +1764 in the interest of the land company "is not known; but in +all probability the fragmentary nature of these reports, however +glowing and enthusiastic, was sufficient cause for the delay of +five years before the land company, through the agency of Boone +and Findlay, succeeded in having a thorough exploration inside of +the Kentucky region. Delay was also caused by rival claims to the +territory. In the Virginia Gazette of December 1, 1768, Henderson +must have read with astonishment not unmixed with dismay that +"the Six Nations and all their tributaries have granted a vast +extent of country to his majesty, and the Proprietaries of +Pennsylvania, and settled an advantageous boundary line between +their hunting country and this, and the other colonies to the +Southward as far as the Cherokee River, for which they received +the most valuable present in goods and dollars that was ever +given at any conference since the settlement of America." The +news was now bruited about through the colony of North Carolina, +that the Cherokees were hot in their resentment because the +Northern Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees and the +perpetual disputants for the vast Middle Ground of Kentucky, had +received at the Treaty of Fort Stanwix, November 5, 1768, an +immense compensation from the crown for the territory which they, +the Cherokees, claimed from time immemorial. Only three weeks +before, John Stuart, Superintendent for Indian Affairs in the +Southern Department, had negotiated with the Cherokees the Treaty +of Hard Labor, South Carolina (October 14th), by which Governor +Tryon's line of 1767, from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, was +continued direct to Colonel Chiswell's mine, the present +Wytheville, Virginia, and thence in a straight Brie to the mouth +of the Great Kanawha. Thus at the close of the year 1768 the +crown through both royal governor and superintendent of Indian +affairs acknowledged in fair and open treaty the right of the +Cherokees, whose Tennessee villages guarded the gateway, to the +valley lands east of the mountain barrier as well as to the dim +mid-region of Kentucky. In the very act of negotiating the Treaty +of Fort Stanwix, Sir William Johnson privately acknowledged that +possession of the trans-Alleghany could be legally obtained only +by extinguishing the title of the Cherokees. +</P> + +<P> +These conflicting claims soon led to collisions between the +Indians and the company's settlers. In the spring of 1769 +occurred one of those incidents in the westward advance which, +though slight in itself, was to have a definite bearing upon the +course of events in later years. In pursuance of his policy, as +agent of the Loyal Land Company, of promoting settlement upon the +company's lands, Dr. Thomas Walker, who had visited Powell's +Valley the preceding year and come into possession of a very +large tract there, simultaneously made proposals to one party of +men including the Kirtleys, Captain Rucker, and others, and to +another party led by Joseph Martin, trader of Orange County, +Virginia, afterward a striking figure in the Old Southwest. The +fevered race by these bands of eighteenth-century "sooners" for +possession of an early "Cherokee Strip" was won by the latter +band, who at once took possession and began to clear; so that +when the Kirtleys arrived, Martin coolly handed them "a letter +from Dr. Walker that informed them that if we got to the valley +first, we were to have 21,000 acres of land, and they were not to +interfere with us." Martin and his companions were delighted with +the beautiful valley at the base of the Cumberland, quickly "eat +and destroyed 23 deer—15 bears—2 buffaloes and a great quantity +of turkeys," and entertained gentlemen from Virginia and Maryland +who desired to settle more than a hundred families there. The +company reckoned, however, without their hosts, the Cherokees, +who, fortified by the treaty of Hard Labor (1768) which left this +country within the Indian reservation, were determined to drive +Martin and his company out. While hunting on the Cumberland +River, northwest of Cumberland Gap, Martin and his company were +surrounded and disarmed by a party of Cherokees who said they had +orders from Cameron, the royal agent, to rob all white men +hunting on their lands. When Martin and his party arrived at +their station in Powell's Valley, they found it broken up and +their goods stolen by the Indians, which left them no recourse +but to return to the settlements in Virginia. It was not until +six years later that Martin, under the stable influence of the +Transylvania Company, was enabled to return to this spot and +erect there the station which was to play an integral part in the +progress of westward expansion. +</P> + +<P> +Before going on to relate Boone's explorations of Kentucky under +the auspices of the land company, it will be convenient to turn +back for a moment and give some account of other hunters and +explorers who visited that territory between the time of its +discovery by Walker and Gist and the advent of Boone. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII. The Long Hunters in the Twilight Zone +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The long Hunters principally resided in the upper countries of +Virginia & North Carolina on New River & Holston River, and when +they intended to make a long Hunt (as they calls it) they +Collected near the head of Holston near whare Abingdon now +stands....—General William Hall. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Before the coming of Walker and Gist in 1750 and 1751 +respectively, the region now called Kentucky had, as far as we +know, been twice visited by the French, once in 1729 when +Chaussegros de Lery and his party visited the Big Bone Lick, and +again in the summer of 1749 when the Baron de Longueuil with four +hundred and fifty-two Frenchmen and Indians, going to join +Bienville in an expedition against "the Cherickees and other +Indians lying at the back of Carolina and Georgia," doubtless +encamped on the Kentucky shore of the Ohio. Kentucky was also +traversed by John Peter Salling with his three adventurous +companions in their journey through the Middle West in 1742. But +all these early visits, including the memorable expeditions of +Walker and Gist, were so little known to the general public that +when John Filson wrote the history of Kentucky in 1784 he +attributed its discovery to James McBride in 1754. More +influential upon the course of westward expansion was an +adventure which occurred in 1752, the very year in which the +Boones settled down in their Vadkin home. +</P> + +<P> +In the autumn of 1752, a Pennsylvania trader, John Findlay, with +three or four companions, descended the Ohio River in a canoe as +far as the falls at the present Louisville, Kentucky, and +accompanied a party of Shawnees to their town of +Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, eleven miles east of what is now Winchester. +</P> + +<P> +This was the site of the "Indian Old Corn Field," the Iroquois +name for which ("the place of many fields," or "prairie") was +Ken-take, whence came the name of the state. +</P> + +<P> +Five miles east of this spot, where still may be seen a mound and +an ellipse showing the outline of the stockade, is the famous +Pilot Knob, from the summit of which the fields surrounding the +town lie visible in their smooth expanse. During Findlay's stay +at the Indian town other traders from Pennsylvania and Virginia, +who reported that they were "on their return from trading with +the Cuttawas (Catawbas), a nation who live in the Territories of +Carolina," assembled in the vicinity in January, 1753. Here, as +the result of disputes arising from their barter, they were set +upon and captured by a large party of straggling Indians +(Coghnawagas from Montreal) on January 26th; but Findlay and +another trader named James Lowry were so fortunate as to escape +and return through the wilderness to the Pennsylvania +settlements." The incident is of important historic significance; +for it was from these traders, who must have followed the Great +Warriors' Path to the country of the Catawbas, that Findlay +learned of the Ouasioto (Cumberland) Gap traversed by the Indian +path. His reminiscences of this gateway to Kentucky, of the site +of the old Indian town on Lulbegrud Creek, a tributary of the Red +River, and of the Pilot Knobwere sixteen years later to fire +Boone to his great tour of exploration in behalf of the +Transylvania Company. +</P> + +<P> +During the next two decades, largely because of the hostility of +the savage tribes, only a few traders and hunters from the east +ranged through the trans-Alleghany. But in 1761, a party of +hunters led by a rough frontiersman, Elisha Walden, penetrated +into Powell's Valley, followed the Indian trail through +Cumberland Gap, explored the Cumberland River, and finally +reached the Laurel Mountain where, encountering a party of +Indians, they deemed it expedient to return. With Walden went +Henry Scaggs, afterward explorer for the Henderson Land Company, +William Elevens and Charles Cox, the famous Virginia hunters, one +Newman, and some fifteen other stout pioneers. Their itinerary +may be traced from the names given to natural objects in honor of +members of the party—Walden's Mountain and Walden's Creek, +Scaggs' Ridge and Newman's Ridge. Following the peace of 1763, +which made travel in this region moderately safe once more, the +English proceeded to occupy the territory which they had won. In +1765 George Croghan with a small party, on the way to prepare the +inhabitants of the Illinois country for transfer to English +sovereignty, visited the Great Bone Licks of Kentucky (May 30th, +31st); and a year later Captain Harry Gordon, chief engineer in +the Western Department in North America, visited and minutely +described the same licks and the falls. But these, and numerous +other water-journeys and expeditions of which no records were +kept, though interesting enough in themselves, had little bearing +upon the larger phases of westward expansion and colonization. +</P> + +<P> +The decade opening with the year 1765 is the epoch of bold and +ever bolder exploration—the more adventurous frontiersmen of the +border pushing deep into the wilderness in search of game, lured +on by the excitements of the chase and the profit to be derived +from the sale of peltries. In midsummer, 1766, Captain James +Smith, Joshua Horton, Uriah Stone, William Baker, and a young +mulatto slave passed through Cumberland Gap, hunted through the +country south of the Cherokee and along the Cumberland and +Tennessee rivers, and as Smith reports "found no vestige of any +white man." During the same year a party of five hunters from +South Carolina, led by Isaac Lindsey, penetrated the Kentucky +wilderness to the tributary of the Cumberland, named Stone's +River by the former party, for one of their number. Here they +encountered two men, who were among the greatest of the western +pioneers, and were destined to leave their names in historic +association with the early settlement of Kentucky, James Harrod +and Michael Stoner, a German, both of whom had descended the Ohio +from Fort Pitt. With the year 1769 began those longer and more +extended excursions into the interior which were to result in +conveying at last to the outside world graphic and detailed +information concerning "the wonderful new country of Cantucky." +In the late spring of this year Hancock and Richard Taylor (the +latter the father of President Zachary Taylor), Abraham +Hempinstall, and one Barbour, all true-blue frontiersmen, left +their homes in Orange County, Virginia, and hunted extensively in +Kentucky and Arkansas. Two of the party traveled through Georgia +and East and West Florida; while the other two hunted on the +Washita during the winter of 1770-1. Explorations of this type +became increasingly hazardous as the animosity of the Indians +increased; and from this time onward for a number of years almost +all the parties of roving hunters suffered capture or attack by +the crafty red men. In this same year Major John McCulloch, +living on the south branch of the Potomac, set out accompanied by +a white man-servant and a negro, to explore the western country. +While passing down the Ohio from Pittsburgh McCulloch was +captured by the Indians near the mouth of the Wabash and carried +to the present site of Terre Haute, Indiana. Set free after four +or five months, he journeyed in company with some French +voyageurs first to Natchez and then to New Orleans, whence he +made the sea voyage to Philadelphia. Somewhat later, Benjamin +Cleveland (afterward famous in the Revolution), attended by four +companions, set out from his home on the upper Yadkin to explore +the Kentucky wilderness. After passing through Cumberland Gap, +they encountered a band of Cherokees who plundered them of +everything they had, even to their hats and shoes, and ordered +them to leave the Indian hunting-grounds. On their return journey +they almost starved, and Cleveland, who was reluctantly forced to +kill his faithful little hunting-dog, was wont to declare in +after years that it was the sweetest meat he ever ate. +</P> + +<P> +Fired to adventure by the glowing accounts brought back by Uriah +Stone, a much more formidable band than any that had hitherto +ventured westward—including Uriah Stone as pilot, Gasper +Mansker, John Rains, Isaac Bledsoe, and a dozen others—assembled +in June, 1769, in the New River region. "Each Man carried two +horses," says an early pioneer in describing one of these +parties, "traps, a large supply of powder and led, and a small +hand vise and bellows, files and screw plate for the purpose of +fixing the guns if any of them should get out of fix." Passing +through Cumberland Gap, they continued their long journey until +they reached Price's Meadow, in the present Wayne County, +Kentucky, where they established their encampment. In the course +of their explorations, during which they gave various names to +prominent natural features, they established their "station camp" +on a creek in Sumner County, Tennessee, whence originated the +name of Station Camp Creek. Isaac Bledsoe and Gasper Mansker, +agreeing to travel from here in opposite directions along a +buffalo trace passing near the camp, each succeeded in +discovering the famous salt-lick which bears his name—namely +Bledsoe's Lick and Mansker's Lick. The flat surrounding the lick, +about one hundred acres in extent, discovered by Bledsoe, +according to his own statement "was principally Covered with +buffelows in every direction—not hundreds but thousands." As he +sat on his horse, he shot down two deer in the lick; but the +buffaloes blindly trod them in the mud. They did not mind him and +his horse except when the wind blew the scent in their nostrils, +when they would break and run in droves. Indians often lurked in +the neighbourhood of these hunters—plundering their camp, +robbing them, and even shooting down one of their number, Robert +Crockett, from ambush. After many trials and vicissitudes, which +included a journey to the Spanish Natchez and the loss of a great +mass of peltries when they were plundered by Piomingo and a war +party of Chickasaws, they finilly reached home in the late spring +of 1770." +</P> + +<P> +The most notable expedition of this period, projected under the +auspices of two bold leaders extraordinarily skilled in +woodcraft, Joseph Drake and Henry Scaggs, was organized in the +early autumn of 1770. This imposing band of stalwart hunters from +the New River and Holston country, some forty in number, garbed +in hunting shirts, leggings, and moccasins, with three +pack-horses to each man, rifles, ammunition, traps, dogs, +blankets, and salt, pushed boldly through Cumberland Gap into the +heart of what was later justly named the "Dark and Bloody Ground" +(see Chapter XIV)—"not doubting," says an old border chronicler, +"that they were to be encountered by Indians, and to subsist on +game." From the duration of their absence from home, they +received the name of the Long Hunters—the romantic appellation +by which they are known in the pioneer history of the Old +Southwest. Many natural objects were named by this party—in +particular Dick's River, after the noted Cherokee hunter, Captain +Dick, who, pleased to be recognized by Charles Scaggs, told the +Long Hunters that on HIS river, pointing it out, they would find +meat plenty—adding with laconic signifigance: "Kill it and go +home." From the Knob Lick, in Lincoln County, as reported by a +member of the party, "they beheld largely over a thousand +animals, including buffaloe, elk, bear, and deer, with many wild +turkies scattered among them; all quite restless, some playing, +and others busily employed in licking the earth.... The +buffaloe and other animals had so eaten away the soil, that they +could, in places, go entirely underground." Upon the return of a +detachment to Virginia, fourteen fearless hunters chose to +remain; and one day, during the absence of some of the band upon +a long exploring trip, the camp was attacked by a straggling +party of Indians under Will Emery, a halfbreed Cherokee. Two of +the hunters were carried into captivity and never heard of again; +a third managed to escape. In embittered commemoration of the +plunder of the camp and the destruction of the peltries, they +inscribed upon a poplar, which had lost its bark, this emphatic +record, followed by their names: +</P> + +<P> +2300 Deer Skins lost Ruination by God +</P> + +<P> +Undismayed by this depressing stroke of fortune, they continued +their hunt in the direction of the lick which Bledsoe had +discovered the preceding year. Shortly after this discovery, a +French voyageur from the Illinois who had hunted and traded in +this region for a decade, Timothe de Monbreun, subsequently +famous in the history of Tennessee, had visited the lick and +killed an enormous number of buffaloes for their tallow and +tongues with which he and his companion loaded a keel boat and +descended the Cumberland. An early pioneer, William Hall, learned +from Isaac Bledsoe that when "the long hunters Crossed the ridge +and came down on Bledsoe's Creek in four or five miles of the +Lick the Cane had grown up so thick in the woods that they +thought they had mistaken the place until they Came to the Lick +and saw what had been done.... One could walk for several +hundred yards a round the Lick and in the lick on buffellows +Skuls, & bones and the whole flat round the Lick was bleached +with buffellows bones, and they found out the Cause of the Canes +growing up so suddenly a few miles around the Lick which was in +Consequence of so many buffellows being killed." +</P> + +<P> +This expedition was of genuine importance, opening the eyes of +the frontiersmen to the charms of the country and influencing +many to settle subsequently in the West, some in Tennessee, some +in Kentucky. The elaborate and detailed information brought back +by Henry Scaggs exerted an appreciable influence, no doubt, in +accelerating the plans of Richard Henderson and Company for the +acquisition and colonization of the trans-Alleghany. But while +the "Long Hunters" were in Tennessee and Kentucky the same region +was being more extensively and systematically explored by Daniel +Boone. To his life, character, and attainments, as the typical +"long hunter" and the most influential pioneer we may now turn +our particular attention. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX. Daniel Boone and Wilderness Exploration +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Here, where the hand of violence shed the blood of the innocent; +where the horrid yells of the savages, and the groans of the +distressed, sounded in our ears, we now hear the praises and +adorations of our Creator; where wretched wigwams stood, the +miserable abodes of savages, we behold the foundations of cities +laid, that, in all probability, will equal the glory of the +greatest upon earth.—Daniel Boone, 1781. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The wandering life of a border Nimrod in a surpassingly beautiful +country teeming with game was the ideal of the frontiersman of +the eighteenth century. AS early as 1728, while running the +dividing line between North Carolina and Virginia, William Byrd +encountered along the North Carolina frontier the typical figure +of the professional hunter: "a famous Woodsman, call'd +Epaphroditus Bainton. This Forester Spends all his time in +ranging the Woods, and is said to make great Havock among the +Deer, and other Inhabitants of the Forest, not much wilder than +himself." By the middle of the century, as he was threading his +way through the Carolina piedmont zone, the hunter's paradise of +the Yadkin and Catawba country, Bishop Spangenberg found ranging +there many hunters, living like Indians, who killed thousands of +deer each year and sold the skins in the local markets or to the +fur-traders from Virginia whose heavy pack-trains with their +tinkling bells constantly traversed the course of the Great +Trading Path. The superlative skill of one of these hunters, both +as woodsman and marksman, was proverbial along the border. The +name of Daniel Boone became synonymous with expert huntsmanship +and almost uncanny wisdom in forest lore. The bottoms of the +creek near the Boone home, three miles west of present +Mocksville, contained a heavy growth of beech, which dropped +large quantities of its rich nuts or mast, greatly relished by +bears; and this creek received its name, Bear Creek, because +Daniel and his father killed in its rich bottoms ninety-nine +bears in a single hunting-season. After living for a time with +his young wife, Rebecca Bryan, in a cabin in his father's yard, +Daniel built a home of his own upon a tract of land, purchased +from his father on October 12, 1759, and lying on Sugar Tree, a +tributary of Dutchman's Creek. Here he dwelt for the next five +years, with the exception of the period of his temporary removal +to Virginia during the terrible era of the Indian war. Most of +his time during the autumn and winter, when he was not engaged in +wagoning or farming, he spent in long hunting-journeys into the +mountains to the west and northwest. During the hunting-season of +1760 he struck deeper than ever before into the western mountain +region and encamped in a natural rocky shelter amidst fine +hunting-grounds, in what is now Washington County in east +Tennessee. Of the scores of inscriptions commemorative of his +hunting-feats, which Boone with pardonable pride was accustomed +throughout his life time to engrave with his hunting-knife upon +trees and rocks, the earliest known is found upon a leaning beech +tree, only recently fallen, near his camp and the creek which +since that day has borne his name. This is a characteristic and +enduring record in the history of American exploration +</P> + +<PRE> + D. Boon + CillED A. BAR On + Tree + in The + yEAR + 1760 +</PRE> + +<P> +Late in the summer of the following year Boone marched under the +command of the noted Indian-fighter of the border, Colonel Hugh +Waddell, in his campaign against the Cherokees. From the lips of +Waddell, who was outspoken in his condemnation of Byrd's futile +delays in road-cutting and fort-building, Boone learned the true +secret of success in Indian warfare, which was lost upon +Braddock, Forbes, and later St. Clair: that the art of defeating +red men was to deal them a sudden and unexpected blow, before +they had time either to learn the strength of the force employed +against them or to lay with subtle craft their artful ambuscade. +</P> + +<P> +In the late autumn of 1761, Daniel Boone and Nathaniel Gist, the +son of Washington's famous guide, who were both serving under +Waddell, temporarily detached themselves from his command and led +a small party on a "long hunt" in the Valley of the Holston, +While encamping near the site of Black's Fort, subsequently +built, they were violently assailed by a pack of fierce wolves +which they had considerable difficulty in beating off; and from +this incident the locality became known as Wolf Hills (now +Abingdon, Virginia). +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +From this time forward Boone's roving instincts had full sway. +For many months each year he threaded his way through that +marvelously beautiful country of western North Carolina +felicitously described as the Switzerland of America. Boone's +love of solitude and the murmuring forest was surely inspired by +the phenomenal beauties of the country' through which he roamed +at will. Blowing Rock on one arm of a great horseshoe of +mountains and Tryon Mountain upon the other arm, overlooked an +enormous, primeval bowl, studded by a thousand emerald-clad +eminences. There was the Pilot Mountain, the towering and +isolated pile which from time immemorial had served the +aborigines as a guide in their forest wanderings; there was the +dizzy height of the Roan on the border; there was Mt. Mitchell, +portentous in its grandeur, the tallest peak on the continent +east of the Rockies; and there was the Grandfather, the oldest +mountain on earth according to geologists, of which it has been +written: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oldest of all terrestrial things—still holding<BR> +Thy wrinkled forehead high;<BR> +Whose every scam, earth's history enfolding,<BR> +Grim science doth defy!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thou caught'st the far faint ray from Sirius rising,<BR> +When through space first was hurled<BR> +The primal gloom of ancient voids surprising,<BR> +This atom, called the World!<BR> +</P> + +<P> +What more gratifying to the eye of the wanderer than the +luxuriant vegetation and lavish profusion of the gorgeous flowers +upon the mountain slopes, radiant rhododendron, rosebay, and +laurel, and the azalea rising like flame; or the rare beauties of +the water—the cataract of Linville, taking its shimmering leap +into the gorge, and that romantic river poetically celebrated in +the lines: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Swannanoa, nymph of beauty,<BR> +I would woo thee in my rhyme,<BR> +Wildest, brightest, loveliest river<BR> +Of our sunny Southern clime.<BR> + * * *<BR> +Gone forever from the borders<BR> +But immortal in thy name,<BR> +Are the Red Men of the forest<BR> +Be thou keeper of their fame!<BR> +Paler races dwell beside thee,<BR> +Celt and Saxon till thy lands<BR> +Wedding use unto thy beauty<BR> +Linking over thee their hands.<BR> +</P> + +<P> +The long rambling excursions which Boone made through western +North Carolina and eastern Tennessee enabled him to explore every +nook and corner of the rugged and beautiful mountain region. +Among the companions and contemporaries with whom he hunted and +explored the country were his little son James and his brother +Jesse; the Linville who gave the name to the beautiful falls; +Julius Caesar Dugger, whose rock house stood near the head of Elk +Creek; and Nathaniel Gist, who described for him the lofty +gateway to Kentucky, through which Christopher Gist had passed in +1751. Boone had already heard of this gateway, from Findlay, and +it was one of the secret and cherished ambitions of his life to +scale the mountain wall of the Appalachians and to reach that +high portal of the Cumberland which beckoned to the mysterious +new Eden beyond. Although hunting was an endless delight to Boone +he was haunted in the midst of this pleasure, as was Kipling's +Explorer, by the lure of the undiscovered: +</P> + +<P> +Till a voice as bad as conscience, rang interminable changes +On one everlasting whisper day and night repeated—so: +'Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the +ranges—'Something lost behind the ranges. Lost and waiting for you. Go.' +</P> + +<P> +Of Boone's preliminary explorations for the land company known as +Richard Henderson and Company, an account has already been given; +and the delay in following them up has been touched on and in +part explained. Meanwhile Boone transferred his efforts for a +time to another field. Toward the close of the summer of 1765 a +party consisting of Major John Field, William Hill, one +Slaughter, and two others, all from Culpeper County, Virginia, +visited Boone and induced him to accompany them on the "long +Journey" to Florida, whither they were attracted by the liberal +offer of Colonel James Grant, governor of the eastern section, +the Florida of to-day. On this long and arduous expedition they +suffered many hardships and endured many privations, found little +game, and on one occasion narrowly escaped starvation. They +explored Florida from St. Augustine to Pensacola; and Boone, who +relished fresh scenes and a new environment, purchased a house +and lot in Pensacola in anticipation of removal thither. But upon +his return home, finding his wife unwilling to go, Boone once +more turned his eager eye toward the West, that mysterious and +alluring region beyond the great range, the fabled paradise of +Kentucky. +</P> + +<P> +The following year four young men from the Yadkin, Benjamin +Cutbird, John Stewart (Boone's brother-in-law who afterwards +accompanied him to Kentucky), John Baker, and James Ward made a +remarkable journey to the westward, crossing the Appalachian +mountain chain over some unknown route, and finally reaching the +Mississippi. The significance of the journey, in its bearing upon +westward expansion, inheres in the fact that while for more than +half a century the English traders from South Carolina had been +winning their way to the Mississippi along the lower routes and +Indian trails, this was the first party from either of the +Carolinas, as far as is known, that ever reached the Mississippi +by crossing the great mountain barrier. When Cutbird, a superb +woodsman and veritable Leather stocking, narrated to Boone the +story of his adventures, it only confirmed Boone in his +determination to find the passage through the mountain chain +leading to the Mesopotamia of Kentucky. +</P> + +<P> +Such an enterprise was attended by terrible dangers. During 1766 +and 1767 the steady encroachments of the white settlers upon the +ancestral domain which the Indians reserved for their imperial +hunting-preserve aroused bitter feelings of resentment among the +red men. Bloody reprisal was often the sequel to such +encroachment. The vast region of Tennessee and the +trans-Alleghany was a twilight zone, through which the savages +roamed at will. From time to time war parties of northern +Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees, scouted through +this no-man's land and even penetrated into the western region of +North Carolina, committing murders and depredations upon the +Cherokees and the whites indiscriminately. During the summer of +1766, while Boone's friend and close connection, Captain William +Linville, his son John, and another young man, named John +Williams, were in camp some ten miles below Linville Falls, they +were unexpectedly fired upon by a hostile band of Northern +Indians, and before they had time to fire a shot, a second volley +killed both the Linvilles and severely wounded Williams, who +after extraordinary sufferings finally reached the settlements." +In May, 1767, four traders and a half-breed child of one of them +were killed in the Cherokee country. In the summer of this year +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina laid out the boundary +line of the Cherokees, and upon his return issued a proclamation +forbidding any purchase of land from the Indians and any issuance +of grants for land within one mile of the boundary line. Despite +this wise precaution, seven North Carolina hunters who during the +following September had lawlessly ventured into the mountain +region some sixty miles beyond the boundary were fired upon, and +several of them killed, by the resentful Cherokees Undismayed by +these signs of impending danger, undeterred even by the tragic +fate of the Linvilles, Daniel Boone, with the determination of +the indomitable pioneer, never dreamed of relinquishing his +long-cherished design. Discouraged by the steady disappearance of +game under the ruthless attack of innumerable hunters, Boone +continued to direct his thoughts toward the project of exploring +the fair region of Kentucky. The adventurous William Hill, to +whom Boone communicated his purpose, readily consented to go with +him; and in the autumn of 1768 Boone and Hill, accompanied, it is +believed, by Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, set forth upon their +almost inconceivably hazardous expedition. They crossed the Blue +Ridge and the Alleghanies, the Holston and Clinch rivers near +their sources, and finally reached the head waters of the West +Fork of the Big Sand. Surmising from its course that this stream +must flow into the Ohio, they pushed on a hundred miles to the +westward and finally, by following a buffalo path, reached a +salt-spring in what is now Floyd County, in the extreme eastern +section of Kentucky. Here Boone beheld great droves of buffalo +that visited the salt-spring to drink the water or lick the +brackish soil. After spending the winter in hunting and trapping, +the Boones and Hill, discouraged by the forbidding aspect of the +hill-country which with its dense growth of laurel was +exceedingly difficult to penetrate, abandoned all hope of finding +Kentucky by this route and wended their arduous way back to the +Yadkin. +</P> + +<P> +The account of Boone's subsequent accomplishment of his purpose +must be postponed to the next chapter. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X. Daniel Boone in Kentucky +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +He felt very much as Columbus did, gazing from his caravel on San +Salvador; as Cortes, looking down, from the crest of Ahualco, on +the Valley of Mexico; or Vasco Nunez, standing alone on the peak +of Darien, and stretching his eyes over the hitherto undiscovered +waters of the Pacific.—-William Gilmore Simms: Views and +Reviews. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +A chance acquaintance formed by Daniel Boone, during the French +and Indian War, with the Irish lover of adventure, John Findlay, +was the origin of Boone's cherished longing to reach the El +Dorado of the West. In this slight incident we may discern the +initial inspiration for the epochal movement of westward +expansion. Findlay was a trader and horse peddler, who had early +migrated to Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He had been licensed a trader +with the Indians in 1747. During the same year he was married to +Elizabeth Harris, daughter of John Harris, the Indian-trader at +Harris's Ferry on the Susquehanna River, after whom Harrisburg +was named. During the next eight years Findlay carried on his +business of trading in the interior. Upon the opening of the +French and Indian War he was probably among "the young men about +Paxtang who enlisted immediately," and served as a waggoner in +Braddock's expedition. Over the campfires, during the ensuing +campaign in 1765, young Boone was an eager listener to Findlay's +stirring narrative of his adventures in the Ohio Valley and on +the wonderfully beautiful levels of Kentucky in 1752. The fancies +aroused in his brooding mind by Findlay's moving recital and his +description of an ancient passage through the Ouasioto or +Cumberland Gap and along the course of the Warrior's Path, +inspired him with an irrepressible longing to reach that alluring +promised land which was the perfect realization of the hunter's +paradise. +</P> + +<P> +Thirteen years later, while engaged in selling pins, needles, +thread, and Irish linens in the Yadkin country, Findlay learned +from the Pennsylvania settlers at Salisbury or at the Forks of +the Yadkin of Boone's removal to the waters of the upper Yadkin. +At Boone's rustic home, in the winter of 1768-9, Findlay visited +his old comrade-in-arms of Braddock's campaign. On learning of +Boone's failure during the preceding year to reach the Kentucky +levels by way of the inhospitable Sandy region, Findlay again +described to him the route through the Ouasioto Gap traversed +sixteen years before by Pennsylvania traders in their traffic +with the Catawbas. Boone, as we have seen, knew that Christopher +Gist, who had formerly lived near him on the upper Yadkin, had +found some passage through the lofty mountain defiles; but he had +never been able to discover the passage. Findlay's renewed +descriptions of the immense herds of buffaloes he had seen in +Kentucky, the great salt-licks where they congregated, the +abundance of bears, deer, and elk with which the country teemed, +the innumerable flocks of wild turkeys, geese, and ducks, aroused +in Boone the hunter's passion for the chase; while the beauty of +the lands, as mirrored in the vivid fancy of the Irishman, +inspired him with a new longing to explore the famous country +which had, as John Filson records, "greatly engaged Mr. Findlay's +attention." +</P> + +<P> +In the comprehensive designs of Henderson, now a judge, for +securing a "graphic report of the trans-Alleghany region in +behalf of his land company", Boone divined the means of securing +the financial backing for an expedition of considerable size and +ample equipment. In numerous suits for debt, aggregating hundreds +of dollars, which had been instituted against Boone by some of +the leading citizens of Rowan, Williams and Henderson had acted +as Boone's attorneys. In order to collect their legal fees, they +likewise brought suit against Boone; but not wishing to press the +action against the kindly scout who had hitherto acted as their +agent in western exploration, they continued the litigation from +court to court, in lieu of certain "conditions performed" on +behalf of Boone, during his unbroken absence, by his attorney in +this suit, Alexander Martin. Summoned to appear in 1769 at the +March term of court at Salisbury, Boone seized upon the occasion +to lay before Judge Henderson the designs for a renewed and +extended exploration of Kentucky suggested by the golden +opportunity of securing the services of Findlay as guide. Shortly +after March 6th, when Judge Henderson reached Salisbury, the +conference, doubtless attended by John Stewart, Boone's +brother-in-law, John Findlay, and Boone, who were all present at +this term of court, must have been held, for the purpose of +devising ways and means for the expedition. Peck, the only +reliable contemporary biographer of the pioneer, who derived many +facts from Boone himself and his intimate acquaintances, draws +the conclusion (1847): "Daniel Boone was engaged as the master +spirit of this exploration, because in his judgment and fidelity +entire confidence could be reposed.... He was known to +Henderson and encouraged by him to make the exploration, and to +examine particularly the whole country south of the Kentucky—or +as then called the Louisa River." As confidential agent of the +land company, Boone carried with him letters and instructions for +his guidance upon this extended tour of exploration." +</P> + +<P> +On May 1, 1769, with Findlay as guide, and accompanied by four of +his neighbors, John Stewart, a skilled woodsman, Joseph Holden, +James Mooney, and William Cooley, Boone left his "peaceable +habitation" on the upper Yadkin and began his historic journey +"in quest of the country of Kentucky." Already heavily burdened +with debts, Boone must have incurred considerable further +financial obligations to Judge Henderson and Colonel Williams, +acting for the land company, in order to obtain the large amount +of supplies requisite for so prolonged an expedition. Each of the +adventurers rode a good horse of strength and endurance; and +behind him were securely strapped the blanket, ammunition, salt, +and cooking-utensils so indispensable for a long sojourn in the +wilderness. In Powell's Valley they doubtless encountered the +party led thither by Joseph Martin (see Chapter VII), and there +fell into the "Hunter's Trail" commented on in a letter written +by Martin only a fortnight before the passing of Boone's +cavalcade. Crossing the mountain at the Ouasioto Gap, they made +their first "station camp" in Kentucky on the creek, still named +after that circumstance, on the Red Lick Fork. After a +preliminary journey for the purpose of locating the spot, Findlay +led the party to his old trading-camp at Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, +where then (June 7, 1769) remained but charred embers of the +Indian huts, with some of the stockading and the gate-posts still +standing. In Boone's own words, he and Findlay at once "proceeded +to take a more thorough survey of the country;" and during the +autumn and early winter, encountering on every hand apparently +inexhaustible stocks of wild game and noting the ever-changing +beauties of the country, the various members of the party made +many hunting and exploring journeys from their "station camp" as +base. On December 22, 1769, while engaged in a hunt, Boone and +Stewart were surprised and captured by a large party of +Shawanoes, led by Captain Will, who were returning from the +autumn hunt on Green River to their villages north of the Ohio. +Boone and Stewart were forced to pilot the Indians to their main +camp, where the savages, after robbing them of all their peltries +and supplies and leaving them inferior guns and little +ammunition, set off to the northward. They left, on parting, this +menacing admonition to the white intruders: "Now, brothers, go +home and stay there. Don't come here any more, for this is the +Indians' hunting-ground, and all the animals, skins, and furs are +ours. If you are so foolish as to venture here again, you may be +sure the wasps and yellow jackets will sting you severely." +</P> + +<P> +Chagrined particularly by the loss of the horses, Boone and +Stewart for two days pursued the Indians in hot haste. Finally +approaching the Indians' camp by stealth in the dead of night, +they secured two of the horses, upon which they fled at top +speed. In turn they were immediately pursued by a detachment of +the Indians, mounted upon their fleetest horses; and suffered the +humiliation of recapture two days later. Indulging in wild +hilarity over the capture of the crestfallen whites, the Indians +took a bell from one of the horses and, fastening it about +Boone's neck, compelled him under the threat of brandished +tomahawks to caper about and jingle the bell, jeering at him the +while with the derisive query, uttered in broken English: "Steal +horse, eh?" With as good grace as they could summon—wry smiles +at best—Boone and Stewart patiently endured these humiliations, +following the Indians as captives. Some days later (about January +4, 1770), while the vigilance of the Indians was momentarily +relaxed, the captives suddenly plunged into a dense canebrake and +in the subsequent confusion succeeded in effecting their escape. +Finding their camp deserted upon their return, Boone and Stewart +hastened on and finally overtook their companions. Here Boone was +both surprised and delighted to encounter his brother Squire, +loaded down with supplies. Having heard nothing from Boone, the +partners of the land company had surmised that he and his party +must have run short of ammunition, flour, salt, and other things +sorely needed in the wilderness; and because of their desire that +the party should remain, in order to make an exhaustive +exploration of the country, Squire Boone had been sent to him +with supplies. Findlay, Holden, Mooney, and Cooley returned to +the settlements; but Stewart, Squire Boone, and Alexander Neely, +who had accompanied Squire, threw in their lot with the intrepid +Daniel, and fared forth once more to the stirring and bracing +adventures of the Kentucky wilderness. In Daniel Boone's own +words, he expected "from the furs and peltries they had an +opportunity of taking ... to recruit his shattered +circumstances; discharge the debts he had contracted by the +adventure; and shortly return under better auspices, to settle +the newly discovered country." +</P> + +<P> +Boone and his party now stationed themselves near the mouth of +the Red River, and soon provided themselves, against the hard. +ships of the long winter, with jerk, bear's oil, buffalo tallow, +dried buffalo tongues, fresh meat, and marrow-bones as food, and +buffalo robes and bearskins as shelter from the inclement +weather. Neely had brought with him, to while away dull hours, a +copy of "Gulliver's Travels"; and in describing Neely's +successful hunt for buffalo one day, Boone in after years +amusingly deposed: "In the year 1770 I encamped on Red River with +five other men, and we had with us for our amusement the History +of Samuel Gulliver's Travels, wherein he gave an account of his +young master, Glumdelick, careing him on market day for a show to +a town called Lulbegrud. A young man of our company called +Alexander Neely came to camp and told us he had been that day to +Lulbegrud, and had killed two Brobdignags in their capital." Far +from unlettered were pioneers who indulged together in such +literary chat and gave to the near-by creek the name (after Dean +Swift's Lorbrugrud) of Lulbegrud which name, first seen on +Filson's map of Kentucky (1784), it bears to this day. From one +of his long, solitary hunts Stewart never returned; and it was +not until five years later, while cutting out the Transylvania +Trail, that Boone and his companions discovered, near the old +crossing at Rockcastle, Stewart's remains in a standing hollow +sycamore. The wilderness never gave up its tragic secret. +</P> + +<P> +The close of the winter and most of the spring were passed by the +Boones, after Neely's return to the settlements, in exploration, +hunting, and trapping beaver and otter, in which sport Daniel +particularly excelled. Owing to the drain upon their ammunition, +Squire was at length compelled to return to the settlements for +supplies; and Daniel, who remained alone in the wilderness to +complete his explorations for the land company, must often have +shared the feelings of Balboa as, from lofty knob or towering +ridge, he gazed over the waste of forest which spread from the +dim out lines of the Alleghanies to the distant waters of the +Mississippi. He now proceeded to make those remarkable solitary +explorations of Kentucky which have given him immortality—through +the valley of the Kentucky and the Licking, and along the +"Belle Riviere" (Ohio) as low as the falls. He visited the Big +Bone Lick and examined the wonderful fossil remains of the +mammoth found there. Along the great buffalo roads, worn several +feet below the surface of the ground, which led to the Blue +Licks, he saw with amazement and delight thousands of huge shaggy +buffalo gamboling, bellowing, and making the earth rumble beneath +the trampling of their hooves. One day, while upon a cliff near +the junction of the Kentucky and Dick's Rivers, he suddenly found +himself hemmed in by a party of Indians. Seizing his only chance +of escape, he leaped into the top of a maple tree growing beneath +the cliffs and, sliding to safety full sixty feet below, made his +escape, pursued by the sound of a chorus of guttural "Ughs" from +the dumbfounded savages. +</P> + +<P> +Finally making his way back to the old camp, Daniel was rejoined +there by Squire on July 27, 1770. During the succeeding months, +much of their time was spent in hunting and prospecting in +Jessamine County, where two caves are still known as Boone's +caves. Eventually, when ammunition and supplies had once more run +low, Squire was compelled a second time to return to the +settlements. Perturbed after a time by Squire's failure to rejoin +him at the appointed time, Daniel started toward the settlements, +in search of him; and by a stroke of good fortune encountered him +along the trail. Overjoyed at this meeting (December, 1770) the +indomitable Boones once more plunged into the wilderness, +determined to conclude their explorations by examining the +regions watered by the Green and Cumberland rivers and their +tributaries. In after years, Gasper Mansker, the old German +scout, was accustomed to describe with comic effect the +consternation created among the Long Hunters, while hunting one +day on Green River, by a singular noise which they could not +explain. Stealthily slipping from tree to tree, Mansker finally +beheld with mingled surprise and amusement a hunter, bareheaded, +stretched flat upon his back on a deerskin spread on the ground, +singing merrily at the top of his voice! It was Daniel Boone, +joyously whiling away the solitary hours in singing one of his +favorite songs of the border. In March, 1771, after spending some +time in company with the Long Hunters, the Boones, their horses +laden with furs, set their faces homeward. On their return +journey, near Cumberland Gap, they had the misfortune to be +surrounded by a party of Indians who robbed them of their guns +and all their peltries. With this humiliating conclusion to his +memorable tour of exploration, Daniel Boone, as he himself says, +"once more reached home after experiencing hardships which would +defy credulity in the recital." +</P> + +<P> +Despite the hardships and the losses, Boone had achieved the +ambition of years: he had seen Kentucky, which he "esteemed a +second paradise." The reports of his extended explorations, which +he made to Judge Henderson, were soon communicated to the other +partners of the land company; and their letters of this period, +to one another, bristle with glowing and minute descriptions of +the country, as detailed by their agent. Boone was immediately +engaged to act in the company's behalf to sound the Cherokees +confidentially with respect to their willingness to lease or sell +the beautiful hunting-grounds of the trans-Alleghany. The high +hopes of Henderson and his associates at last gave promise of +brilliant realization. Daniel Boone's glowing descriptions of +Kentucky excited in their minds, says a gifted early chronicler, +the "spirit of an enterprise which in point of magnitude and +peril, as well as constancy and heroism displayed in its +execution, has never been paralleled in the history of America." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI. The Regulators +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +It is not a persons labour, nor yet his effects that will do, but +if he has but one horse to plow with, one bed to lie on, or one +cow to give a little milk for his children, they must all go to +raise money which is not to be had. And lastly if his personal +estate (sold at one tenth of its value) will not do, then his +lands (which perhaps has cost him many years of toil and labour) +must go the same way to satisfy, these cursed hungry +caterpillars, that are eating and will eat out the bowels of our +Commonwealth, if they be not pulled down from their nests in a +very short time.—George Sims: A Serious Address to the +Inhabitants of Granville County, containing an Account of our +deplorable Situation we suffer .... and some necessary Hints with +Respect to a Reformation. June 6, 1765. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It is highly probable that even at the time of his earlier +explorations in behalf of Richard Henderson and Company, Daniel +Boone anticipated speedy removal to the West. Indeed, in the very +year of his first tour in their interest, Daniel and his wife +Rebeckah sold all their property in North Carolina, consisting of +their home and six hundred and forty acres of land, and after +several removals established themselves upon the upper Yadkin. +This removal and the later western explorations just outlined +were due not merely to the spirit of adventure and discovery. +Three other causes also were at work. In the first place there +was the scarcity of game. For fifteen years the shipments of +deerskins from Bethabara to Charleston steadily increased; and +the number of skins bought by Gammern, the Moravian storekeeper, +ran so high that in spite of the large purchases made at the +store by the hunters he would sometimes run entirely out of +money. Tireless in the chase, the far roaming Boone was among +"the hunters, who brought in their skins from as far away as the +Indian lands"; and the beautiful upland pastures and mountain +forests, still teeming with deer and bear, doubtless lured him to +the upper Yadkin, where for a time in the immediate neighborhood +of his home abundance of game fell before his unerring rifle. +Certainly the deer and other game, which were being killed in +enormous numbers to satisfy the insatiable demand of the traders +at Salisbury, the Forks, and Bethabara, became scarcer and +scarcer; and the wild game that was left gradually fled to the +westward. Terrible indeed was the havoc wrought among the elk; +and it was reported that the last elk was killed in western North +Carolina as early as 1781. +</P> + +<P> +Another grave evil of the time with which Boone had to cope in +the back country of North Carolina was the growth of undisguised +outlawry, similar to that found on the western plains of a later +era. This ruthless brigand age arose as the result of the +unsettled state of the country and the exposed condition of the +settlements due to the Indian alarms. When rude borderers, +demoralized by the enforced idleness attendant upon fort life +during the dark days of Indian invasion, sallied forth upon +forays against the Indians, they found much valuable +property—horses, cattle, and stock—left by their owners when +hurriedly fleeing to the protection of the frontier stockades. +The temptations thus afforded were too great to resist; and the +wilder spirits of the backwoods, with hazy notions of private +rights, seized the property which they found, slaughtered the +cattle, sold the horses, and appropriated to their own use the +temporarily abandoned household goods and plantation tools. The +stealing of horses, which were needed for the cultivation of the +soil and useful for quickly carrying unknown thieves beyond the +reach of the owner and the law, became a common practice; and was +carried on by bands of outlaws living remote from one another and +acting in collusive concert. +</P> + +<P> +Toward the end of July, 1755, when the Indian outrages upon the +New River settlements in Virginia had frightened away all the +families at the Town Fork in the Yadkin country, William Owen, a +man of Welsh stock, who had settled in the spring of 1752 in the +upper Yadkin near the Mulberry Fields, was suspected of having +robbed the storekeeper on the Meho. Not long afterward a band of +outlaws who plundered the exposed cabins in their owners' +absence, erected a rude fort in the mountain region in the rear +of the Yadkin settlements, where they stored their ill-gotten +plunder and made themselves secure from attack. Other members of +the band dwelt in the settlements, where they concealed their +robber friends by day and aided them by night in their nefarious +projects of theft and rapine. +</P> + +<P> +The entire community was finally aroused by the bold depredations +of the outlaws; and the most worthy settlers of the Yadkin +country organized under the name of Regulators to break up the +outlaw band. When it was discovered that Owen, who was well known +at Bethabara, had allied himself with the highwaymen, one of the +justices summoned one hundred men; and seventy, who answered the +call, set forth on December 26, 1755, to seek out the outlaws and +to destroy their fortress. Emboldened by their success, the +latter upon one occasion had carried off a young girl of the +settlements. Daniel Boone placed himself at the head of one of +the parties, which included the young girl's father, to go to her +rescue; and they fortunately succeeded in effecting the release +of the frightened maiden. One of the robbers was apprehended and +brought to Salisbury, where he was thrown into prison for his +crimes. Meanwhile a large amount of plunder had been discovered +at the house of one Cornelius Howard; and the evidences of his +guilt so multiplied against him that he finally confessed his +connection with the outlaw band and agreed to point out their +fort in the mountains. +</P> + +<P> +Daniel Boone and George Boone joined the party of seventy men, +sent out by the colonial authorities under the guidance of +Howard, to attack the stronghold of the bandits. Boone afterward +related that the robbers' fort was situated in the most fitly +chosen place for such a purpose that he could imagine—beneath an +overhanging cliff of rock, with a large natural chimney, and a +considerable area in front well stockaded. The frontiersmen +surrounded the fort, captured five women and eleven children, and +then burned the fort to the ground. Owen and his wife, +Cumberland, and several others were ultimately made prisoners; +but Harman and the remainder of the band escaped by flight. Owen +and his fellow captives were then borne to Salisbury, +incarcerated in the prison there, and finally (May, 1756) +condemned to the gallows. Owen sent word to the Moravians, +petitioning them to adopt his two boys and to apprentice one to a +tailor, the other to a carpenter. But so infuriated was Owen's +wife by Howard's treachery that she branded him as a second +Judas; and this at once fixed upon him the sobriquet "Judas" +Howard-a sobriquet he did not live long to bear, for about a year +later he was ambushed and shot from his horse at the crossing of +a stream. He thus paid the penalty of his betrayal of the outlaw +band. For a number of years, the Regulators continued to wage war +against the remaining outlaws, who from time to time committed +murders as well as thefts. As late as January, 1768, the +Regulators caught a horse thief in the Hollows of Surry County +and brought him to Bethabara, whence Richter and Spach took him +to the jail at Salisbury. After this year, the outlaws were heard +of no more; and peace reigned in the settlements. +</P> + +<P> +Colonel Edmund Fanning—of whom more anon—declared that the +Regulation began in Anson County which bordered upon South +Carolina. Certain it is that the upper country of that province +was kept in an uproar by civil disturbances during this early +period. Owing to the absence of courts in this section, so remote +from Charleston, the inhabitants found it necessary, for the +protection of property and the punishment of outlaws, to form an +association called, like the North Carolina society, the +Regulation. Against this association the horse thieves and other +criminals made common cause, and received tacit support from +certain more reputable persons who condemned "the irregularity of +the Regulators." The Regulation which had been thus organized in +upper South Carolina as early as 1764 led to tumultuous risings +of the settlers; and finally in the effort to suppress these +disorders, the governor, Lord Charles Montagu, appointed one +Scovil, an utterly unworthy representative, to carry out his +commands. After various disorders, which became ever more +unendurable to the law-abiding, matters came to a crisis (1769) +as the result of the high-handed proceedings of Scovil, who +promiscuously seized and flung into prison all the Regulators he +could lay hands on. In the month of March the back country rose +in revolt against Scovil and a strong body of the settlers was on +the point of attacking the force under his command when an +eleventh-hour letter arrived from Montagu, dismissing Scovil from +office. Thus was happily averted, by the narrowest of margins, a +threatened precursor of the fight at Alamance in 1771 (see +Chapter XII). As the result of the petition of the Calhouns and +others, courts were established in 1760, though not opened until +four years later. Many horse thieves were apprehended, tried, and +punished. Justice once more held full sway. +</P> + +<P> +Another important cause for Boone's removal from the neighborhood +of Salisbury into the mountain fastnesses was the oppressive +administration of the law by corrupt sheriffs, clerks, and +tax-gatherers, and the dissatisfaction of the frontier squatters +with the owners of the soil. At the close of the year 1764 +reports reached the town of Wilmington, after the adjournment of +the assembly in November, of serious disturbances in Orange +County, due, it was alleged, to the exorbitant exactions of the +clerks, registers, and some of the attorneys. As a result of this +disturbing news, Governor Dobbs issued a proclamation forbidding +any officer to take illegal fees. Troubles had been brewing in +the adjacent county of Granville ever since the outbreak of the +citizens against Francis Corbin, Lord Granville's agent (January +24, 1759), and the issuance of the petition of Reuben Searcy and +others (March 23d) protesting against the alleged excessive fees +taken and injustices practised by Robert (Robin) Jones, the +famous lawyer. These disturbances were cumulative in their +effect; and the people at last (1765 ) found in George Sims, of +Granville, a fit spokesman of their cause and a doughty champion +of popular rights. In his "Serious Address to the Inhabitants of +Granville County, containing an Account of our deplorable +Situation we suffer ... and some necessary Hints with Respect +to a Reformation," recently brought to light, he presents a +crushing indictment of the clerk of the county court, Samuel +Benton, the grandfather of Thomas Hart Benton. After describing +in detail the system of semi-peonage created by the merciless +exactions of lawyers and petty court officials, and the +insatiable greed of "these cursed hungry caterpillars," Sims with +rude eloquence calls upon the people to pull them down from their +nests for the salvation of the Commonwealth. +</P> + +<P> +Other abuses were also recorded. So exorbitant was the charge for +a marriage-license, for instance, that an early chronicler +records "The consequence was that some of the inhabitants on the +head-waters of the Yadkin took a short cut. They took each other +for better or for worse; and considered themselves as married +without further ceremony." The extraordinary scarcity of currency +throughout the colony, especially in the back country, was +another great hardship and a perpetual source of vexation. All +these conditions gradually became intolerable to the uncultured +but free spirited men of the back country. Events were slowly +converging toward a crisis in government and society. Independent +in spirit, turbulent in action, the backwoodsmen revolted not +only against excessive taxes, dishonest sheriffs, and +extortionate fees, but also against the rapacious practices of +the agents of Lord Granville. These agents industriously picked +flaws in the titles to the lands in Granville's proprietary upon +which the poorer settlers were seated; and compelled them to pay +for the land if they had not already done so, or else to pay the +fees twice over and take out a new patent as the only remedy of +the alleged defect in their titles. In Mecklenburg County the +spirit of backwoods revolt flamed out in protest against the +proprietary agents. Acting under instructions to survey and close +bargains for the lands or else to eject those who held them, +Henry Eustace McCulloh, in February, 1765, went into the county +to call a reckoning. The settlers, many of whom had located +without deeds, indignantly retorted by offering to buy only at +their own prices, and forbade the surveyors to lay out the +holdings when this smaller price was declined. They not only +terrorized into acquiescence those among them who were willing to +pay the amount charged for the lands, but also openly declared +that they would resist by force any sheriff in ejectment +proceedings. On May 7th an outbreak occurred; and a mob, led by +Thomas Polk, set upon John Frohock, Abraham Alexander, and +others, as they were about to survey a parcel of land, and gave +them a severe thrashing, even threatening the young McCulloh with +death. +</P> + +<P> +The choleric backwoodsmen, instinctively in agreement with +Francis Bacon, considered revenge as a sort of wild justice. +Especial objects of their animosity were the brothers Frohock, +John and Thomas, the latter clerk of the court at Salisbury, and +Edmund Fanning, a cultured gentleman-adventurer, associate +justice of the superior court. So rapacious and extortionate were +these vultures of the courts who preyed upon the vitals of the +common people, that they were savagely lampooned by Rednap +Howell, the backwoods poet-laureate of the Regulation. The temper +of the back country is well caught in Howell's lines anent this +early American "grafter", the favorite of the royal governor: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +When Fanning first to Orange came,<BR> +He looked both pale and wan;<BR> +An old patched coat was on his back,<BR> +An old mare he rode on.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Both man and mare wan't worth five pounds,<BR> +As I've been often told;<BR> +But by his civil robberies,<BR> +He's laced his coat with gold.<BR> +</P> + +<P> +The germs of the great westward migration in the coming decade +were thus working among the people of the back country. If the +tense nervous energy of the American people is the transmitted +characteristic of the border settlers, who often slept with +loaded rifle in hand in grim expectation of being awakened by the +hideous yells, the deadly tomahawk, and the lurid firebrand of +the savage, the very buoyancy of the national character is in +equal measure "traceable to the free democracy founded on a +freehold inheritance of land." The desire for free land was the +fundamental factor in the development of the American democracy. +No colony exhibited this tendency more signally than did North +Carolina in the turbulent days of the Regulation. The North +Carolina frontiersmen resented the obligation to pay quit-rents +and firmly believed that the first occupant of the soil had an +indefeasible right to the land which he had won with his rifle +and rendered productive by the implements of toil. Preferring the +dangers of the free wilderness to the paying of tribute to +absentee landlords and officials of an intolerant colonial +government, the frontiersman found title in his trusty rifle +rather than in a piece of parchment, and was prone to pay his +obligations to the owner of the soil in lead rather than in gold. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII. Watauga—Haven of Liberty +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The Regulators despaired of seeing better times and therefore +quitted the Province. It is said 1,500 departed since the Battle +of Alamance and to my knowledge a great many more are only +waiting to dispose of their plantations in order to follow +them.—Reverend Morgan Edwards, 1772. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The five years (1766-1771) which saw the rise, development, and +ultimate defeat of the popular movement known as the Regulation, +constitute a period not only of extraordinary significance in +North Carolina but also of fruitful consequences in the larger +movements of westward expansion. With the resolute intention of +having their rulers "give account of their stewardship," to +employ their own words, the Sandy Creek Association of Baptists +(organized in 1758), in a series of papers known as Regulators' +Advertisements (1766-8) proceeded to mature, through popular +gatherings, a rough form of initiative and referendum. At length, +discouraged in its efforts, and particularly in the attempt to +bring county officials to book for charging illegal fees, this +association ceased actively to function. It was the precursor of +a movement of much more drastic character and formidable +proportions, chiefly directed against Colonel Edmund Fanning and +his associates. This movement doubtless took its name, "the +Regulation," from the bands of men already described who were +organized first in North Carolina and later in South Carolina, to +put down highwaymen and to correct many abuses in the back +country, such as the tyrannies of Scovil and his henchmen. +Failing to secure redress of their grievances through legal +channels, the Regulators finally made such a powerful +demonstration in support of their refusal to pay taxes that +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina, in 1768, called out the +provincial militia, and by marching with great show of force +through the disaffected regions, succeeded temporarily in +overawing the people and thus inducing them to pay their +assessments. +</P> + +<P> +The suits which had been brought by the Regulators against Edmund +Fanning, register, and Francis Nash, clerk, of Orange County, +resulted in both being "found guilty of taking too high fees." +Fanning immediately resigned his commission as register; while +Nash, who in conjunction with Fanning had fairly offered in 1766 +to refund to any one aggrieved any fee charged by him which the +Superior Court might hold excessive, gave bond for his appearance +at the next court. Similar suits for extortion against the three +Froliocks in Rowan County in 1769 met with failure, however; and +this outcome aroused the bitter resentment of the Regulators, as +recorded by Herman Husband in his "Impartial Relation." During +this whole period the insurrectionary spirit of the people, who +felt themselves deeply aggrieved but recognized their inability +to secure redress, took the form of driving local justices from +the bench and threatening court officials with violence. +</P> + +<P> +At the session of the Superior Court at Hillsborough, September +22, 1770, an elaborate petition prepared by the Regulators, +demanding unprejudiced juries and the public accounting for taxes +by the sheriffs, was handed to the presiding justice by James +Hunter, a leading Regulator. This justice was our acquaintance, +Judge Richard Henderson, of Granville County, the sole high +officer in the provincial government from the entire western +section of the colony. In this petition occur these trenchant +words: "As we are serious and in good earnest and the cause +respects the whole body of the people it would be loss of time to +enter into arguments on particular points for though there are a +few men who have the gift and art of reasoning, yet every man has +a feeling and knows when he has justice done him as well as the +most learned." On the following Monday (September 24th), upon +convening of court, some one hundred and fifty Regulators, led by +James Hunter, Herman Husband, Rednap Howell, and others, armed +with clubs, whips, and cudgels, surged into the court-room and +through their spokesman, Jeremiah Fields, presented a statement +of their grievances. "I found myself," says Judge Henderson, +"under a necessity of attempting to soften and turn away the fury +of these mad people, in the best manner in my power, and as such +could well be, pacify their rage and at the same time preserve +the little remaining dignity of the court." +</P> + +<P> +During an interim, in which the Regulators retired for +consultation, they fell without warning upon Fanning and gave him +such rough treatment that he narrowly escaped with his life. The +mob, now past control, horsewhipped a number of leading lawyers +and citizens gathered there at court, and treated others, notably +the courtly Mr. Hooper of Boston, "with every mark of contempt +and insult." Judge Henderson was assured by Fields that no harm +should come to him provided he would conduct the court in +accordance with the behest of the Regulators: namely, that no +lawyer, save the King's Attorney, should be admitted to the +court, and that the Regulators' cases should be tried with new +jurors chosen by the Regulators. With the entire little village +terrorized by this campaign of "frightfulness," and the court +wholly unprotected, Judge Henderson reluctantly acknowledged to +himself that "the power of the judiciary was exhausted." +Nevertheless, he says, "I made every effort in my power +consistent with my office and the duty the public is entitled to +claim to preserve peace and good order." Agreeing under duress to +resume the session the following day, the judge ordered an +adjournment. But being unwilling, on mature reflection, to permit +a mockery of the court and a travesty of justice to be staged +under threat and intimidation, he returned that night to his home +in Granville and left the court adjourned in course. Enraged by +the judge's escape, the Regulators took possession of the court +room the following morning, called over the cases, and in futile +protest against the conditions they were powerless to remedy, +made profane entries which may still be seen on the record: +"Damned rogues," "Fanning pays cost but loses nothing," "Negroes +not worth a damn, Cost exceeds the whole," "Hogan pays and be +damned," and, in a case of slander, "Nonsense, let them argue for +Ferrell has gone hellward." +</P> + +<P> +The uprising of these bold and resolute, simple and imperfectly +educated people, which had begun as a constitutional struggle to +secure justice and to prevent their own exploitation by dishonest +lawyers of the county courts, now gave place to open anarchy and +secret incendiarism. In the dead of night, November 12th and +14th, Judge Henderson's barn, stables, and dwelling house were +fired by the Regulators and went up in flames. Glowing with a +sense of wrong, these misguided people, led on by fanatical +agitators, thus vented their indiscriminate rage, not only upon +their op pressors, but also upon men wholly innocent of injuring +them—men of the stamp of William Hooper, afterward signer of the +Declaration of Independence, Alexander Martin, afterward governor +and United States Senator, and Richard Henderson, popular +representative of the back country and a firm champion of due +process of law. It is perhaps not surprising in view of these +events that Governor Tryon and the ruling class, lacking a +sympathy broad enough to ensure justice to the oppressed people, +seemed to be chiefly impressed with the fact that a widespread +insurrection was in progress, threatening not only life and +property, but also civil government itself. The governor called +out the militia of the province and led an army of well nigh one +thousand men and officers against the Regulators, who had +assembled at Alamance to the number of two thousand. Tryon stood +firm upon the demands that the people should submit to government +and disperse at a designated hour. The Regulators, on their side, +hoped to secure the reforms they desired by intimidating the +governor with a great display of force. The battle was a tragic +fiasco for the Regulators, who fought bravely, but without +adequate arms or real leadership. With the conclusion of this +desultory action, a fight lasting about two hours (May 16, 1771), +the power of the Regulators was completely broken." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Among these insurgents there was a remarkable element, an element +whose influence upon the course of American history has been but +imperfectly understood which now looms into prominence as the +vanguard of the army of westward expansion. There were some of +the Regulators who, though law-abiding and conservative, were +deeply imbued with ideas of liberty, personal independence, and +the freedom of the soil. Through the influence of Benjamin +Franklin, with whom one of the leaders of the group, Herman +Husband, was in constant correspondence, the patriotic ideas then +rapidly maturing into revolutionary sentiments furnished the +inspiration to action. As early as 1766, the Sandy Creek leaders, +referred to earlier in this chapter, issued a call to each +neighborhood to send delegates to a gathering for the purpose of +investigating the question "whether the free men of this country +labor under any abuses of power or not." The close connection +between the Sandy Creek men and the Sons of Liberty is amply +demonstrated in this paper wherein the Sons of Liberty in +connection with the "stamp law" are praised: for "redeeming us +from Tyranny" and for having "withstood the lords in Parliament +in behalf of true liberty." Upon the records of the Dutchman's +Creek Church, of "regular" Baptists, at the Forks of the Yadkin, +to which Daniel Boone's family belonged, may be found this +memorable entry, recognizing the "American Cause" well-nigh a +year before the declaration of independence at Philadelphia: "At +the monthly meeting it was agreed upon concerning the American +Cause, if any of the brethren see cause to join it they have the +liberty to do it without being called to an account by the +church. But whether they join or do not join they should be used +with brotherly love. +</P> + +<P> +The fundamental reasons underlying the approaching westward +hegira are found in the remarkable petition of the Regulators of +An son County (October 9, 1769), who request that "Benjamin +Franklin or some other known PATRIOT" be appointed agent of the +province in London to seek redress at the source. They exposed +the basic evil in the situation by pointing out that, in +violation of the law restricting the amount of land that might be +granted to each person to six hundred and forty acres, much of +the most fertile territory in the province had been distributed +in large tracts to wealthy landlords. In consequence "great +numbers of poor people are necessitated to toil in the +cultivation of the bad Lands whereon they hardly can subsist." It +was these poor people, "thereby deprived of His Majesties +liberality and Bounty," who soon turned their gaze to the +westward and crossed the mountains in search of the rich, free +lands of the trans-Alleghany region. +</P> + +<P> +This feverish popular longing for freedom, stimulated by the +economic pressure of thousands of pioneers who were annually +entering North Carolina, set in motion a wave of migration across +the mountains in 1769. Long before Alamance, many of the true +Americans, distraught by apparently irremediable injustices, +plunged fearlessly into the wilderness, seeking beyond the +mountains a new birth of liberty, lands of their own selection +free of cost or quit-rents, and a government of their own +choosing and control."' The glad news of the rich valleys beyond +the mountains early lured such adventurous pioneers as Andrew +Greer and Julius Caesar Dugger to the Watauga country. The +glowing stories, told by Boone, and disseminated in the back +country by Henderson, Williams, and the Harts, seemed to give +promise to men of this stamp that the West afforded relief from +oppressions suffered in North Carolina. During the winter of +1768-9 there was also a great rush of settlers from Virginia into +the valley of the Holston. A party from Augusta County, led by +men who had been delighted with the country viewed seven years +before when they were serving under Colonel William Byrd against +the Cherokees, found that this region, a wilderness on their +outward passage in 1768, was dotted with cabins on every spot +where the grazing was good, upon their return the following year. +Writing to Hillsborough on October 18, 1770, concerning the "many +hundred families" in the region from Green River to the branches +of the Holston, who refused to comply with the royal proclamation +of 1763, Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia reports that "very +little if any Quit Rents have been received for His Majesty's use +from that Quarter for some time past"—the people claiming that +"His Majesty hath been pleased to withdraw his protection from +them since 1763." +</P> + +<P> +In the spring of 1770, with the express intention of discovering +suitable locations for homes for himself and a number of others, +who wished to escape the accumulating evils of the times, James +Robertson of Orange County, North Carolina, made an arduous +journey to the pleasing valley of the Watauga. Robertson, who was +born in Brunswick County, Virginia, June 28, 1742, of excellent +Scotch-Irish ancestry, was a noteworthy figure of a certain +type—quiet, reflective, conservative, wise, a firm believer in the +basic principles of civil Liberty and the right of local +self-government. Robertson spent some time with a man named +Honeycut in the Watauga region, raised a crop of corn, and chose +for himself and his friends suitable locations for settlement. +Lost upon his return in seeking the mountain defiles traversed by +him on the outward journey, Robertson probably escaped death from +starvation only through the chance passing of two hunters who +succored him and set him upon the right path. On arriving in +Orange he found political and social conditions there much worse +than before, many of the colonists declining to take the +obligatory oath of allegiance to the British Crown after the +Battle of Alamance, preferring to carve out for themselves new +homes along the western waters. Some sixteen families of this +stamp, indignant at the injustices and oppressions of British +rule, and stirred by Robertson's description of the richness and +beauty of the western country, accompanied him to Watauga shortly +after the battle. +</P> + +<P> +This vanguard of the army of westward advance, independent +Americans in spirit with a negligible sprinkling of Loyalists, +now swept in a great tide into the northeastern section of +Tennessee. The men of Sandy Creek, actuated by independent +principles but out of sympathy with the anarchic side of the +Regulation, left the colony almost to a man. "After the defeat of +the Regulators," says the historian of the Sandy Creek +Association, "thousands of the oppressed, seeing no hope of +redress for their grievances, moved into and settled east +Tennessee. A large proportion of these were of the Baptist +population. Sandy Creek Church which some time previous to 1771, +numbered 606, was afterward reduced to fourteen members!" This +movement exerted powerful influence in stimulating westward +expansion. Indeed, it was from men of Regulating principles—Boone, +Robertson, and the Searcys—who vehemently condemned the +anarchy and incendiarism of 1770, that Judge Henderson received +powerful cooperation in the opening up of Kentucky and Tennessee. +</P> + +<P> +The several treaties concerning the western boundary of white +settlement, concluded in close succession by North Carolina, +Virginia, and the Crown with the Southern and Northern Indians, +had an important bearing upon the settlement of Watauga. The +Cherokee boundary line, as fixed by Governor Tryon (1767) and by +John Stuart (1768), ran from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, +thence straight to Chiswell's Mine, and thence direct to the +mouth of the Great Kanawha River. By the treaty at Fort Stanwix +(November 5, 1768), in the negotiation of which Virginia was +represented by Dr. Thomas Walker and Major Andrew Lewis, the Six +Nations sold to the Crown their shadowy claim to a vast tract of +western country, including in particular all the land between the +Ohio and the Tennessee Rivers. The news of the cession resulted +in a strong southwestward thrust of population, from the +neighborhood of Abingdon, in the direction of the Holston Valley. +Recognizing that hundreds of these settlers were beyond the line +negotiated by Stuart, but on lands not yet surveyed, Governor +Botetourt instructed the Virginia commissioners to press for +further negotiations, through Stuart, with the Cherokees. +Accordingly, on October 18, 1770, a new treaty was made at +Lochaber, South Carolina, by which a new line back of Virginia +was established, beginning at the intersection of the North +Carolina-Cherokee line (a point some seventy odd miles east of +Long Island), running thence in a west course to a point six +miles east of Long Island, and thence in a direct course to the +confluence of the Great Kanawha and Ohio Rivers. At the time of +the treaty, it was agreed that the Holston River, from its +intersection with the North Carolina-Virginia line, and down the +course of the same, should be a temporary southern boundary of +Virginia until the line should be ascertained by actual survey. A +strong influx of population into the immense new triangle thus +released for settlement brought powerful pressure to bear upon +northern Tennessee, the point of least resistance along the +western barrier. Singularly enough, this advance was not opposed +by the Cherokees, whose towns were strung across the extreme +southeast corner of Tennessee. +</P> + +<P> +When Colonel John Donelson ran the line in the latter part of +1771, The Little Carpenter, who with other Indian chiefs +accompanied the surveying party, urged that the line agreed upon +at Lochaber should break off at the head of the Louisa River, and +should run thence to the mouth thereof, and thence up the Ohio to +the mouth of the Great Kanawha. For this increase in the +territory of Virginia they of course expected additional payment. +As a representative of Virginia, Donelson agreed to the proposed +alteration in the boundary line; and accordingly promised to send +the Cherokees, in the following spring, a sum alleged by them to +have been fixed at five hundred pounds, in compensation for the +additional area. This informal agreement, it is believed, was +never ratified by Virginia; nor was the promised compensation +ever paid the Cherokees. +</P> + +<P> +Under the belief that the land belonged to Virginia, Jacob Brown +with one or two families from North Carolina settled in 1771 upon +a tract of land on the northern bank of the Nonachunheh +(corruption, Nolichucky) River. During the same year, an +experimental line run westward from Steep Rock and Beaver Creek +by Anthony Bledsoe showed that upon the extension of the boundary +line, these settlers would fall within the bounds of North +Carolina. Although thus informally warned of the situation, the +settlers made no move to vacate the lands. But in the following +year, after the running of Donelson's line, Alexander Cameron, +Stuart's deputy, required "all persons who had made settlements +beyond the said line to relinquish them." Thus officially warned, +Brown and his companions removed to Watauga. Cameron's order did +not apply, however, to the settlement, to the settlement north of +the Holston River, south and east of Long Island; and the +settlement in Carter's Valley, although lying without the +Virginia boundary, strangely enough remained unmolested. The +order was directed at the Watauga settlers, who were seated south +of the Holston River in the Watauga Valley. +</P> + +<P> +The plight in which the Watauga settlers now found themselves was +truly desperate; and the way in which they surmounted this +apparently insuperable difficulty is one of the most striking and +characteristic events in the pre-Revolutionary history of the Old +Southwest. It exhibits the indomitable will and fertile resource +of the American character at the margin of desperation. The +momentous influence of the Watauga settlers, inadequately +reckoned hitherto by historians, was soon to make itself +powerfully felt in the first epochal movement of westward +expansion. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIII. Opening the Gateway—Dunmore's War +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Virginia, we conceive, can claim this Country [Kentucky] with the +greatest justice and propriety, its within the Limits of their +Charter. They Fought and bled for it. And had it not been for the +memorable Battle, at the Great Kanaway those vast regions had yet +continued inaccessable.—The Harrodsburg Petition. June 7-15, +1776. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It was fortunate for the Watauga settlers that the Indians and +the whites were on the most peaceful terms with each other at the +time the Watauga Valley was shown, by the running of the boundary +line, to lie within the Indian reservation. With true American +self reliance, the settlers met together for deliberation and +counsel, and deputed James Robertson and John Been, as stated by +Tennessee's first historian, "to treat with their landlords, and +agree upon articles of accommodation and friendship. The attempt +succeeded. For though the Indians refused to give up the land +gratuitously, they consented, for a stipulated amount of +merchandise, muskets, and other articles of convenience, to lease +all the country on the waters of the Watauga." In addition to the +land thus leased for ten years, several other tracts were +purchased from the Indians by Jacob Brown, who reoccupied his +former location on the Nolichucky. +</P> + +<P> +In taking this daring step, the Watauga settlers moved into the +spotlight of national history. For the inevitable consequence of +leasing the territory was the organization of a form of +government for the infant settlement. Through his familiarity +with the North Carolina type of "association," in which the +settlers had organized for the purpose of "regulating" abuses, +and his acquaintance with the contents of the "Impartial +Relation," in which Husband fully expounded the principles and +practices of this association, Robertson was peculiarly fitted +for leadership in organizing this new government. The convention +at which Articles of Association, unfortunately lost, were drawn +up, is noteworthy as the first governmental assemblage of +free-born American citizens ever held west of the Alleghanies. +The government then established was the first free and +independent government, democratic in spirit, representative in +form, ever organized upon the American continent. In describing +this mimic republic, the royal Governor of Virginia says: "They +appointed magistrates, and framed laws for their present +occasion, and to all intents and purposes, erected themselves +into, though an inconsiderable, yet a separate State." The most +daring spirit in this little state was the young John Sevier, of +French Huguenot family (originally spelled Xavier), born in +Augusta County, Virginia, on September 23, 1745. It was from +Millerstown in Shenandoah County where he was living the +uneventful life of a small farmer, that he emigrated (December, +1773) to the Watauga region. With his arrival there begins one of +the most fascinating and romantic careers recorded in the varied +arid stirring annals of the Old Southwest. In this daring and +impetuous young fellow, fair-haired, blue-eyed, magnetic, +debonair—of powerful build, splendid proportions, and athletic +skill—we hold the gallant exemplar of the truly heroic life of +the border. The story of his life, thrilling in the extreme, is +rich in all the multi-colored elements which impart romance to +the arduous struggle of American civilization in the opening +years of the republic. +</P> + +<P> +The creative impulses in the Watauga commonwealth are hinted at +by Dunmore, who serves, in the letter above quoted, that Watauga +"sets a dangerous example to the people America, of forming +governments distinct from and independent of his Majesty's +authority." +</P> + +<P> +It is true that the experiment was somewhat limited. The +organization of the Watauga association, which constituted a +temporary expedient to meet a crisis in the affairs of a frontier +community cut off by forest wilderness and mountain barriers from +the reach of the arm of royal or provincial government, is not to +be compared with the revolutionary assemblage at Boonesborough, +May 23, 1775, or with the extraordinary demands for inde pendence +in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, during the same month. +Nevertheless the Watauga settlers defied both North Carolina and +the Crown, by adopting the laws of Virginia and by ignoring +Governor Josiah Martin's proclamation (March 26, 1774) "requiring +the said settlers immediately to retire from the Indian +Territories." Moreover, Watauga really was the parent of a series +of mimic republics in the Old Southwest, gradually tending toward +higher forms of organization, with a larger measure of individual +liberty. Watauga, Transylvania, Cumberland, Franklin represent +the evolving political genius of a free people under the creative +leadership of three constructive minds—James Robertson, John +Sevier, and Richard Henderson. Indeed, Watauga furnished to Judge +Henderson precisely the "dangerous example" of which Dunmore +prophetically speaks. +</P> + +<P> +Immediately upon his return in 1771 from the extended exploration +of Kentucky, Daniel Boone as already noted was engaged as secret +agent, to treat with the Cherokees for the lease or purchase of +the trans-Alleghany region, on behalf of Judge Henderson and his +associates. Embroiled in the exciting issues of the Regulation +and absorbed by his confining duties as colonial judge, Henderson +was unable to put his bold design into execution until after the +expiration of the court itself which ceased to exist in 1773. +Disregarding the royal proclamation of 1763 and Locke's +Fundamental Constitutions for the Carolinas, which forbade +private parties to purchase lands from the Indians, Judge +Henderson applied to the highest judicial authorities in England +to know if there was any law in existence forbidding purchase of +lands from the Indian tribes. Lord Mansfield gave Judge Henderson +the "sanction of his great authority in favor of the purchase." +Lord Chancellor Camden and Mr. Yorke had officially advised the +King in 1757, in regard to the petition of the East Indian +Company, "that in respect to such territories as have been, or +shall be acquired by treaty or grant from the Great Mogul, or any +of the Indian princes or governments, your Majesty's letters +patent are NOT NECESSARY; the property of the soil vesting in the +company by the Indian grant subject only to your Majesties right +of sovereignty over the settlements, as English settlements, and +over the inhabitants, as English subjects, who carry with them +your Majesties laws wherever they form colonies, and receive your +Majesties protection by virtue of your royal charters." This +opinion, with virtually no change, was rendered in regard to the +Indian tribes of North America by the same two authorities, +certainly as early as 1769; and a true copy, made in London, +April 1, 1772, was transmitted to Judge Henderson. Armed with the +legal opinions received from England, Judge Henderson was fully +persuaded that there was no legal bar whatsoever to his seeking +to acquire by purchase from the Cherokees the vast domain of the +trans-Alleghany. A golden dream of empire, with its promise of an +independent republic in the form of a proprietary colony, casts +him under the spell of its alluring glamour. +</P> + +<P> +In the meantime, the restless Boone, impatient over the delay in +the consummation of Judge Henderson's plans, resolved to +establish himself in Kentucky upon his own responsibility. +Heedless of the question of title and the certain hazards +incident to invading the territory of hostile savages, Boone +designated a rendezvous in Powell's Valley where he and his party +of five families were to be met by a band under the leadership of +his connections, the Bryans, and another company led by Captain +William Russell, a daring pioneer of the Clinch Valley. A small +detachment of Boone's party was fiercely attacked by Shawanoes in +Powell's Valley on October 10, 1773, and almost all were killed, +including sons of Boone and Russell, and young John and Richard +Mendenhall of Guilford County, North Carolina. As the result of +this bloody repulse, Boone's attempt to settle in Kentucky at +this time was definitely abandoned. His failure to effect a +settlement in Kentucky was due to that characteristic disregard +of the territorial rights of the Indians which was all too common +among the borderers of that period. +</P> + +<P> +This failure was portentous of the coming storm. The reign of the +Long Hunters was over. Dawning upon the horizon was the day of +stern adventurers, fixed in the desperate and lawless resolve to +invade the trans-Alleghany country and to battle savagely with +the red man for its possession. More successful than Boone was +the McAfee party, five in number, from Botetourt County, +Virginia, who between May 10th and September 1, 1773, safely +accomplished a journey through Kentucky and carefully marked +well-chosen sites for future location." An ominous incident of +the time was the veiled warning which Cornstalk, the great +Shawanoe chieftain, gave to Captain Thomas Bullitt, head of a +party of royal surveyors, sent out by Lord Dunmore, Governor of +Virginia. Cornstalk at Chillicothe, June 7, 1773, warned Bullitt +concerning the encroachments of the whites, "designed to deprive +us," he said, "of the hunting of the country, as usual ... the +hunting we stand in need of to buy our clothing." During the +preceding summer, George Rogers Clark, an aggressive young +Virginian, with a small party, had descended the Ohio as low as +Fish Creek, where he built a cabin; and in this region for many +months various parties of surveyors were busily engaged in +locating and surveying lands covered by military grants. Most +significant of the ruthless determination of the pioneers to +occupy by force the Kentucky area was the action of the large +party from Monongahela, some forty in number, led by Captain +James Harrod, who penetrated to the present Miller County, where +in June, 1774, they made improvements and actually laid out a +town. +</P> + +<P> +A significant, secretly conducted movement, of which historians +have taken but little account, was now in progress under the +manipulation of Virginia's royal governor. As early as 1770 Dr. +John Connolly proposed the establishment of an extensive colony +south of the Ohio; and the design of securing such territory from +the Indians found lodgment in the mind of Lord Dunmore. But this +design was for the moment thwarted when on October 28, 1773, an +order was issued from the Privy Council chamber in Whitehall +granting an immense territory, including all of the present West +Virginia and the land alienated to Virginia by Donelson's +agreement with the Cherokees (1772), to a company including +Thomas Walpole, Samuel Wharton, Benjamin Franklin, and others. +This new colony, to be named "Vandalia," seemed assured. A clash +between Dunmore and the royal authorities was imminent; for +Virginia under her sea-to-sea charter claimed the vast middle +region of the continent, extending without known limit to west +and northwest. Moreover, Dunmore was interested in great land +speculations on his own account; and while overtly vindicating +Virginia's claim to the trans-Alleghany by despatching parties of +surveyors to the western wilderness to locate and survey lands +covered by military grants, he with the collusion of certain +members of the "Honourable Board," his council, as charged by +Washington, was more than "lukewarm," secretly restricting as +rigorously as he dared the extent and number of the soldiers' +allotments. According to the famous Virginia Remonstrance, he was +in league with "men of great influence in some of the neighboring +states" to secure, under cover of purchases from the Indians, +large tracts of country between the Ohio and the Mississippi." In +shaping his plans Dunmore had the shrewd legal counsel of Patrick +Henry, who was equally intent upon making for himself a private +purchase from the Cherokees. It was Henry's legal opinion that +the Indiana purchase from the Six Nations by the Pennsylvania +traders at Fort Stanwix (November 5, 1768) was valid; and that +purchase by private individuals from the Indians gave full and +ample title. In consequence of these facts, William Murray, in +behalf of himself and his associates of the Illinois Land +Company, and on the strength of the Camden Yorke decision, +purchased two large tracts, on the Illinois and Ohio +respectively, from the Illinois Indians (July 5, 1773); and in +order to win the support of Dunmore, who was ambitious to make a +fortune in land speculation, organized a second company, the +Wabash (Ouabache) Land Company, with the governor as the chief +share-holder. In response to Murray's petition on behalf of the +Illinois Land Company, Dunmore (May, 1774) recommended it to Lord +Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies, and urged that it +be granted; and in a later letter he disingenuously disclaimed +any personal interest in the Illinois speculation. +</P> + +<P> +The party of surveyors sent out under the direction of Colonel +William Preston, on the request of Washington and other leading +eastern men, in 1774 located lands covered by military grants on +the Ohio and in the Kentucky area for prominent Virginians, +including Washington, Patrick Henry, William Byrd, William +Preston, Arthur Campbell, William Fleming, and Andrew Lewis, +among others, and also a large tract for Dr. Connolly. Certain of +these grants fell within the Vandalia area; and in his reply +(September 10, 1774) to Dunmore's letter, Lord Dartmouth sternly +censured Dunmore for allowing these grants, and accused the white +settlers of having brought on, by such unwarrantable aggressions, +the war then raging with the Indians. This charge lay at the door +of Dunmore himself; and there is strong evidence that Dunmore +personally fomented the war, ostensibly in support of Virginia's +charter rights, but actually in order to further his own +speculative designs." Dunmore's agent, Dr. Connolly, heading a +party posing as Virginia militia, fired without provocation upon +a delegation of Shawanoe chiefs assembled at Fort Pitt (January, +1774). Taking advantage of the alarming situation created by the +conflict of the claims of Virginia and Pennsylvania, Connolly, +inspired by Dunmore without doubt, then issued an incendiary +circular (April 21, 1774), declaring a state of war to exist. +Just two weeks before the Battle of the Great Kanawha, Patrick +Henry categorically stated, in conversation with Thomas Wharton: +</P> + +<P> +"that he was at Williamsburg with Ld. D. when Dr. Conolly first +came there, that Conolly is a chatty, sensible man, and informed +Ld. Dunmore of the extreme richness of the lands which lay on +both sides of the Ohio; that the prohibitory orders which had +been sent him relative to the land on the hither side (or +Vandalia) had caused him to turn his thoughts to the opposite +shore, and that as his Lordship was determined to settle his +family in America he was really pursueing this war, in order to +obtain by purchase or treaty from the natives a tract of +territory on that side; he then told me that he was convinced +from every authority that the law knew, that a purchase from the +natives was as full and ample a title as could be obtained, that +they had Lord Camden and Mr. York's opinion on that head, which +opinion with some others that Ld. Dunmore had consulted, and with +the knowledge Conolly had given him of the quality of the country +and his determined resolution to settle his family on this +continent, were the real motives or springs of the present +expedition." +</P> + +<P> +At this very time, Patrick Henry, in conjunction with William +Byrd 3d and others, was negotiating for a private purchase of +lands from the Cherokees; and when Wharton, after answering +Henry's inquiry as to where he might buy Indian goods, remarked: +"It's not possible you mean to enter the Indian trade at this +period," Henry laughingly replied: "The wish-world is my hobby +horse." "From whence I conclude," adds Wharton, "he has some +prospect of making a purchase of the natives, but where I know +not." +</P> + +<P> +The war, thus promulgated, we believe, at Dunmore's secret +instigation and heralded by a series of ghastly atrocities, came +on apace. After the inhuman murder of the family of Logan, the +Indian chieftain, by one Greathouse and his drunken companions +(April 30th), Logan, who contrary to romantic views was a +blackhearted and vengeful savage, harried the Tennessee and +Virginia borders, burning and slaughtering. Unable to arouse the +Cherokees, owing to the opposition of Atta-kulla-kulla, Logan as +late as July 21st said in a letter to the whites: "The Indians +are not angry, only myself," and not until then did Dunmore begin +to give full execution to his warlike plans. The best woodsmen of +the border, Daniel Boone and the German scout Michael Stoner, +having been despatched on July 27th by Colonel William Preston to +warn the surveyors of the trans-Alleghany, made a remarkable +journey on foot of eight hundred miles in sixty-one days. +Harrod's company at Harrodsburg, a company of surveyors at +Fontainebleau, Floyd's party on the Kentucky, and the surveyors +at Mann's Lick, this warned, hurried in to the settlements and +were saved. Meanwhile, Dunmore, in command of the Virginia +forces, invaded territory guaranteed to the Indians by the royal +proclamation of 1763 and recently (1774) added to the province of +Quebec, a fact of which he was not aware, conducted a vigorous +campaign, and fortified Camp Charlotte, near Old Chillicothe. +Andrew Lewis, however, in charge of the other division of +Dunmore's army, was the one destined to bear the real brunt and +burden of the campaign. His division, recruited from the very +flower of the pioneers of the Old Southwest, was the most +representative body of borderers of this region that up to this +time had assembled to measure strength with the red men. It was +an army of the true stalwarts of the frontier, with fringed +leggings and hunting-capes, rifles and powder-horns, +hunting-knives and tomahawks. +</P> + +<P> +The Battle of the Great Kanawha, at Point Pleasant, was fought on +October 10, 1774, between Lewis's force, eleven hundred strong, +and the Indians, under Cornstalk, somewhat inferior in numbers. +It was a desultory action, over a greatly extended front and in +very brushy country between Crooked Creek and the Ohio. +Throughout the long day, the Indians fought with rare craft and +stubborn bravery—loudly cursing the white men, cleverly picking +off their leaders, and derisively inquiring, in regard to the +absence of the fifes: "Where are your whistles now?" Slowly +retreating, they sought to draw the whites into an ambuscade and +at a favorable moment to "drive the Long Knives like bullocks +into the river." No marked success was achieved on either side +until near sunset, when a flank movement directed by young Isaac +Shelby alarmed the Indians, who mistook this party for the +expected reinforcement under Christian, and retired across the +Ohio. In the morning the whites were amazed to discover that the +Indians, who the preceding day so splendidly heeded the echoing +call of Cornstalk, "Be strong! Be strong!", had quit the +battlefield and left the victory with the whites. +</P> + +<P> +The peace negotiated by Dunmore was durable. The governor had +accomplished his purpose, defied the authority of the crown, and +vindicated the claim of Virginia, to the enthusiastic +satisfaction of the backwoodsmen. While tendering their thanks to +him and avowing their allegiance to George III, at the close of +the campaign, the borderers proclaimed their resolution to exert +all their powers "for the defense of American liberty, and for +the support of her just rights and privileges, not in any +precipitous, riotous or tumultuous manner, but when regularly +called forth by the unanimous voice of our countrymen." Dunmore's +War is epochal, in that it procured for the nonce a state of +peace with the Indians, which made possible the advance of Judge +Henderson over the Transylvania Trail in 1775, and, through his +establishment of the Transylvania Fort at Boonesborough, the +ultimate acquisition by the American Confederation of the +imperial domain of the trans-Alleghany. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIV. Richard Henderson and the Transylvania Company +</H3> + + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I happened to fall in company, and have a great deal of +conversation with one of the most singular and extraordinary +persons and excentric geniuses in America, and perhaps in the +world. His name is Richard Henderson.—J. F. D. Smyth: A Tour in +the United States of America. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Early in 1774, chastened by his own disastrous failure the +preceding autumn, Boone advised Judge Henderson that the time was +auspicious for opening negotiations with the Cherokees for +purchasing the trans-Alleghany region." In organizing a company +for this purpose, Henderson chose men of action and resource, +leaders in the colony, ready for any hazard of life and fortune +in this gigantic scheme of colonization and promotion. The new +men included, in addition to the partners in the organization +known as Richard Henderson and Company, were Colonel John +Luttrell, destined to win laurels in the Revolution, and William +Johnston, a native of Scotland, the leading merchant of +Hillsborough. +</P> + +<P> +Meeting in Hillsborough on August 27, 1774, these men organized +the new company under the name of the Louisa Company. In the +articles then drawn up they agreed to "rent or purchase" a tract +of land from the Indian owners of the soil for the express +purpose of "settling the country." Each partner obligated himself +to "furnish his Quota of Expenses necessary towards procuring the +grant." In full anticipation of the grave dangers to be +encountered, they solemnly bound themselves, as "equal sharers in +the property," to "support each other with our lives and +fortunes." Negotiations with the Indians were begun at once. +Accompanied by Colonel Nathaniel Hart and guided by the +experienced Indian-trader, Thomas Price, Judge Henderson visited +the Cherokee chieftains at the Otari towns. After elaborate +consultations, the latter deputed the old chieftain, +Atta-kulla-kulla, a young buck, and a squaw, "to attend the said +Henderson and Hart to North Carolina, and there examine the Goods +and Merchandize which had been by them offered as the +Consideration of the purchase." The goods purchased at Cross +Creek (now Fayetteville, North Carolina), in which the Louisa +Company "had embarked a large amount," met the entire approval of +the Indians—the squaw in particular shrewdly examining the goods +in the interest of the women of the tribe. +</P> + +<P> +On January 6, 1775, the company was again enlarged, and given the +name of the Transylvania Company-the three new partners being +David Hart, brother to Thomas and Nathaniel, Leonard Henley +Bullock, a prominent citizen of Granville, and James Hogg, of +Hillsborough, a native Scotchman and one of the most influential +men in the colony. In the elaborate agreement drawn up reference +is explicitly made to the contingency of "settling and voting as +a proprietor and giving Rules and Regulations for the Inhabitants +etc." Hillsborough was the actual starting-point for the westward +movement, the first emigrants, traveling thence to the Sycamore +Shoals of the Watauga. In speaking of the departure of the +settlers, the first movement of extended and permanent westward +migration, an eye-witness quaintly says: "At this place +[Hillsborough] I saw the first party of emigrant families that +moved to Kentucky under the auspices of Judge Henderson. They +marched out of the town with considerable solemnity, and to many +their destination seemed as remote as if it had been to the South +Sea Islands." Meanwhile, the "Proposals for the encouragement of +settling the lands etc.," issued on Christmas Day, 1774, were +quickly spread broadcast through the colony and along the +border." It was the greatest sensation North Carolina had known +since Alamance; and Archibald Neilson, deputy-auditor and naval +officer of the colony, inquired with quizzical anxiety: "Pray, is +Dick Henderson out of his head?" The most liberal terms, +proffered by one quite in possession of his head, were embodied +in these proposals. Land at twenty shillings per hundred acres +was offered to each emigrant settling within the territory and +raising a crop of corn before September 1, 1775, the emigrant +being permitted to take up as much as five hundred acres for him +self and two hundred and fifty acres for each tithable person +under him. In these "Proposals" there was no indication that the +low terms at which the lands were offered would be maintained +after September 1, 1775. In a letter to Governor Dunmore +(January, 1775), Colonel William Preston, county surveyor of +Fincastle County, Virginia, says "The low price he [Henderson] +proposes to sell at, together with some further encouragement he +offers, will I am apprehensive induce a great many families to +remove from this County (Fincastle) & Carolina and settle there." +Joseph Martin, states his son, "was appointed entry-Taker and +agent for the Powell Valley portion" of the Transylvania Purchase +on January 20, 1775; and "he (Joseph Martin) and others went on +in the early part of the year 1775 and made their stand at the +very spot where he had made corn several years before. In +speaking of the startling design, unmasked by Henderson, of +establishing an independent government, Colonel Preston writes to +George Washington of the contemplated "large Purchase by one Col. +Henderson of North Carolina from the Cherokees.... I hear +that Henderson talks with great Freedom & Indecency of the +Governor of Virginia, sets the Government at Defiance & says if +he once had five hundred good Fellows settled in that Country he +would not Value Virginia." +</P> + +<P> +Early in 1775 runners were sent off to the Cherokee towns to +summon the Indians to the treaty ground at the Sycamore Shoals of +the Watauga; and Boone, after his return from a hunt in Kentucky +in January, was summoned by Judge Henderson to aid in the +negotiations preliminary to the actual treaty. The dominating +figure in the remarkable assemblage at the treaty ground, +consisting of twelve hundred Indians and several hundred whites, +was Richard Henderson, "comely in person, of a benign and social +disposition," with countenance betokening the man of strenuous +action" noble forehead, prominent nose, projecting chin, firm-set +jaw, with kindness and openness of expression." Gathered about +him, picturesque in garb and striking in appearance, were many of +the buckskin-clad leaders of the border—James Robertson, John +Sevier, Isaac Shelby, William Bailey Smith, and their +compeers—as well as his Carolina friends John Williams, Thomas +and Nathaniel Hart, Nathaniel Henderson, Jesse Benton, and +Valentine Searcy. +</P> + +<P> +Little was accomplished on the first day of the treaty (March +14th); but on the next day, the Cherokees offered to sell the +section bargained for by Donelson acting as agent for Virginia in +1771. Although the Indians pointed out that Virginia had never +paid the promised compensation of five hundred pounds and had +therefore forfeited her rights, Henderson flatly refused to +entertain the idea of purchasing territory to which Virginia had +the prior claim. Angered by Henderson's refusal, The Dragging +Canoe, leaping into the circle of the seated savages, made an +impassioned speech touched with the romantic imagination peculiar +to the American Indian. With pathetic eloquence he dwelt upon the +insatiable land-greed of the white men, and predicted the +extinction of his race if they committed the insensate folly of +selling their beloved hunting-grounds. Roused to a high pitch of +oratorical fervor, the savage with uplifted arm fiercely exhorted +his people to resist further encroachments at all hazards—and +left the treaty ground. This incident brought the conference to a +startling and abrupt conclusion. On the following day, however, +the savages proved more tractable, agreeing to sell the land as +far as the Cumberland River. In order to secure the additional +territory watered by the tributaries of the Cumberland, Henderson +agreed to pay an additional sum of two thousand pounds. Upon this +day there originated the ominous phrase descriptive of Kentucky +when The Dragging Canoe, dramatically pointing toward the west, +declared that a DARK Cloud hung over that land, which was known +as the BLOODY GROUND. +</P> + +<P> +On the last day, March 17th, the negotiations were opened with +the signing of the "Great Grant." The area purchased, some twenty +millions of acres, included almost all the present state of +Kentucky, and an immense tract in Tennessee, comprising all the +territory watered by the Cumberland River and all its +tributaries. For "two thousand weight of leather in goods" +Henderson purchased "the lands lying down Holston and between the +Watauga lease, Colonel Donelson's line and Powell's Mountain" as +a pathway to Kentucky—the deed for which was known as the "Path +Deed." By special arrangement, Carter's Valley in this tract went +to Carter and Lucas; two days later, for two thousand pounds, +Charles Robertson on behalf of the Watauga Association purchased +a large tract in the valleys of the Holston, Watauga, and New +Rivers; and eight days later Jacob Brown purchased two large +areas, including the Nolichucky Valley. This historic treaty, +which heralds the opening of the West, was conducted with +absolute justice and fairness by Judge Henderson and his +associates. No liquor was permitted at the treaty ground; and +Thomas Price, the ablest of the Cherokee traders, deposed that +"he at that time understood the Cherokee language, so as to +comprehend everything which was said and to know that what was +observed on either side was fairly and truly translated; that the +Cherokees perfectly understood, what Lands were the subject of +the Treaty...." The amount paid by the Transylvania Company +for the imperial domain was ten thousand pounds sterling, in +money and in goods. +</P> + +<P> +Although Daniel Boone doubtless assisted in the proceedings prior +to the negotiation of the treaty, his name nowhere appears in the +voluminous records of the conference. Indeed, he was not then +present; for a fortnight before the conclusion of the treaty he +was commissioned by Judge Henderson to form a party of competent +woodmen to blaze a passage through the wilderness. On March 10th +this party of thirty ax-men, under the leadership of Boone, +started from the rendezvous, the Long Island of Holston, to +engage in the arduous labor of cutting out the Transylvania +Trail. +</P> + +<P> +Henderson, the empire-builder, now faced with courage and +resolution the hazardous task of occupying the purchased +territory and establishing an independent government. No mere +financial promoter of a vast speculative enterprise, he was one +of the heroic figures of the Old Southwest; and it was his +dauntless courage, his unwavering resolve to go forward in the +face of all dangers, which carried through the armed "trek" to a +successful conclusion. At Martin's Station, where Henderson and +his party tarried to build a house in which to store their +wagons, as the road could be cleared no further, they were joined +by another party, of five adventurers from Prince William County, +Virginia." In Henderson's party were some forty men and boys, +with forty packhorses and a small amount of powder, lead, salt, +and garden-seeds. The warning freely given by Joseph Martin of +the perils of the path was soon confirmed, as appears from the +following entry in Henderson's diary: +</P> + +<P> +"Friday the 7th. [April] About Brake of Day began to snow. About +11 O'Clock received a letter from Mr. Luttrells camp that were +five persons killd on the road to the Cantuckie by Indians. Capt. +[Nathaniel] Hart, uppon the receipt of this News Retreated back +with his Company, & determined to Settle in the Valley to make +Corn for the Cantucky people. The same Day Received a Letter from +Dan. Boone, that his Company was fired uppon by Indians, Kill'd +Two of his men—tho he kept the ground & saved the Baggage &c." +</P> + +<P> +The following historic letter, which reveals alike the dogged +resolution of Boone and his reliance upon Henderson and his +company in this black hour of disaster, addressed "Colonel +Richard Henderson—these with care," is eloquent in its +simplicity +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"Dear Colonel: After my compliments to you, I shall acquaint you +of our misfortunes. On March the 25 a party of Indians fired on +my Company about half an hour before day, and killed Mr. Twitty +and his negro, and wounded Mr. Walker very deeply, but I hope he +will recover. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"On March the 28 as we were hunting for provisions, we found +Samuel Tate's son, who gave us an account that the Indians fired +on their camp on the 27th day. My brother and I went down and +found two men killed and sculped, Thomas McDowell and Jeremiah +McFeters. I have sent a man down to all the lower companies in +order to gather them all at the mouth of Otter Creek. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"My advice to you, Sir, is to come or send as soon as possible. +Your company is desired greatly, for the people are very uneasy, +but are willing to stay and venture their lives with you, and now +is the time to flusterate their [the Indians'] intentions, and +keep the country, whilst we are in it. If we give way to them +now, it will ever be the case. This day we start from the battle +ground, for the mouth of Otter Creek, where we shall immediately +erect a Fort, which will be done before you can come or send, +then we can send ten men to meet you, if you send for them. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"I am, Sir, your most obedient<BR> + Omble Sarvent<BR> +Daniel Boone. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"N.B. We stood on the ground and guarded our baggage till day, +and lost nothing. We have about fifteen miles to Cantuck +[Kentucky River] at Otter Creek." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This dread intelligence caused the hearts of strong men to quail +and induced some to turn back, but Henderson, the jurist-pioneer, +was made of sterner stuff. At once (April 8th) he despatched an +urgent letter in hot haste to the proprietors of Transylvania, +enclosing Boone's letter, informing them of Boone's plight and +urging them to send him immediately a large quantity of powder +and lead, as he had been compelled to abandon his supply of +saltpeter at Martin's Station. "We are all in high spirits," he +assures the proprietors, "and on thorns to fly to Boone's +assistance, and join him in defense of so fine and valuable a +country." +</P> + +<P> +Laconically eloquent is this simple entry in his diary: "Saturday +the 8th. Started abt. 10 oClock Crossed Cumberland Gap about 4 +miles met about 40 persons Returning from the Cantucky, on Acct. +of the Late Murders by the Indians could prevail on one only to +return. Memo Several Virginians who were with us return'd." +</P> + +<P> +There is no more crucial moment in early Western history than +this, in which we see the towering form of Henderson, clad in the +picturesque garb of the pioneer, with outstretched arm resolutely +pointing forward to the "dark and bloody ground," and in +impassioned but futile eloquence pleading with the pale and +panic-stricken fugitives to turn about, to join his company, and +to face once more the mortal dangers of pioneer conquest. +Significant indeed are the lines: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Some to endure, and many to fail,<BR> +Some to conquer, and many to quail,<BR> +Toiling over the Wilderness Trail.<BR> +</P> + +<P> +The spirit of the pioneer knight-errant inspires Henderson's +words: "In this situation, some few, of genuine courage and +undaunted resolution, served to inspire the rest; by the help of +whose example, assisted by a little pride and some ostentation, +we made a shift to march on with all the appearance of gallantry, +and, cavalier like, treated every insinuation of danger with the +utmost contempt." +</P> + +<P> +Fearing that Boone, who did not even know that Henderson's +cavalcade was on the road, would be unable to hold out, Henderson +realized the imperative necessity for sending him a message of +encouragement. The bold young Virginian, William Cocke, +volunteered to brave alone the dangers of the murder-haunted +trail to undertake a ride more truly memorable and hazardous than +that of Revere. "This offer, extraordinary as it was, we could by +no means refuse," remarks Henderson, who shed tears of gratitude +as he proffered his sincere thanks and wrung the brave +messenger's hand. Equipped with "a good Queen Anne's musket, +plenty of ammunition, a tomahawk, a large cuttoe knife [French, +couteau], a Dutch blanket, and no small quantity of jerked beef," +Cocke on April 10th rode off "to the Cantuckey to Inform Capt +Boone that we were on the road." The fearful apprehensions felt +for Cocke's safety were later relieved, when along the road were +discovered his letters in forming Henderson of his arrival and of +his having been joined on the way by Page Portwood of Rowan. On +his arrival at Otter Creek, Cocke found Boone and his men, and on +relating his adventures, "came in for his share of applause." +Boone at once despatched the master woodman, Michael Stoner, with +pack-horses to assist Henderson's party, which he met on April +18th at their encampment "in the Eye of the Rich Land." Along +with "Excellent Beef in plenty," Stoner brought the story of +Boone's determined stand and an account of the erection of a rude +little fortification which they had hurriedly thrown up to resist +attack. With laconic significance Henderson pays the following +tribute to Boone which deserves to be perpetuated in national +annals: "It was owing to Boone's confidence in us, and the +people's in him, that a stand was ever attempted in order to wait +for our coming." +</P> + +<P> +In the course of their journey over the mountains and through the +wilderness, the pioneers forgot the trials of the trail in the +face of the surpassing beauties of the country. The Cumberlands +were covered with rich undergrowth of the red and white +rhododendron, the delicate laurel, the mountain ivy, the +flameazalea, the spicewood, and the cane; while the white stars +of the dogwood and the carmine blossoms of the red-bud, strewn +across the verdant background of the forest, gleamed in the eager +air of spring. "To enter uppon a detail of the Beuty & Goodness +of our Country," writes Nathaniel Henderson, "would be a task too +arduous.... Let it suffice to tell you it far exceeds any +country I ever saw or herd off. I am conscious its out of the +power of any man to make you clearly sensible of the great Beuty +and Richness of Kentucky." Young Felix Walker, endowed with more +vivid powers of description, says with a touch of native +eloquence: +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps no Adventurer Since the days of donquicksotte or before +ever felt So Cheerful & Ilated in prospect, every heart abounded +with Joy & excitement ... & exclusive of the Novelties of the +Journey the advantages & accumalations arising on the Settlement +of a new Country was a dazzling object with many of our Company.... +As the Cain ceased, we began to discover the pleasing & +Rapturous appearance of the plains of Kentucky, a New Sky & +Strange Earth to be presented to our view.... So Rich a Soil +we had never Saw before, Covered with Clover in full Bloom. the +Woods alive abounding in wild Game, turkeys so numerous that it +might be said there appeared but one flock Universally Scattered +in the woods ... it appeared that Nature in the profusion of +her Bounties, had Spread a feast for all that lives, both for the +Animal & Rational World, a Sight so delightful to our View and +grateful to our feelings almost Induced us, in Immitation of +Columbus in Transport to Kiss the Soil of Kentucky, as he haild & +Saluted the sand on his first setting his foot on the Shores of +America." +</P> + +<P> +On the journey Henderson was joined in Powell's Valley by +Benjamin Logan, afterward so famous in Kentucky annals, and a +companion, William Galaspy. At the Crab Orchard they left +Henderson's party; and turning their course westward finally +pitched camp in the present Lincoln County, where Logan +subsequently built a fort. On Sunday, April 16th, on Scaggs's +Creek, Henderson records: "About 12 oClock Met James McAfee with +18 other persons Returning from Cantucky." They advised Henderson +of the "troublesomeness and danger" of the Indians, says Robert +McAfee junior: "but Henderson assured them that he had purchased +the whole country from the Indians, that it belonged to him, and +he had named it Transylvania.... Robt, Samuel, and William +McAfee and 3 others were inclined to return, but James opposed +it, alleging that Henderson had no right to the land, and that +Virginia had previously bought it. The former (6) returned with +Henderson to Boonesborough." Among those who had joined +Henderson's party was Abraham Hanks from Virginia, the maternal +grandfather of Abraham Lincoln; but alarmed by the stories +brought by Stewart and his party of fugitives, Hanks and Drake, +as recorded by William Calk on that day (April 13th), turned +back. +</P> + +<P> +At last the founder of Kentucky with his little band reached the +destined goal of their arduous journeyings. Henderson's record on +his birthday runs: "Thursday the 20th [April] Arrived at Fort +Boone on the Mouth of Oter Creek Cantuckey River where we were +Saluted by a running fire of about 25 Guns; all that was then at +Fort.... The men appeared in high spirits & much rejoiced in +our arrival." It is a coincidence of historic interest that just +one day after the embattled farmers at Lexington and Concord +"fired the shots heard round the world," the echoing shots of +Boone and his sturdy backwoodsmen rang out to announce the +arrival of the proprietor of Transylvania and the birth of the +American West. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XV. Transylvania—A wilderness Commonwealth +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +You are about a work of the utmost importance to the well-being +of this country in general, in which the interest and security of +each and every individual are inseparably connected .... Our +peculiar circumstances in this remote country, surrounded on all +sides with difficulties, and equally subject to one common +danger, which threatens our common overthrow, must, I think, in +their effects, secure to us an union of interests, and, +consequently, that harmony in opinion, so essential to the +forming good, wise and wholesome laws.—Judge Richard Henderson: +Address to the Legislature of Transylvania, May 23, 1775. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The independent spirit displayed by the Transylvania Company, and +Henderson's procedure in open defiance of the royal governors of +both North Carolina and Virginia, naturally aroused grave alarm +throughout these colonies and South Carolina. "This in my +Opinion," says Preston in a letter to George Washington (January +31, 1775), "will soon become a serious Affair, & highly deserves +the Attention of the Government. For it is certain that a vast +Number of People are preparing to go out and settle on this +Purchase; and if once they get fixed there, it will be next to +impossible to remove them or reduce them to Obedience; as they +are so far from the Seat of Government. Indeed it may be the +Cherokees will support them." Governor Martin of North Carolina, +already deeply disturbed in anticipation of the coming +revolutionary cataclysm, thundered in what was generally regarded +as a forcible-feeble proclamation (February 19, 1775) against +"Richard Henderson and his Confederates" in their "daring, unjust +and unwarrantable proceedings." In a letter to Dartmouth he +denounces "Henderson the famous invader" and dubs the +Transylvania Company "an infamous Company of land Pyrates." +</P> + +<P> +Officials who were themselves eager for land naturally opposed +Henderson's plans. Lord Dunmore, who in 1774, as we have seen, +was heavily interested in the Wabash Land Company engineered by +William Murray, took the ground that the Wabash purchase was +valid under the Camden-Yorke decision. This is so stated in the +records of the Illinois Company. Likewise under Murray's control. +But although the "Ouabache Company," of which Dunmore was a +leading member, was initiated as early as May 16, 1774, the +purchase of the territory was not formally effected until October +18, 1775—too late to benefit Dunmore, then deeply embroiled in +the preliminaries to the Revolution. Under the cover of his +agent's name, it is believed, Dunmore, with his "passion for land +and fees," illegally entered tracts aggregating thousands of +acres of land surveyed by the royal surveyors in the summer of +1774 for Dr. John Connolly. Early in this same year, Patrick +Henry, who, as already pointed out, had entered large tracts in +Kentucky in violation of Virginia's treaty obligations with the +Cherokees, united with William Byrd 3d, John Page, Ralph Wormley, +Samuel Overton, and William Christian, in the effort to purchase +from the Cherokees a tract of land west of Donelson's line, being +firmly persuaded of the validity of the Camden-Yorke opinion. +Their agent, William Kenedy, considerably later in the year, went +on a mission to the Cherokee towns, and upon his return reported +that the Indians might be induced to sell. When it became known +that Judge Henderson had organized the Transylvania Company and +anticipated Patrick Henry and his associates, Colonel Arthur +Campbell, as he himself states, applied to several of the +partners of the Transylvania Company on behalf of Patrick Henry, +requesting that Henry be taken in as a partner. It was afterward +stated, as commonly understood among the Transylvania +proprietors, that both Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson desired +to become members of the company; but that Colonel Richard +Henderson was instrumental in preventing their admission "lest +they should supplant the Colonel [Henderson] as the guiding +spirit of the company." +</P> + +<P> +Fully informed by Preston's elaborate communication on the +gravity of the situation, Dunmore acted energetically, though +tardily, to prevent the execution of Henderson's designs. On +March 21st Dunmore sent flying through the back country a +proclamation, demanding the immediate relinquishment of the +territory by "one Richard Henderson and other disorderly persons, +his associates," and "in case of refusal, and of violently +detaining such possession, that he or they be immediately fined +and imprisoned. This proclamation, says a peppery old chronicler, +may well rank with the one excepting those arch traitors and +rebels, Samuel Adams and John Hancock, from the mercy of the +British monarch. In view of Dunmore's confidence in the validity +of the Camden-Yorke decision, it is noteworthy that no mention of +the royal proclamation of 1763 occurs in his broadside; and that +he bases his objection to the Transylvania purchase upon the +king's instructions that all vacant lands "within this colony" be +laid off in tracts, from one hundred to one thousand acres in +extent, and sold at public auction. This proclamation which was +enclosed, oddly enough, in a letter of official instructions to +Preston warning him not to survey any lands "beyond the line run +by Colonel Donaldson," proved utterly ineffective. At the same +time, Dunmore despatched a pointed letter to Oconostota, +Atta-kulla-kulla, Judge's Friend, and other Cherokee chieftains, +notifying them that the sale of the great tract of land below the +Kentucky was illegal and threatening them with the king's +displeasure if they did not repudiate the sale. +</P> + +<P> +News of the plans which Henderson had already matured for +establishing an independent colony in the trans-Alleghany +wilderness, now ran like wild-fire through Virginia. In a letter +to George Washington (April 9, 1775), Preston ruefully says: +"Henderson I hear has made the Purchase & got a Conveyance of the +great and Valluable Country below the Kentucky from the +Cherokees. He and about 300 adventurers are gone out to take +Possession, who it is said intends to set up an independent +Government & form a Code of Laws for themselves. How this may be +I cant say, but I am affraid the steps taken by the Government +have been too late. Before the Purchase was made had the Governor +interfered it is believed the Indians would not have sold." +</P> + +<P> +Meanwhile Judge Henderson, with strenuous energy, had begun to +erect a large stockaded fort according to plans of his own. +Captain James Harrod with forty-two men was stationed at the +settlement he had made the preceding year, having arrived there +before the McAfees started back to Virginia; and there were small +groups of settlers at Boiling Spring, six miles southeast of +Harrods settlement, and at St. Asaph's, a mile west of the +present Stanford. A representative government for Transylvania +was then planned. When the frank and gallant Floyd arrived at the +Transylvania Fort on May 3d, he "expressed great satisfaction," +says Judge Henderson, "on being informed of the plan we proposed +for Legislation & sayd he must most heartily concur in that & +every other measure we should adopt for the well Govern'g or good +of the Community in Gen'l." In reference to a conversation with +Captain James Harrod and Colonel Thomas Slaughter of Virginia, +Henderson notes in his diary (May 8th): "Our plan of Legislation, +the evils pointed out—the remedies to be applyed &c &c &c were +Acceeded to without Hesitation. The plann was plain & Simple—'twas +nothing novel in its essence a thousand years ago it was +in use, and found by every year's experience since to be +unexceptionable. We were in four distinct settlem'ts. Members or +delegates from every place by free choice of Individuals they +first having entered into writings solemnly binding themselves to +obey and carry into Execution Such Laws as representatives should +from time to time make, Concurred with, by A Majority of the +Proprietors present in the Country." +</P> + +<P> +In reply to inquiries of the settlers, Judge Henderson gave as +his reason for this assembling of a Transylvania Legislature that +"all power was derived from the people." Six days before the +prophetic arrival of the news of the Battle of Lexington and +eight days before the revolutionary committee of Mecklenburg +County, North Carolina, promulgated their memorable Resolves +establishing laws for independent government, the pioneers +assembled on the green beneath the mighty plane-tree at the +Transylvania Fort. In his wise and statesmanlike address to this +picturesque convention of free Americans (May 23, 1775), an +address which Felix Walker described as being "considered equal +to any of like kind ever delivered to any deliberate body in that +day and time," Judge Henderson used these memorable words: +</P> + +<P> +"You, perhaps, are fixing the palladium, or placing the first +corner stone of an edifice, the height and magnificence of whose +superstructure ... can only become great in proportion to the +excellence of its foundation.... If any doubt remain amongst +you with respect to the force or efficiency of whatever laws you +now, or hereafter make, be pleased to consider that ALL POWER IS +ORIGINALLY IN THE PEOPLE; MAKE AND THEIR INTEREST, THEREFORE, BY +IMPARTIAL AND BENEFICENT LAWS, AND YOU MAY BE SURE OF THEIR +INCLINATION TO SEE THEM ENFORCED." +</P> + +<P> +An early writer, in speaking of the full blooded democracy of +these "advanced" sentiments, quaintly comments: "If Jeremy +Bentham had been in existence of manhood, he would have sent his +compliments to the President of Transylvania." This, the first +representative body of American freemen which ever convened west +of the Alleghanies, is surely the most unique colonial government +ever set up on this continent. The proceedings of this backwoods +legislature—the democratic leader ship of the principal +proprietor; the prudence exhibited in the laws for protecting +game, breeding horses, etc.; the tolerance shown in the granting +of full religious liberty—all display the acumen and practical +wisdom of these pioneer law-givers. As the result of Henderson's +tactfulness, the proprietary form of government, thoroughly +democratized in tone, was complacently accepted by the backwoods +men. From one who, though still under royal rule, vehemently +asserted that the source of all political power was the people, +and that "laws derive force and efficiency from our mutual +consent," Western democracy thus born in the wilderness was +"taking its first political lesson." In their answer to +Henderson's assertion of freedom from alien authority the +pioneers unhesitatingly declared: "That we have an absolute +right, as a political body, without giving umbrage to Great +Britain, or any of the colonies, to form rules for the government +of our little society, cannot be doubted by any sensible mind and +being without the jurisdiction of, and not answerable to any of +his Majesty's courts, the constituting tribunals of justice shall +be a matter of our first contemplation...." In the +establishment of a constitution for the new colony, Henderson +with paternalistic wisdom induced the people to adopt a legal +code based on the laws of England. Out of a sense of +self-protection he reserved for the proprietors only one +prerogative not granted them by the people, the right of veto. He +clearly realized that if this power were given up, the delegates +to any convention that might be held after the first would be +able to assume the claims and rights of the proprietors. +</P> + +<P> +A land-office was formally opened, deeds were issued, and a store +was established which supplied the colonists with powder, lead, +salt, osnaburgs, blankets, and other chief necessities of pioneer +existence. Writing to his brother Jonathan from Leestown, the +bold young George Rogers Clark, soon to plot the downfall of +Transylvania, enthusiastically says (July 6, 1775): "A richer and +more Beautifull Cuntry than this I believe has never been seen in +America yet. Col. Henderson is hear and Claims all ye Country +below Kentucke. If his Claim Should be good, land may be got +Reasonable Enough and as good as any in ye World." Those who +settled on the south side of Kentucky River acknowledged the +validity of the Transylvania purchase; and Clark in his Memoir +says: "the Proprietors at first took great pains to Ingratiate +themselves in the fav'r of the people." +</P> + +<P> +In regard to the designs of Lord Dunmore, who, as noted above, +had illegally entered the Connolly grant on the Ohio and sought +to outlaw Henderson, and of Colonel William Byrd 3d, who, after +being balked in Patrick Henry's plan to anticipate the +Transylvania Company in effecting a purchase from the Cherokees, +was supposed to have tried to persuade the Cherokees to repudiate +the "Great Treaty," Henderson defiantly says: "Whether Lord +Dunmore and Colonel Byrd have interfered with the Indians or not, +Richard Henderson is equally ignorant and indifferent. The utmost +result of their efforts can only serve to convince them of the +futility of their schemes and possibly frighten some few +faint-hearted persons, naturally prone to reverence great names +and fancy everything must shrink at the magic of a splendid +title." +</P> + +<P> +Prompted by Henderson's desire to petition the Continental +Congress then in session for recognition as the fourteenth +colony, the Transylvania legislature met again on the first +Thursday in September and elected Richard Henderson and John +Williams, among others, as delegates to the gathering at +Philadelphia. Shortly afterward the Proprietors of Transylvania +held a meeting at Oxford, North Carolina (September 25, 1775), +elected Williams as the agent of the colony, and directed him to +proceed to Boonesborough there to reside until April, 1776. James +Hogg, of Hillsborough, chosen as Delegate to represent the Colony +in the Continental Congress, was despatched to Philadelphia, +bearing with him an elaborate memorial prepared by the President, +Judge Henderson, petitioning the Congress "to take the infant +Colony of Transylvania into their protection." +</P> + +<P> +Almost immediately upon his arrival in Philadelphia, James Hogg +was presented to "the famous Samuel and John Adams." The latter +warned Hogg, in view of the efforts then making toward +reconciliation between the colonies and the king, that "the +taking under our protection a body of people who have acted in +defiance of the King's proclamation, will be looked on as a +confirmation of that independent spirit with which we are daily +reproached." Jefferson said that if his advice were followed, all +the use the Virginians should make of their charter would be "to +prevent any arbitrary or oppressive government to be established +within the boundaries of it"; and that it was his wish "to see a +free government established at the back of theirs [Virginia's] +properly united with them." He would not consent, however, that +Congress should acknowledge the colony of Transylvania, until it +had the approbation of the Virginia Convention. The quit-rents +imposed by the company were denounced in Congress as a mark of +vassalage; and many advised a law against the employment of +negroes in the colony. "They even threatened us with their +opposition," says Hogg, with precise veracity, "if we do not act +upon liberal principles when we have it so much in our power to +render ourselves immortal." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVI. The Repulse of the Red Men +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +To this short war may be properly attributed all the kind +feelings and fidelity to treaty stipulations manifested by the +Cherokees ever afterwards. General Rutherford instilled into the +Indians so great a fear of the whites, that never afterwards were +they disposed to engage in any cruelty, or destroy any of the +property of our frontier men.—David L. Swain: The Indian War of +1776. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +During the summer of 1775 the proprietors of Transylvania were +confronted with two stupendous tasks—that of winning the favor +and support of the frontiersmen and that of rallying the rapidly +dwindling forces in Kentucky in defense of the settlements. +Recognizing the difficulty of including Martin's Station, because +of its remoteness, with the government provided for Transylvania, +Judge Henderson prepared a plan of government for the group of +settlers located in Powell's Valley. In a letter to Martin (July +30th), in regard to the recent energetic defense of the settlers +at that point against the Indians, Henderson says: "Your spirited +conduct gives me much pleasure.... Keep your men in heart if +possible, NOW IS OUR TIME, THE INDIANS MUST NOT DRIVE US." The +gloom which had been occasioned by the almost complete desertion +of the stations at Harrodsburg, the Boiling Spring, and the +Transylvania Fort or Boonesborough was dispelled with the return +of Boone, accompanied by some thirty persons, on September 8th, +and of Richard Callaway with a considerable party on September +26th. The crisis was now passed; and the colony began for the +first time really to flourish. The people on the south side of +the Kentucky River universally accepted proprietary rule for the +time being. But the seeds of dissension were soon to be sown +among those who settled north of the river, as well as among men +of the stamp of James Harrod, who, having preceded Henderson in +the establishment of a settlement in Kentucky, naturally resented +holding lands under the Transylvania Company. +</P> + +<P> +The great liberality of this organization toward incoming +settlers had resulted in immense quantities of land being taken +up through their land-office. The ranging, hunting, and +road-building were paid for by the company; and the entire +settlement was furnished with powder, lead, and supplies, wholly +on credit, for this and the succeeding year. "Five hundred and +sixty thousand acres of land are now entered," reports Floyd on +December 1st, "and most of the people waiting to have it run +out." After Dunmore, having lost his hold upon the situation, +escaped to the protection of a British vessel, the Fowey, Colonel +Preston continued to prevent surveys for officers' grants within +the Transylvania territory; and his original hostility to Judge +Henderson gave place to friendship and support. On December 1st, +Colonel John Williams, resident agent of the Transylvania +Company, announced at Boonesborough the long-contemplated and +widely advertised advance in price of the lands, from twenty to +fifty shillings per hundred acres, with surveying fees of four +dollars for tracts not exceeding six hundred and forty acres. At +a meeting of the Transylvania legislature, convened on December +21st, John Floyd was chosen surveyor general of the colony, +Nathaniel Henderson was placed in charge of the Entering Office, +and Richard Harrison given the post of secretary. At this meeting +of the legislature, the first open expression of discontent was +voiced in the "Harrodsburg Remonstrance," questioning the +validity of the proprietors' title, and protesting against any +increase in the price of lands, as well as the taking up by the +proprietors and a few other gentlemen of the best lands at the +Falls of the Ohio. Every effort was made to accommodate the +remonstrants, who were led by Abraham Hite. Office fees were +abolished, and the payment of quit-rents was deferred until +January 1, 1780. Despite these efforts at accommodation, grave +doubts were implanted by this Harrodsburg Remonstrance in the +minds of the people; and much discussion and discontent ensued. +</P> + +<P> +By midsummer, 1775, George Rogers Clark, a remarkably +enterprising and independent young pioneer, was "engrossing all +the land he could" in Kentucky. Upon his return to Virginia, as +he relates, he "found there was various oppinions Respecting +Henderson claim. many thought it good, others douted whether or +not Virginia coud with propriety have any pretentions to the +cuntrey." Jefferson displayed a liberal attitude toward the +claims of the Transylvania proprietors; and Patrick Henry openly +stated that, in his opinion, "their claim would stand good." But +many others, of the stamp of George Mason and George Washington, +vigorously asserted Virginia's charter rights over the Western +territory." This sharp difference of opinion excited in Clark's +mind the bold conception of seizing the leadership of the country +and making terms with Virginia under threat of secession. With +the design of effecting some final disposition in regard to the +title of the Transylvania proprietors, Judge Henderson and +Colonel Williams set off from Boonesborough about May 1st, +intending first to appeal to the Virginia Convention and +ultimately to lay their claims before the Continental Congress. +"Since they have gone," reports Floyd to Preston, "I am told most +of the men about Harrodsburg have re-assumed their former +resolution of not complying with any of the office rules +whatever. Jack Jones, it is said, is at the head of the party & +flourishes away prodigiously." John Gabriel Jones was the mere +figurehead in the revolt. The real leader, the brains of the +conspiracy, was the unscrupulous George Rogers Clark. At Clark's +instance, an eight-day election was held at Harrodsburg (June +7-15), at which time a petition to the Virginia Convention was +drawn up; and Clark and Jones were elected delegates. Clark's +plan, the scheme of a bold revolutionist, was to treat with +Virginia for terms; and if they were not satisfactory, to revolt +and, as he says, "Establish an Independent Government" ... +"giving away great part of the Lands and disposing of the +Remainder." In a second petition, prepared by the self-styled +"Committee of West Fincastle" (June 20th), it was alleged that +"if these pretended Proprietors have leave to continue to act in +their arbitrary manner out the controul of this colony [Virginia] +the end must be evident to every well wisher to American +Liberty." +</P> + +<P> +The contest which now ensued between Richard Henderson and George +Rogers Clark, waged upon the floor of the convention and behind +the scenes, resulted in a conclusion that was inevitable at a +moment in American history marked by the signing of the +Declaration of Independence. Virginia, under the leader ship of +her new governor, Patrick Henry, put an end to the proprietary +rule of the Transylvania Company. On December 7th such part of +Transylvania as lay within the chartered limits of Virginia was +erected by the legislature of that colony into the County of +Kentucky. The proprietary form of government with its "marks of +vassalage," although liberalized with the spirit of democracy, +was unendurable to the independent and lawless pioneers, already +intoxicated with the spirit of freedom swept in on the first +fresh breezes of the Revolution. Yet it is not to be doubted that +the Transylvania Company, through the courage and moral influence +of its leaders, made a permanent contribution to the colonization +of the West, which, in providential timeliness and effective +execution, is without parallel in our early annals. +</P> + +<P> +While events were thus shaping themselves in Kentucky—events +which made possible Clark's spectacular and meteoric campaign in +the Northwest and ultimately resulted in the establishment of the +Mississippi instead of the Alleghanies as the western boundary of +the Confederation—the pioneers of Watauga were sagaciously +laying strong the foundations of permanent occupation. In +September, 1775, North Carolina, through her Provincial Congress, +provided for the appointment in each district of a Committee of +Safety, to consist of a president and twelve other members. +Following the lead thus set, the Watauga settlers assumed for +their country the name of "Washington District"; and proceeded by +unanimous vote of the people to choose a committee of thirteen, +which included James Robertson and John Sevier. This district was +organized "shortly after October, 1775, according to Felix +Walker; and the first step taken after the election of the +committee was the organization of a court, consisting of five +members. Felix Walker was elected clerk of the court thus +organized, and held the position for about four years. James +Robertson and John Sevier, it is believed, were also members of +this court. To James Robertson who, with the assistance of his +colleagues, devised this primitive type of frontier rule—a true +commission form of government, on the "Watauga Plan"—is justly +due distinctive recognition for this notable inauguration of the +independent democracy of the Old Southwest. The Watauga +settlement was animated by a spirit of deepest loyalty to the +American cause. In a memorable petition these hardy settlers +requested the Provincial Council of North Carolina not to regard +them as a "lawless mob," but to "annex" them to North Carolina +without delay. "This committee (willing to become a party in the +present unhappy contest)", states the petition, which must have +been drafted about July 15, 1776, "resolved (which is now on our +records), to adhere strictly to the rules and orders of the +Continental Congress, and in open committee acknowledged +themselves indebted to the united colonies their full proportion +of the Continental expense." +</P> + +<P> +While these disputes as to the government of the new communities +were in progress an additional danger threatened the pioneers. +For a whole year the British had been plying the various Indian +tribes from the lakes to the gulf with presents, supplies, and +ammunition. In the Northwest bounties had actually been offered +for American scalps. During the spring of 1776 plans were +concerted, chiefly through Stuart and Cameron, British agents +among the Southern Indians, for uniting the Loyalists and the +Indians in a crushing attack upon the Tennessee settlements and +the back country of North Carolina. Already the frontier of South +Carolina had passed through the horrors of Indian uprising; and +warning of the approaching invasion had been mercifully sent the +Holston settlers by Atta-kulla-kulla's niece, Nancy Ward, the +"Pocahontas of the West"—doubtless through the influence of her +daughter, who loved Joseph Martin. The settlers, flocking for +refuge into their small stockaded forts, waited in readiness for +the dreaded Indian attacks, which were made by two forces +totaling some seven hundred warriors. +</P> + +<P> +On July 20th, warned in advance of the approach of the Indians, +the borderers, one hundred and seventy in all, marched in two +columns from the rude breastwork, hastily thrown up at Eaton's +Station, to meet the Indians, double their own number, led by The +Dragging Canoe. The scouts surprised one party of Indians, +hastily poured in a deadly fire, and rushed upon them with such +impetuous fury that they fled precipitately. Withdrawing now +toward their breastwork, in anticipation of encountering there a +larger force, the backwoodsmen suddenly found themselves attacked +in their rear and in grave danger of being surrounded. Extending +their own line under the direction of Captain James Shelby, the +frontiersmen steadily met the bold attack of the Indians, who, +mistaking the rapid extension of the line for a movement to +retreat, incautiously made a headlong onslaught upon the whites, +giving the war-whoop and shouting: "The Unakas are running!" In +the ensuing hot conflict at close quarters, in some places hand +to hand, the Indians were utterly routed—The Dragging Canoe +being shot down, many warriors wounded, and thirteen left dead +upon the field. +</P> + +<P> +On the day after Thompson, Cocke, Shelby, Campbell, Madison, and +their men were thus winning the battle of the Long Island +"flats," Robertson, Sevier, and their little band of forty-two +men were engaged in repelling an attack, begun at sunrise, upon +the Watauga fort near the Sycamore Shoals. This attack, which was +led by Old Abraham, proved abortive; but as the result of the +loose investment of the log fortress, maintained by the Indians +for several weeks, a few rash venturers from the fort were killed +or captured, notably a young boy who was carried to one of the +Indian towns and burned at the stake, and the wife of the pioneer +settler, William Been, who was rescued from a like fate by the +intercession of the humane and noble Nancy Ward. It was during +this siege, according to constant tradition, that a frontier +lass, active and graceful as a young doe, was pursued to the very +stockade by the fleet-footed savages. Seeing her plight, an +athletic young officer mounted the stockade at a single leap, +shot down the foremost of the pursuers, and leaning over, seized +the maiden by the hands and lifted her over the stockade. The +maiden who sank breathless into the arms of the young officer, +John Sevier, was "Bonnie Kate Sherrill"—who, after the fashion +of true romance, afterward became the wife of her gallant +rescuer. +</P> + +<P> +While the Tennessee settlements were undergoing the trials of +siege and attack, the settlers on the frontiers of Rowan were +falling beneath the tomahawk of the merciless savage. In the +first and second weeks of July large forces of Indians penetrated +to the outlying settlements; and in two days thirty-seven persons +were killed along the Catawba River. On July 13th, the bluff old +soldier of Rowan, General Griffith Rutherford, reported to the +council of North Carolina that "three of our Captains are killed +and one wounded"; and that he was setting out that day with what +men he could muster to relieve Colonel McDowell, ten men, and one +hundred and twenty women and children, who were "besieged in some +kind of a fort." Aroused to extraordinary exertions by these +daring and deadly blows, the governments of North Carolina, South +Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia instituted a joint campaign +against the Cherokees. It was believed that, by delivering a +series of crushing blows to the Indians and so conclusively +demonstrating the overwhelming superiority of the whites, the +state governments in the Old Southwest would convince the savages +of the futility, of any attempt ever again to oppose them +seriously. +</P> + +<P> +Within less than a week after sending his despatches to the +council Rutherford set forth at the head of twenty-five hundred +men to protect the frontiers of North Carolina and to overwhelm +the foe. Leading the South Carolina army of more than eighteen +hundred men, Colonel Andrew Williamson directed his attack +against the lower Cherokee towns; while Colonel Samuel Jack led +two hundred Georgians against the Indian towns at the heads of +the Chattahoochee and Tugaloo Rivers. Assembling a force of some +sixteen hundred Virginians, Colonel William Christian +rendezvoused in August at the Long Island of Holston, where his +force was strengthened by between three and four hundred North +Carolinians under Colonels Joseph Williams and Love, and Major +Winston. The various expeditions met with little effective +opposition on the whole, succeeding everywhere in their design of +utterly laying waste the towns of the Cherokees. One serious +engagement occurred when the Indians resolutely challenged +Rutherford's advance at the gap of the Nantahala Mountains. +Indian women—heroic Amazons disguised in war-paint and armed +with the weapons of warriors and the courage of despair—fought +side by side with the Indian braves in the effort to arrest +Rutherford's progress and compass his defeat. More than forty +frontiersmen fell beneath the deadly shots of this truly Spartan +band before the final repulse of the savages. +</P> + +<P> +The most picturesque figures in this overwhelmingly successful +campaign were the bluff old Indian-fighter, Griffith Rutherford, +wearing "a tow hunting shirt, dyed black, and trimmed with white +fringe" as a uniform; Captain Benjamin Cleveland, a rude paladin +of gigantic size, strength, and courage; Lieutenant William +Lenoir (Le Noir), the gallant and recklessly brave French +Huguenot, later to win a general's rank in the Revolution; and +that militant man of God, the Reverend James Hall, graduate of +Nassau Hall, stalwart and manly, who carried a rifle on his +shoulder and, in the intervals between the slaughter of the +savages, preached the gospel to the vindictive and bloodthirsty +backwoodsmen. Such preaching was sorely needed on that campaign—when +the whites, maddened beyond the bounds of self-control by +the recent ghastly murders, gladly availed themselves of the +South Carolina bounty offered for fresh Indian scalps. At times +they exultantly displayed the reeking patches of hair above the +gates of their stockades; at others, with many a bloody oath, +they compelled their commanders either to sell the Indian +captives into slavery or else see them scalped on the spot. +Twenty years afterward Benjamin Hawkins relates that among Indian +refugees in extreme western Georgia the children had been so +terrorized by their parents' recitals of the atrocities of the +enraged borderers in the campaign of 1776, that they ran +screaming from the face of a white man. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVII. The Colonization of the Cumberland +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +March 31, 1760. Set out this day, and after running some +distance, met with Col. Richard Henderson, who was running the +line between Virginia and North Carolina. At this meeting we were +much rejoiced. He gave us every information we wished, and +further informed 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 without bread, and are +compelled to hunt the buffalo to preserve life.—John Donelson: +Journal of a Voyage, intended by God's permission, in the good +boat Adventure, from Fort Patrick Henry, on Holston River, to the +French Salt Springs on Cumberland River. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +To the settlements in Tennessee and Kentucky, which they had +seized and occupied, the pioneers held on with a tenacious grip +which never relaxed. From these strongholds, won through sullen +and desperate strokes, they pushed deeper into the wilderness, +once again to meet with undimmed courage the bitter onslaughts of +their resentful foes. The crushing of the Cherokees in 1776 +relieved the pressure upon the Tennessee settlers, enabling them +to strengthen their hold and prepare effectively for future +eventualities; the possession of the gateway to Kentucky kept +free the passage for Western settlement; Watauga and its +defenders continued to offer a formidable barrier to British +invasion of the East from Kentucky and the Northwest during the +Revolution; while these Tennessee frontiersmen were destined soon +to set forth again to invade a new wilderness and at frightful +cost to colonize the Cumberland. +</P> + +<P> +The little chain of stockades along the farflung frontier of +Kentucky was tenaciously held by the bravest of the race, grimly +resolved that this chain must not break. The Revolution +precipitated against this chain wave after wave of formidable +Indian foes from the Northwest under British leadership. At the +very time when Grifth Rutherford set out for the relief of +McDowell's Fort, a marauding Indian band captured by stealth near +the Transylvania Fort, known as Boone's Fort (Boonesborough), +Elizabeth and Frances Callaway, and Jemima Boone, the daughters +of Richard Callaway and Daniel Boone, and rapidly marched them +away toward the Shawanoe towns on the Ohio. A relief party, in +two divisions, headed respectively by the young girls' fathers, +and composed among others of the lovers of the three girls, +Samuel Henderson, John Holder, and Flanders Callaway, pursued +them with almost incredible swiftness. Guided by broken twigs and +bits of cloth surreptitiously dropped by Elizabeth Callaway, they +finally overtook the unsuspecting savages, killed two of them, +and rescued the three maidens unharmed. This romantic +episode—which gave Fenimore Cooper the theme for the most +memorable scene in one of his Leatherstocking Tales had an even +more romantic sequel in the subsequent marriage of the three +pairs of lovers. +</P> + +<P> +This bold foray, so shrewdly executed and even more sagaciously +foiled, was a true precursor of the dread happenings of the +coming neighborhood of the stations; and relief was felt when the +Transylvania Fort, the great stockade planned by Judge Henderson, +was completed by the pioneers (July, 1776). Glad tidings arrived +only a few days later when the Declaration of Independence, read +aloud from the Virginia Gazette, was greeted with wild huzzas by +the patriotic backwoodsmen. During the ensuing months occasional +invasions were made by savage bands; but it was not until April +24, 1777, that Henderson's "big fort" received its first attack, +being invested by a company of some seventy-five savages. The +twenty-two riflemen in the fort drove off the painted warriors, +but not before Michael Stoner, Daniel Boone, and several others +were severely wounded. As he lay helpless upon the ground, his +ankle shattered by a bullet, Boone was lifted by Simon Kenton and +borne away upon his shoulders to the haven of the stockade amid a +veritable shower of balls. The stoical and taciturn Boone clasped +Kenton's hand and gave him the accolade of the wilderness in the +brief but heartfelt utterance; "You are a fine fellow." On July +4th of this same year the fort was again subjected to siege, when +two hundred gaudily painted savages surrounded it for two days. +But owing to the vigilance and superb markmanship of the +defenders, as well as to the lack of cannon by the besieging +force, the Indians reluctantly abandoned the siege, after leaving +a number dead upon the field. Soon afterward the arrival of two +strong bodies of prime riflemen, who had been hastily summoned +from the frontiers of North Carolina and Virginia, once again +made firm the bulwark of white supremacy in the West. +</P> + +<P> +Kentucky's terrible year, 1778, opened with a severe disaster to +the white settlers—when Boone with thirty men, while engaged in +making salt at the "Lower Salt Spring," was captured in February +by more than a hundred Indians, sent by Governor Hamilton of +Detroit to drive the white settlers from "Kentucke." Boone +remained in captivity until early summer, when, learning that his +Indian captors were planning an attack in force upon the +Transylvania Fort, he succeeded in effecting his escape. After a +break-neck journey of one hundred and sixty miles, during which +he ate but one meal, Boone finally arrived at the big fort on +June 20th. The settlers were thus given ample time for +preparation, as the long siege did not begin until September 7th. +The fort was invested by a powerful force flying the English +flag—four hundred and forty-four savages gaudy in the vermilion +and ochre of their war-paint, and eleven Frenchmen, the whole +being commanded by the French-Canadian, Captain Dagniaux de +Quindre, and the great Indian Chief, Black-fish who had adopted +Boone as a son. In the effort to gain his end de Quindre resorted +to a dishonorable stratagem, by which he hoped to outwit the +settlers and capture the fort with but slight loss. "They formed +a scheme to deceive us," says Boone, "declaring it was their +orders, from Governor Hamilton, to take us captives, and not to +destroy us; but if nine of us would come out and treat with them, +they would immediately withdraw their forces from our walls, and +return home peacably." Transparent as the stratagem was, Boone +incautiously agreed to a conference with the enemy; Callaway +alone took the precaution to guard against Indian duplicity. +After a long talk, the Indians proposed to Boone, Callaway, and +the seven or eight pioneers who accompanied them that they shake +hands in token of peace and friendship. As picturesquely +described by Daniel Trabue: +</P> + +<P> +"The Indians sayed two Indians must shake hands with one white +man to make a Double or sure peace at this time the Indians had +hold of the white men's hands and held them. Col. Calloway +objected to this but the other Indians laid hold or tryed to lay +hold of the other hand but Colonel Calloway was the first that +jerked away from them but the Indians seized the men two Indians +holt of one man or it was mostly the case and did their best to +hold them but while the man and Indians was a scuffling the men +from the Fort agreeable to Col. Calloway's order fired on them +they had a dreadful skuffel but our men all got in the fort safe +and the fire continued on both sides." +</P> + +<P> +During the siege Callaway, the leader of the pioneers, made a +wooden cannon wrapped with wagon tires, which on being fired at a +group of Indians "made them scamper perdidiously." The secret +effort of the Indians to tunnel a way underground into the fort, +being discovered by the defenders, was frustrated by a +countermine. Unable to outwit, outfight, or outmaneuver the +resourceful Callaway, de Quindre finally withdrew on September +16th, closing the longest and severest attack that any of the +fortified stations of Kentucky had ever been called upon to +withstand. +</P> + +<P> +The successful defense of the Transylvania Fort, made by these +indomitable backwoodsmen who were lost sight of by the +Continental Congress and left to fight alone their battles in the +forests, was of national significance in its results. Had the +Transylvania Fort fallen, the northern Indians in overwhelming +numbers, directed by Hamilton and led by British officers, might +well have swept Kentucky free of defenders and fallen with +devastating force upon the exposed settlements along the western +frontiers of North Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, This +defense of Boonesborough, therefore, is deserving of +commemoration in the annals of the Revolution, along with +Lexington and Bunker's Hill. Coupled with Clark's meteoric +campaign in the Northwest and the subsequent struggles in the +defense of Kentucky, it may be regarded as an event basically +responsible for the retention of the trans-Alleghany region by +the United States. The bitter struggles, desperate sieges, and +bloody reprisals of these dark years came to a close with the +expeditions of Clark and Logan in November, 1782, which +appropriately concluded the Revolution in the West by putting a +definite end to all prospect of formidable invasion of Kentucky. +</P> + +<P> +In November, 1777, "Washington District," the delegates of which +had been received in the preceding year by the Provincial +Congress of North Carolina, was formed by the North Carolina +General Assembly into Washington County; and to it were assigned +the boundaries of the whole of the present state of Tennessee. +While this immense territory was thus being definitely included +within the bounds of North Carolina, Judge Henderson on behalf of +the Transylvania Company was making a vigorous effort to secure +the reestablishment of its rights from the Virginia Assembly. By +order of the Virginia legislature, an exhaustive investigation of +the claims of the Transylvania Company was therefore made, +hearings being held at various points in the back country. On +July 18, 1777, Judge Henderson presented to the peace +commissioners for North Carolina and Virginia at the Long Island +treaty ground an elaborate memorial in behalf of the Transylvania +Company, which the commissioners unanimously refused to consider, +as not coming under their jurisdiction. Finally, after a full and +impartial discussion before the Virginia House of Delegates, that +body declared the Transylvania purchase void. But in +consideration of "the very great expense [incurred by the +company] in making the said purchase, and in settling the said +lands, by which the commonwealth is likely to receive great +advantage, by increasing its inhabitants, and establishing a +barrier against the Indians," the House of Delegates granted +Richard Henderson and Company two hundred thousand acres of land +situated between the Ohio and Green rivers, where the town of +Henderson, Kentucky, now stands. With this bursting of the +Transylvania bubble and the vanishing of the golden dreams of +Henderson and his associates for establishing the fourteenth +American colony in the heart of the trans-Alleghany, a first +romantic chapter in the history of Westward expansion comes to a +close. +</P> + +<P> +But another and more feasible project immediately succeeded. +Undiscouraged by Virginia's confiscation of Transylvania, and +disregarding North Carolina's action in extending her boundaries +over the trans-Alleghany region lying within her chartered +limits, Henderson, in whom the genius of the colonizer and the +ambition of the speculative capitalist were found in striking +conjunction, was now inspired to repeat, along broader and more +solidly practical lines, the revolutionary experiment of +Transylvania. It was not his purpose, however, to found an +independent colony; for he believed that millions of acres in the +Transylvania purchase lay within the bounds of North Carolina, +and he wished to open for colonization, settlement, and the sale +of lands, the vast wilderness of the valley of the Cumberland +supposed to lie within those confines. But so universal was the +prevailing uncertainty in regard to boundaries that it was +necessary to prolong the North Carolina-Virginia line in order to +determine whether or not the Great French Lick, the ideal +location for settlement, lay within the chartered limits of North +Carolina. +</P> + +<P> +Judge Henderson's comprehensive plans for the promotion of an +extensive colonization of the Cumberland region soon began to +take form in vigorous action. Just as in his Transylvania project +Henderson had chosen Daniel Boone, the ablest of the North +Carolina pioneers, to spy out the land and select sites for +future location, so now he chose as leader of the new colonizing +party the ablest of the Tennessee pioneers, James Robertson. +Although he was the acknowledged leader of the Watauga settlement +and held the responsible position of Indian agent for North +Carolina, Robertson was induced by Henderson's liberal offers to +leave his comparatively peaceful home and to venture his life in +this desperate hazard of new fortunes. The advance party of eight +white men and one negro, under Robertson's leadership, set forth +from the Holston settlement on February 6, 1779, to make a +preliminary exploration and to plant corn "that bread might be +prepared for the main body of emigrants in the fall." After +erecting a few cabins for dwellings and posts of defense, +Robertson plunged alone into the wilderness and made the long +journey to Post St. Vincent in the Illinois, in order to consult +with George Rogers Clark, who had entered for himself in the +Virginia Land Office several thousand acres of land at the French +Lick. After perfecting arrangements with Clark for securing +"cabin rights" should the land prove to lie in Virginia, +Robertson returned to Watauga to take command of the migration. +</P> + +<P> +Toward the end of the year two parties set out, one by land, the +other by water, for the wonderful new country on the Cumberland +of which Boone and Scaggs and Mansker had brought back such +glowing descriptions. During the autumn Judge Henderson and other +commissioners from North Carolina, in conjunction with +commissioners from Virginia, had been running out the boundary +line between the two states. On the very day—Christmas, +1779—that Judge Henderson reached the site of the Transylvania +Fort, now called Boonesborough, the swarm of colonists from the +parent hive at Watauga, under Robertson's leadership, reached the +French Lick and on New Year's Day, 1780, crossed the river on the +ice to the present site of Nashville. +</P> + +<P> +The journal of the other party, which, as has been aptly said, +reads like a chapter from one of Captain Mayne Reid's fascinating +novels of adventure, was written by Colonel John Donelson, the +father-in-law of Andrew Jackson. Setting out from Fort Patrick +Henry on Holston River, December 22, 1779, with a flotilla +consisting of about thirty flatboats, dugouts, and canoes, they +encountered few difficulties until they began to run the gauntlet +of the Chickamauga towns on the Tennessee. Here they were +furiously attacked by the Indians, terrible in their red and +black war-paint; and a well-filled boat lagging in the rear, with +smallpox on board, was driven to shore by the Indians. The +occupants were massacred; but the Indians at once contracted the +disease and died by the hundreds. This luckless sacrifice of +"poor Stuart, his family and friends," while a ghastly price to +pay, undoubtedly procured for the Cumberland settlements +comparative immunity from Indian forays until the new-comers had +firmly established themselves in their wilderness stronghold. +Eloquent of the granite endurance and courageous spirit of the +typical American pioneer in its thankfulness for sanctuary, for +reunion of families and friends, and for the humble shelter of a +log cabin, is the last entry in Donelson's diary (April 24, +1780): +</P> + +<P> +"This day we arrived at our journey's end at the Big Salt Lick, +where we have the pleasure of finding Capt. 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 +intrusted to our care, and who, some time since, perhaps, +despaired of ever meeting again. Though our prospects at present +are dreary, we have found a few log cabins which have been built +on a cedar bluff above the Lick by Capt. Robertson and his +company." +</P> + +<P> +In the midst of the famine during this terrible period of the +"hard winter," Judge Henderson was sorely concerned for the fate +of the new colony which he had projected, and immediately +proceeded to purchase at huge cost a large stock of corn. On +March 5, 1780, this corn, which had been raised by Captain +Nathaniel Hart, was "sent from Boonesborough in perogues +[pettiaugers or flatboats] under the command of William Bailey +Smith.... This corn was taken down the Kentucky River, and +over the Falls of Ohio, to the mouth of the Cumberland, and +thence up that river to the fort at the French Lick. It is +believed have been the only bread which the settlers had until it +was raised there in 1781." There is genuine impressiveness in +this heroic triumphing over the obstacles of obdurate nature and +this paternalistic provision for the exposed Cumberland +settlement—the purchase by Judge Henderson, the shipment by +Captain Hart, and the transportation by Colonel Smith, in an +awful winter of bitter cold and obstructed navigation, of this +indispensable quantity of corn purchased for sixty thousand +dollars in depreciated currency. +</P> + +<P> +Upon his arrival at the French Lick, shortly after the middle of +April, Judge Henderson at once proceeded to organize a government +for the little community. On May 1st articles of association were +drawn up; and important additions thereto were made on May 13th, +when the settlers signed the complete series. The original +document, still preserved, was drafted by Judge Henderson, being +written throughout in his own handwriting; and his name heads the +list of two hundred and fifty and more signatures. The +"Cumberland Compact," as this paper is called, is fundamentally a +mutual contract between the copartners of the Transylvania +Company and the settlers upon the lands claimed by the company. +It represents the collective will of the community; and on +account of the careful provisions safeguarding the rights of each +party to the contract it may be called a bill of rights. The +organization of this pure democracy was sound and +admirable—another notable early example of the commission form +of government. The most remarkable feature of this backwoods +constitution marks Judge Henderson as a pioneer in the use of the +political device so prominent to-day, one hundred and forty years +later—the "recall of judges." In the following striking clause +this innovation in government was recognized thus early in +American history as the most effective means of securing and +safeguarding justice in a democracy: +</P> + +<P> +"As often as the people in general are dissatisfied with the +doings of the Judges or Triers so to be chosen, they may call a +new selection in any of the said stations, and elect bothers in +their stead, having due respect to the number now agreed to be +elected at each station, which persons so to be chosen shall have +the same power with those in whose room or place they shall or +may be chosen to act." +</P> + +<P> +A land-office was now opened, the entry-taker being appointed by +Judge Henderson, in accordance with the compact; and the lands, +for costs of entry, etc., were registered for the nominal fee of +ten dollars per thousand acres. But as the Transylvania Company +was never able to secure a "satisfactory and indisputable title," +the clause resulted in perpetual nonpayment. In 1783, following +the lead of Virginia in the case of Transylvania, North Carolina +declared the Transylvania Company's purchase void, but granted +the company in compensation a tract of one hundred and ninety +thousand acres in Powell's Valley. As compensation, the grants of +North Carolina and Virginia were quite inadequate, considering +the value of the service in behalf of permanent western +colonization rendered by the Transylvania company. +</P> + +<P> +James Robertson was chosen as presiding officer of the court of +twelve commissioners, and was also elected commander-in-chief of +the military forces of the eight little associated settlements on +the Cumberland. Here for the next two years the self-reliant +settlers under Robertson's wise and able leadership successfully +repelled the Indians in their guerrilla warfare, firmly +entrenched themselves in their forest-girt stronghold, and +vindicated their claim to the territory by right of occupation +and conquest. Here sprang up in later times a great and populous +city—named, strangely enough, neither for Henderson, the +founder, nor for Robertson and Donelson, the leaders of the two +colonizing parties, but for one having no association with its +history or origins, the gallant North Carolinian, General Francis +Nash, who was killed at the Battle of Germantown. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVIII. King's Mountain +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +With the utmost satisfaction I can acquaint you with the sudden +and favorable turn of our public affairs. A few days ago +destruction hung over our heads. Cornwallis with at least 1500 +British and Tories waited at Charlotte for the reinforcement of +1000 from Broad River, which reinforcement has been entirely cut +off, 130 killed and the remainder captured. Cornwallis +immediately retreated, and is now on his way toward Charleston, +with part of our army in his rear....—Elizabeth Maxwell +Steel: Salisbury, October 25, 1780. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +So thoroughly had the Cherokees been subdued by the devastations +of the campaign of 1776 that for several years thereafter they +were unable to organize for a new campaign against the +backwoodsmen along the frontiers of North Carolina and Tennessee. +During these years the Holston settlers principally busied +themselves in making their position secure, as well as in setting +their house in order by severely punishing the lawless Tory +element among them. In 1779 the Chickamaugas, with whom The +Dragging Canoe and his irreconcilable followers among the +Cherokees had joined hands after the campaign of 1776, grew so +bold in their bloody forays upon small exposed settlements that +North Carolina and Virginia in conjunction despatched a strong +expedition against them. Embarking on April 10th at the mouth of +Big Creek near the present Rogersville, Tennessee, three hundred +and fifty men led by Colonel Evan Shelby descended the Tennessee +to the fastnesses of the Chickamaugas. Meeting with no resistance +from the astonished Indians, who fled to the shelter of the +densely wooded hills, they laid waste the Indian towns and +destroyed the immense stores of goods collected by the British +agents for distribution among the red men. The Chickamaugas were +completely quelled; and during the period of great stress through +which the Tennessee frontiersmen were soon to pass, the Cherokees +were restrained through the wise diplomacy of Joseph Martin, +Superintendent of Indian affairs for Virginia. +</P> + +<P> +The great British offensive against the Southern colonies, which +were regarded as the vulnerable point in the American +Confederacy, was fully launched upon the fall of Charleston in +May, 1780. Cornwallis established his headquarters at Camden; and +one of his lieutenants, the persuasive and brilliant Ferguson, +soon rallied thousands of Loyalists in South Carolina to the +British standard. When Cornwallis inaugurated his campaign for +cutting Washington wholly off from the Southern colonies by +invading North Carolina, the men upon the western waters realized +that the time had come to rise, in defense of their state and in +protection of their homes. Two hundred Tennessee riflemen from +Sullivan County, under Colonel Isaac Shelby, were engaged in +minor operations in South Carolina conducted by Colonel Charles +McDowell; and conspicuous among these engagements was the affair +at Musgrove's Mill on August 18th when three hundred horsemen led +by Colonel James Williams, a native of Granville County, North +Carolina, Colonel Isaac Shelby, and Lieutenant-Colonel Clark of +Georgia repulsed with heavy loss a British force of between four +and five hundred. +</P> + +<P> +These minor successes availed nothing in face of the disastrous +defeat of Gates by Cornwallis at Camden on August 16th and the +humiliating blow to Sumter at Rocky Mount on the following day. +Ferguson hotly pursued the frontiersmen, who then retreated over +the mountains; and from his camp at Gilbert Town he despatched a +threatening message to the Western leaders, declaring that if +they did not desist from their opposition to the British arms and +take protection under his standard, he would march his army over +the mountains and lay their country waste with fire and sword. +Stung to action, Shelby hastily rode off to consult with Sevier +at his log castle near Jonesboro; and together they matured a +plan to arouse the mountain men and attack Ferguson by surprise. +In the event of failure, these wilderness free-lances planned to +leave the country and find a home with the Spaniards in +Louisiana. +</P> + +<P> +At the original place of rendezvous, the Sycamore Shoals of the +Watauga, the overmountain men gathered on September 25th. There +an eloquent sermon was preached to them by that fiery man of God, +the Reverend Samuel Doak, who concluded his discourse with a +stirring invocation to the sword of the Lord and of Gideon—a +sentiment greeted with the loud applause of the militant +frontiersmen. Here and at various places along the march they +were joined by detachments of border fighters summoned to join +the expedition—Colonel William Campbell, who with some +reluctance had abandoned his own plans in response to Shelby's +urgent and repeated message, in command of four hundred hardy +frontiersmen from Washington County, Virginia; Colonel Benjamin +Cleveland, with the wild fighters of Wilkes known as "Cleveland's +Bulldogs"; Colonel Andrew Hampton, with the stalwart riflemen of +Rutherford; Major Joseph Winston, the cousin of Patrick Henry, +with the flower of the citizenry of Surry; the McDowells, Charles +and Joseph, with the bold borderers of Burke; Colonels Lacy and +Hill, with well-trained soldiers of South Carolina; and +Brigadier-General James Williams, leading the intrepid Rowan +volunteers. +</P> + +<P> +Before breaking camp at Quaker Meadows, the leading officers in +conference chose Colonel William Campbell as temporary officer of +the day, until they could secure a general officer from +headquarters as commander-in-chief. The object of the +mountaineers and big-game hunters was, in their own terms, to +pursue Ferguson, to run him down, and to capture him. In +pursuance of this plan, the leaders on arriving at the ford of +Green River chose out a force of six hundred men, with the best +mounts and equipment; and at daybreak on October 6th this force +of picked mounted riflemen, followed by some fifty "foot-cavalry" +eager to join in the pursuit, pushed rapidly on to the Cowpens. +Here a second selection took place; and Colonel Campbell, was +again elected commander of the detachment, now numbering some +nine hundred and ten horsemen and eighty odd footmen, which +dashed rapidly on in pursuit of Ferguson. +</P> + +<P> +The British commander had been apprised of the coming of the +over-mountain men. Scorning to make a forced march and attempt to +effect a junction with Cornwallis at Charlotte, Ferguson chose to +make a stand and dispose once for all of the barbarian horde whom +he denounced as mongrels and the dregs of mankind. After +despatching to Cornwallis a message asking for aid, Ferguson took +up his camp on King's Mountain, just south of the North Carolina +border line, in the present York County, South Carolina. Here, +after his pickets had been captured in silence, he was surprised +by his opponents. At three o'clock in the afternoon of October +7th the mountain hunters treed their game upon the heights. +</P> + +<P> +The battle which ensued presents an extraordinary contrast in the +character of the combatants and the nature of the strategy and +tactics. Each party ran true to form—Ferguson repeating +Braddock's suicidal policy of opposing bayonet charges to the +deadly fusillade of riflemen, who in Indian fashion were +carefully posted behind trees and every shelter afforded by the +natural inequalities of the ground. In the army of the Carolina +and Virginia frontiersmen, composed of independent detachments +recruited from many sources and solicitous for their own +individual credit, each command was directed in the battle by its +own leader. Campbell—like Cleveland, Winston, Williams, Lacey, +Shelby, McDowell, Sevier, and Hambright—personally led his own +division; but the nature of the fighting and the peculiarity of +the terrain made it impossible for him, though the chosen +commander of the expedition, actually to play that role in the +battle. The plan agreed upon in advance by the frontier leaders +was simple enough—to surround and capture Ferguson's camp on the +high plateau. The more experienced Indian fighters, Sevier and +Shelby, unquestionably suggested the general scheme which in any +case would doubtless have been employed by the frontiersmen; it +was to give the British "Indian play"—namely to take cover +everywhere and to fire from natural shelter. Cleveland, a +Hercules in strength and courage who had fought the Indians and +recognized the wisdom of Indian tactics, ordered his men, as did +some of the other leaders, to give way before a bayonet charge, +but to return to the attack after the charge had spent its force. +</P> + +<P> +"My brave fellows," said Cleveland, "every man must consider +himself an officer, and act from his own judgment. Fire as quick +as you can, and stand your ground as long as you can. When you +can do no better, get behind trees, or retreat; but I beg you not +to run quite off. If we are repulsed, let us make a point of +returning and renewing the fight; perhaps we may have better luck +in the second attempt than in the first." +</P> + +<P> +The plateau upon which Ferguson was encamped was the top of an +eminence some six hundred yards long and about two hundred and +fifty yards from one base across to the other; and its shape was +that of an Indian paddle, varying from one hundred and twenty +yards at the blade to sixty yards at the handle in width. +Outcropping boulders upon the outer edge of the plateau afforded +some slight shelter for Ferguson's force; but, unsuspicious of +attack, Ferguson had made no abatis to protect his camp from the +assault to which it was so vulnerable because of the protection +of the timber surrounding it on all sides. As to the disposition +of the attacking force, the center to the northeast was occupied +by Cleveland with his "Bulldogs," Hambright with his South Fork +Boys from the Catawba (now Lincoln County, North Carolina), and +Winston with his Surry riflemen; to the south were the divisions +of Joseph McDowell, Sevier, and Campbell; while Lacey's South +Carolinians, the Rowan levies under Williams, and the Watauga +borderers under Shelby were stationed upon the north side. +Ferguson's forces consisted of Provincial Rangers, one hundred +and fifty strong, and other well-drilled Loyalists, between eight +and nine hundred in number; but his strength was seriously +weakened by the absence of a foraging party of between one and +two hundred who had gone off on the morning the battle occurred. +Shelby's men, before getting into position, received a hot fire, +the opening shots of the engagement. This inspired Campbell, who +now threw off his coat, to shout encouraging orders to his men +posted on the side of the mountain opposite to Shelby's force. +When Campbell's Virginians uttered a series of piercing shouts, +the British officer, De Peyster, second in command, remarked to +his chief: "These things are ominous—these are the damned +yelling boys." +</P> + +<P> +The battle, which lasted some minutes short of an hour, was waged +with terrific ferocity. The Loyalist militia, whenever possible, +fired from the shelter of the rocks; while the Provincial Corps, +with fixed bayonets, steadily charged the frontiersmen, who fired +at close range and then rapidly withdrew to the very base of the +mountain. After each bayonet charge the Provincials coolly +withdrew to the summit, under the accumulating fire of the +returning mountaineers, who quickly gathered in their rear. Owing +to their elevated location, the British, although using the +rapid-fire breech-loading rifle invented by Ferguson himself, +found their vision deflected, and continually fired high, thus +suffering from nature's handicap, refraction. The militia, using +sharpened butcher-knives which Ferguson had taught them to +utilize as bayonets, charged against the mountaineers; but their +fire, in answer to the deadly fusillade of the expert squirrel-shooters, +was belated, owing to the fact that they could not fire +while the crudely improvised bayonets remained inserted in their +pieces. The Americans, continually firing upward, found ready +marks for their aim in the clearly delineated outlines of their +adversaries, and felt the fierce exultation which animates the +hunter who has tracked to its lair and surrounded wild game at +bay. +</P> + +<P> +The leaders of the various divisions of the mountaineers bore +themselves with impetuous bravery, recklessly rushing between the +lines of fire and with native eloquence, interspersed with +profanity, rallying their individual commands again and again to +the attack. The valiant Campbell scaled the rugged heights, +loudly encouraging his men to the ascent. Cleveland, resolutely +facing the foe, urged on is Bulldogs with the inspiriting words: +"Come, boys; let's try 'em again. We'll have better luck next +time." No sooner did Shelby's men reach the bottom of the hill, +in retreating before a charge, than their commander, fiery and +strenuous, ardently shouted: "Now boys, quickly reload your +rifles, and let's advance upon them, and give them another hell +of a fire." The most deadly charge, led by De Peyster himself, +fell upon Hambright's South Fork boys; and one of their gallant +officers, Major Chronicle, waving his military hat, was mortally +wounded, the command, "Face to the hill!", dying on his lips. +These veteran soldiers, unlike the mountaineers, firmly met the +shock of the charge, and a number of their men were shot down or +transfixed; but the remainder, reserving their fire until the +charging column was only a few feet away, poured in a deadly +volley before retiring. The gallant William Lenoir, whose +reckless bravery made him a conspicuous target for the enemy, +received several wounds and emerged from the battle with his hair +and clothes torn by balls. The ranking American officer, +Brigadier General James Williams, was mortally wounded while "on +the very top of the mountain, in the thickest of the fight"; and +as he momentarily revived, his first words were: "For God's sake, +boys, don't give up the hill." Hambright, sorely wounded, his +boot overflowing with blood and his hat riddled with three bullet +holes, declined to dismount, but pressed gallantly forward, +exclaiming in his "Pennsylvania Dutch": "Huzza, my prave poys, +fight on a few minutes more, and the pattle will be over!" On the +British side, Ferguson was supremely valorous, rapidly dashing +from one point to another, rallying his men, oblivious to all +danger. Wherever the shrill note of his silver whistle sounded, +there the fighting was hottest and the British resistance the +most stubborn. His officers fought with the characteristic +steadiness of the British soldier; and again and again his men +charged headlong against the wavering and fiery circle of the +frontiersmen. +</P> + +<P> +Ferguson's boast that "he was on King's Mountain, that he was +king of the Mountain, and God Almighty could not drive him from +it" was doubtless prompted, less by a belief in the +impregnability of his position, than by a desperate desire to +inspire confidence in his men. His location was admirably chosen +for defense against attack by troops employing regulation +tactics; but, never dreaming of the possibility of sudden +investment, Ferguson had erected no fortifications for his +encampment. His frenzied efforts on the battlefield seem like a +mad rush against fate; for the place was indefensible against the +peculiar tactics of the frontiersmen. While the mountain flamed +like a volcano and resounded with the thunder of the guns, a +steady stricture was in progress. The lines were drawn tighter +and tighter around the trapped and frantically struggling army; +and at last the fall of their commander, riddled with bullets, +proved the tragic futility of further resistance. The game was +caught and bagged to a man. When Winston, with his fox-hunters of +Surry, dashed recklessly through the woods, says a chronicler of +the battle, and the last to come into position, +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Flow'd in, and settling, circled all the lists, +</P> + +<P> +then +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +From all the circle of the hills death sleeted in upon the +doomed. +</P> + +<P> +The battle was decisive in its effect—shattering the plans of +Cornwallis, which till then appeared certain of success. The +victory put a full stop to the invasion of North Carolina, which +was then well under way. Cornwallis abandoned his carefully +prepared campaign and immediately left the state. After +ruthlessly hanging nine prisoners, an action which had an +effectively deterrent effect upon future Tory murders and +depredations, the patriot force quietly disbanded. The brilliant +initiative of the buckskin-clad borderers, the strenuous energy +of their pursuit, the perfection of their surprise—all +reinforced by the employment of ideal tactics for meeting the +given situation—were the controlling factors in this +overwhelming victory of the Revolution. The pioneers of the Old +Southwest—the independent and aggressive yeomanry of North +Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina—had risen in their might. +Without the aid or authority of blundering state governments, +they had created an army of frontiersmen, Indian-fighters, and +big-game hunters which had found no parallel or equal on the +continent since the Battle of the Great Kanawha. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIX. The State of Franklin +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Designs of a more dangerous nature and deeper die seem to glare +in the western revolt .... I have thought proper to issue this +manifesto, hereby warning all persons concerned in the said +revolt ... that the honour of this State has been particularly +wounded, by seizing that by violence which, in time, no doubt, +would have been obtained by consent, when the terms of separation +would have been explained or stipulated, to the mutual +satisfaction of the mother and new State.... Let your +proposals be consistent with the honour of the State to accede +to, which by your allegiance as good citizens, you cannot violate +and I make no doubt but her generosity, in time, will meet your +wishes.—Governor Alexander Martin: Manifesto against the State +of Franklin, April 25, 1785. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +To the shrewd diplomacy of Joseph Martin, who held the Cherokees +in check during the period of the King's Mountain campaign, the +settlers in the valleys of the Watauga and the Holston owed their +temporary immunity from Indian attack. But no sooner did Sevier +and his over-mountain men return from the battle-field of King's +Mountain than they were called upon to join in an expedition +against the Cherokees, who had again gone on the war-path at the +instigation of the British. After Sevier with his command had +defeated a small party of Indians at Boyd's Creek in December, +the entire force of seven hundred riflemen, under the command of +Colonel Arthur Campbell, with Major Joseph Martin as subordinate, +penetrated to the heart of the Indian country, burned Echota, +Chilhowee, Settiquo, Hiawassee, and seven other principal +villages, and destroyed an immense amount of property and +supplies. In March, suspecting that the arch-conspirators against +the white settlers were the Cherokees at the head waters of the +Little Tennessee, Sevier led one hundred and fifty horsemen +through the devious mountain defiles and struck the Indians a +swift and unexpected blow at Tuckasegee, near the present +Webster, North Carolina. In this extraordinarily daring raid, one +of his most brilliant feats of arms, Sevier lost only one man +killed and one wounded; while upon the enemy he inflicted the +loss of thirty killed, took many more prisoners, burned six +Indian towns, and captured many horses and supplies. Once his +deadly work was done, Sevier with his bold cavaliers silently +plunged again into the forest whence he had so suddenly emerged, +and returned in triumph to the settlements. +</P> + +<P> +Disheartened though the Indians were to see the smoke of their +burning towns, they sullenly remained averse to peace; and they +did not keep the treaty made at Long Island in July, 1781. The +Indians suffered from very real grievances at the hands of the +lawless white settlers who persisted in encroaching upon the +Indian lands. When the Indian ravages were resumed, Sevier and +Anderson, the latter from Sullivan County, led a punitive +expedition of two hundred riflemen against the Creeks and the +Chickamaugas; and employing the customary tactics of laying waste +the Indian towns, administered stern and salutary chastisement to +the copper-colored marauders. +</P> + +<P> +During this same period the settlers on the Cumberland were +displaying a grim fortitude and stoical endurance in the face of +Indian attack forever memorable in the history of the Old +Southwest. On the night of January 15, 1781, the settlers at +Freeland's Station, after a desperate resistance, succeeded in +beating off the savages who attacked in force. At Nashborough on +April 2d, twenty of the settlers were lured from the stockade by +the artful wiles of the savages; and it was only after serious +loss that they finally won their way back to the protection of +the fort. Indeed, their return was due to the fierce dogs of the +settlers, which were released at the most critical moment, and +attacked the astounded Indians with such ferocity that the +diversion thus created enabled the settlers to escape from the +deadly trap. During the next two years the history of the +Cumberland settlements is but the gruesome recital of murder +after murder of the whites, a few at a time, by the lurking +Indian foe. Robertson's dominant influence alone prevented the +abandonment of the sorely harassed little stations. The arrival +of the North Carolina commissioners for the purpose of laying off +bounty lands and settlers' preemptions, and the treaty of peace +concluded at the French Lick on November 5 and 6, 1783, gave +permanence and stability to the Cumberland settlements. The +lasting friendship of the Chickasaws was won; but the Creeks for +some time continued to harass the Tennessee pioneers. The +frontiersmen's most formidable foe, the Cherokees, stoically, +heroically fighting the whites in the field, and smallpox, +syphilis, and drunkenness at home, at last abandoned the unequal +battle. The treaty at Hopewell on November 28, 1785, marks the +end of an era—the Spartan yet hopeless resistance of the +intrepid red men to the relentless and frequently unwarranted +expropriation by the whites of the ancient and immemorial domain +of the savage. +</P> + +<P> +The skill in self-government of the isolated people beyond the +mountains, and the ability they had already demonstrated in the +organization of "associations," received a strong stimulus on +June 2, 1784, when the legislature of North Carolina ceded to the +Congress of the United States the title which that state +possessed to the land west of the Alleghanies. Among the terms of +the Cession Act were these conditions: that the ceded territory +should be formed into a separate state or states; and that if +Congress should not accept the lands thus ceded and give due +notice within two years, the act should be of no force and the +lands should revert to North Carolina. No sooner did this news +reach the Western settlers than they began to mature plans for +the organization of a government during the intervening twelve +months. Their exposed condition on the frontiers, still harassed +by the Indians, and North Carolina's delay in sending goods +promised the Indians by a former treaty, both promoted Indian +hostility; and these facts, combined with their remote location +beyond the mountains, rendering them almost inaccessible to +communication with North Carolina—all rendered the decision of +the settlers almost inevitable. Moreover, the allurements of high +office and the dazzling dreams of ambition were additional +motives sufficiently human in themselves to give driving power to +the movement toward independence. +</P> + +<P> +At a convention assembled at Jonesborough on August 23, 1784, +delegates from the counties of Washington, Sullivan, and Greene +characteristically decided to organize an "Association." They +solemnly declared by resolution: "We have a just and undeniable +right to petition to Congress to accept the session made by North +Carolina, and for that body to countenance us for forming +ourselves into a separate government, and to frame either a +permanent or temporary constitution, agreeably to a resolve of +Congress...." Meanwhile, Governor Martin, largely as the +result of the prudent advice of North Carolina's representative +in Congress, Dr. Hugh Williamson, was brought to the conclusion +that North Carolina, in the passage of the cession act, had acted +precipitately. This important step had been taken without the +full consideration of the people of the state. Among the various +arguments advanced by Williamson was the impressive contention +that, in accordance with the procedure in the case of other +states, the whole expense of the huge Indian expeditions in 1776 +and the heavy militia aids to South Carolina and Georgia should +be credited to North Carolina as partial fulfilment of her +continental obligations before the cession should be irrevocably +made to the Federal government. Williamson's arguments proved +convincing; and it was thus primarily for economic reasons of far +reaching national importance that the assembly of North Carolina +(October 22 to November 25, 1784) repealed the cession act made +the preceding spring. +</P> + +<P> +Before the news of the repeal of the cession act could reach the +western waters, a second convention met at Jonesborough on +December 17th. Sentiment at this time was much divided, for a +number of the people, expecting the repeal of the cession act, +genuinely desired a continued allegiance to North Carolina. Of +these may well have been John Sevier, who afterward declared to +Joseph Martin that he had been "Draged into the Franklin measures +by a large number of the people of this country." The principal +act of this convention was the adoption of a temporary +constitution for six months and the provision for a convention to +be held within one year, at the expiration of which time this +constitution should be altered, or adopted as the permanent +constitution of the new state. The scholars on the western +waters, desiring to commemorate their aspirations for freedom, +chose as the name of the projected new state: "Frankland"—the +Land of the Free. The name finally chosen, however, perhaps for +reasons of policy, was "Franklin," in honor of Benjamin Franklin. +Meanwhile, in order to meet the pressing needs for a stable +government along the Tennessee frontier, the North Carolina +assembly, which repealed the cession act, created out of the four +western counties the District of Washington, with John Haywood as +presiding judge and David Campbell as associate, and conferred +upon John Sevier the rank of brigadier general of the new +district. The first week in December Governor Martin sent to +Sevier his military commission; and replying to Joseph Martin's +query (December 31, 1784, prompted by Governor Martin) as to +whether, in view of the repeal of the cession act, he intended to +persist in revolt or await developments, Sevier gave it out +broadcast that "we shall pursue no further measures as to a new +State." +</P> + +<P> +Owing to the remoteness of the Tennessee settlements and the +difficulty of appreciating through correspondence the atmosphere +of sentiment in Franklin, Governor Martin realized the necessity +of sending a personal representative to discover the true state +of affairs in the disaffected region beyond the mountains. For +the post of ambassador to the new government, Governor Martin +selected a man distinguished for mentality and diplomatic skill, +a pioneer of Tennessee and Kentucky, Judge Richard Henderson's +brother, Colonel Samuel Henderson. Despite Sevier's disavowal of +any further intention to establish a new state, the governor gave +Colonel Henderson elaborate written instructions, the purport of +which was to learn all that he could about the political +complexion of the Tennessee frontiersmen, the sense of the +people, and the agitation for a separate commonwealth. Moreover, +in the hope of placating the leading chieftains of the Cherokees, +who had bitterly protested against the continued aggressions and +encroachments upon their lands by the lawless borderers, he +instructed Colonel Henderson also to learn the temper and +dispositions of the Indians, and to investigate the case of +Colonel James Hubbardt who was charged with the murder of Untoola +of Settiquo, a chief of the Cherokees. +</P> + +<P> +When Colonel Henderson arrived at Jonesborough, he found the +third Franklin legislature in session, and to this body he +presented Governor Martin's letter of February 27, 1785. In +response to the governor's request for an "account of the late +proceedings of the people in the western country," an extended +reply was drafted by the new legislature; and this letter, +conveyed to Governor Martin by Colonel Henderson, in setting +forth in detail the reasons for the secession, made the following +significant statement: "We humbly thank North Carolina for every +sentiment of regard she has for us, but are sorry to observe, +that as it is founded upon principles of interest, as is aparent +from the tenor of your letter, we are doubtful, when the cause +ceases which is the basis of that affection, we shall lose your +esteem." At the same time (March 22nd), Sevier, who had just been +chosen Governor of the State of Franklin, transmitted to Governor +Martin by Colonel Henderson a long letter, not hitherto published +in any history of the period, in which he outspokenly says: +</P> + +<P> +"It gives me great pain to think there should arise any Disputes +between us and North Carolina, & I flatter myself when North +Carolina states the matter in a fair light she will be fully +convinced that necessity and self preservation have Compelled Us +to the measures we Have taken, and could the people have +discovered that No. Carolina would Have protected and Govern'd +them, They would have remained where they were; but they +perceived a neglect and Coolness, and the Language of Many of +your most leading members Convinced them they were Altogether +Disregarded." +</P> + +<P> +Following the issuance of vigorous manifestos by Martin (April +25th) and Sevier (May 15th), the burden of the problem fell upon +Richard Caswell, who in June succeeded Martin as Governor of +North Carolina. +</P> + +<P> +Meantime the legislature of the over-mountain men had given the +name of Franklin to the new state, although for some time it +continued to be called by many Frankland, and its adherents +Franks. The legislature had also established an academy named +after Governor Martin, and had appointed (March 12th) William +Cocke as a delegate to the Continental Congress, urging its +acceptance of the cession. In the Memorial from the Franklin +legislature to the Continental Congress, dealing in some detail +with North Carolina's failure to send the Cherokees some goods +promised them for lands acquired by treaty, it is alleged: +</P> + +<P> +"She [North Carolina] immediately stoped the goods she had +promised to give the Indians for the said land which so +exasperated them that they begun to commit hostalities on our +frontiers in this situation we were induced to a declaration of +Independence not doubting we should be excused by Congress ... as +North Carolina seemed quite regardless of our interest and the +Indians daily murdering our friends and relations without +distinction of age or sex." +</P> + +<P> +Sympathizing with the precarious situation of the settlers, as +well as desiring the cession, Congress urged North Carolina to +amend the repealing act and execute a conveyance of the western +territory to the Union. +</P> + +<P> +Among the noteworthy features of the Franklin movement was the +constitution prepared by a committee, headed by the Reverend +Samuel Houston of Washington County, and presented at the meeting +of the Franklin legislature, Greeneville, November 14, 1785. This +eccentric constitution was based in considerable part upon the +North Carolina model; but it was "rejected in the lump" and the +constitution of North Carolina, almost unchanged, was adopted. +Under this Houston constitution, the name "Frankland" was chosen +for the new state. The legislature was to consist of but a single +house. In a section excluding from the legislature "ministers of +the gospel, attorneys at law, and doctors of physics," those were +declared ineligible for office who were of immoral character or +guilty of "such flagrant enormities as drunkenness, gaming, +profane swearing, lewdness, Sabbath-breaking and such like," or +who should deny the existence of God, of heaven, and of hell, the +inspiration of the Scriptures, or the existence of the Trinity. +Full religious liberty and the rights of conscience were +assured—but strict orthodoxy was a condition for eligibility to +office. No one should be chosen to office who was "not a scholar +to do the business." This remarkable document, which provided for +many other curious innovations in government, was the work of +pioneer doctrinaires—Houston, Campbell, Cocke, and Tipton—and +deserves study as a bizarre reflection of the spirit and genius +of the western frontiersmen. +</P> + +<P> +The liberal policy of Martin, followed by the no less +conciliatory attitude of his successor, Caswell, for the time +proved wholly abortive. However, Martin's appointment of Evan +Shelby in Sevier's place as brigadier, and of Jonathan Tipton as +colonel of his county, produced disaffection among the Franks; +and the influence of Joseph Martin against the new government was +a powerful obstacle to its success. At first the two sets of +military, civil, and judicial officers were able to work amicably +together; and a working-basis drawn up by Shelby and Sevier, +although afterward repudiated by the Franklin legislature, +smoothed over some of the rapidly accumulating difficulties. The +persistent and quiet assertion of authority by North Carolina, +without any overt act of violence against the officers of +Franklin state, revealed great diplomatic skill in Governors +Martin and Caswell. It was doubtless the considerate policy of +the latter, coupled with the defection from Sevier's cause of men +of the stamp of Houston and Tipton, after the blundering and +cavalier rejection of their singular constitution, which +undermined the foundations of Franklin. Sevier himself later +wrote with considerable bitterness: "I have been faithfull, and +my own breast acquits myself that I have acted no part but what +has been Consistent with honor and justice, tempered with +Clemency and mercy. How far our pretended patriots have supported +me as their pretended chiefe magistrate, I leave the world at +large to Judge." Arthur Campbell's plans for the formation of a +greater Franklin, through the union of the people on the western +waters of Virginia with those of North Carolina, came to nought +when Virginia in the autumn of 1785 with stern decisiveness +passed an act making it high treason to erect an independent +government within her limits unless authorized by the assembly. +Sevier, however, became more fixed in his determination to +establish a free state, writing to Governor Caswell: "We shall +continue to act independent and would rather suffer death, in all +its various and frightful shapes, than conform to anything that +is disgraceful." North Carolina, now proceeding with vigor +(November, 1786), fully reassumed its sovereignty and +jurisdiction over the mountain counties, but passed an act of +pardon and oblivion, and in many ways adopted moderate and +conciliatory measures. +</P> + +<P> +Driven to extremities, Cocke and Sevier in turn appealed for aid +and advice to Benjamin Franklin, in whose honor the new state had +been named. In response to Cocke, Franklin wrote (August 12, +1786): "I think you are perfectly right in resolving to submit +them [the Points in Dispute] to the Decision of Congress and to +abide by their Determination." Franklin's views change in the +interim; for when, almost a year later, Sevier asks him for +counsel, Franklin has come to the conclusion that the wisest move +for Sevier was not to appeal to Congress, but to endeavor to +effect some satisfactory compromise with North Carolina (June 30, +1787): +</P> + +<P> +"There are only two Things that Humanity induces me to wish you +may succeed in: The Accomodating your Misunderstanding with the +Government of North Carolina, by amicable Means; and the Avoiding +an Indian war, by preventing Encroaching on their Lands.... +The Inconvenience to your People attending so remote a Seat of +Government, and the difficulty to that Government in ruling well +so remote a People, would I think be powerful Inducements with +it, to accede to any fair & reasonable Proposition it may receive +from you towards an Accommodation." +</P> + +<P> +Despite Sevier's frenzied efforts to achieve independence—his +treaty with the Indians, his sensational plan to incorporate the +Cherokees into the new state, his constancy to an ideal of revolt +against others in face of the reality of revolt against himself, +his struggle, equivocal and half-hearted, with the North Carolina +authorities under Tipton—despite all these heroic efforts, the +star of Franklin swiftly declined. The vigorous measures pursued +by General Joseph Martin, and his effective influence focussed +upon a movement already honey-combed with disaffection, finally +turned the scale. To the Franklin leaders he sent the urgent +message: "Nothing will do but a submission to the laws of North +Carolina." Early in April, 1788, Martin wrote to Governor +Randolph of Virginia: "I returned last evening from Green Co. +Washington destrict, North Carolina, after a tower through that +Co'ntry, and am happy to inform your Excellency that the late +unhappy dispute between the State of North Carolina, and the +pretended State of Franklin is subsided." Ever brave, constant, +and loyal to the interest of the pioneers, Sevier had originally +been drawn into the movement against his best judgment. Caught in +the unique trap, created by the passage of the cession act and +the sudden volte-face of its repeal, he struggled desperately to +extricate himself. Alone of all the leaders, the governor of +ill-starred Franklin remained recalcitrant. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XX. The Lure of Spain—The Haven of Statehood +</H3> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The people of this region have come to realize truly upon what +part of the world and upon which nation their future happiness +and security depend, and they immediately infer that their +interest and prosperity depend entirely upon the protection and +liberality of your government.—John Sevier to Don Diego de +Gardoqui, September 12, 1788. +</P> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +From the early settlements in the eastern parts of this Continent +to the late & more recent settlements on the Kentucky in the Rest +the same difficulties have constantly occurred which now oppress +you, but by a series of patient sufferings, manly and spirited +exertions and unconquerable perseverance, they have been +altogether or in great measure subdued.—Governor Samuel Johnston +to James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe, January 29, 1788. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +A strange sham-battle, staged like some scene from opera bouffe, +in the bleak snow-storm of February, 1788, is really the prelude +to a remarkable drama of revolt in which Sevier, Robertson, +Bledsoe, and the Cumberland stalwarts play the leading roles. On +February 27th, incensed beyond measure by the action of Colonel +John Tipton in harboring some of his slaves seized by the sheriff +under an execution issued by one of the North Carolina courts, +Sevier with one hundred and fifty adherents besieged Tipton with +a few of his friends in his home on Sinking Creek. The siege was +raised at daybreak on February 29th by the arrival of +reinforcements under Colonel Maxwell from Sullivan County; and +Sevier, who was unwilling to precipitate a conflict, withdrew his +forces after some desultory firing, in which two men were killed +and several wounded. Soon afterward Sevier sent word to Tipton +that on condition his life be spared he would submit to North +Carolina. On this note of tragi-comedy the State of Franklin +appeared quietly to expire. The usually sanguine Sevier, now +thoroughly chastened, sought shelter in the distant settlements—deeply +despondent over the humiliating failure of his plans and +the even more depressing defection of his erstwhile friends and +supporters The revolutionary designs and separatist tendencies +which he still harbored were soon to involve him in a secret +conspiracy to give over the State of Franklin into the protection +of a foreign power. +</P> + +<P> +The fame of Sevier's martial exploits and of his bold stroke for +independence had long since gone abroad, astounding even so +famous an advocate of liberty as Patrick Henry and winning the +sympathy of the Continental Congress. One of the most interested +observers of the progress of affairs in the State of Franklin was +Don Diego de Gardoqui, who had come to America in the spring of +1785, bearing a commission to the American Congress as Spanish +charge d'affaires (Encargados de Negocios) to the United States. +In the course of his negotiations with Jay concerning the right +of navigation of the Mississippi River, which Spain denied to the +Americans, Gardoqui was not long in discovering the violent +resentment of the Western frontiersmen, provoked by Jay's crass +blunder in proposing that the American republic, in return for +reciprocal foreign advantages offered by Spain, should waive for +twenty-five years her right to navigate the Mississippi. The +Cumberland traders had already felt the heavy hand of Spain in +the confiscation of their goods at Natchez; but thus far the +leaders of the Tennessee frontiersmen had prudently restrained +the more turbulent agitators against the Spanish policy, fearing +lest the spirit of retaliation, once aroused, might know no +bounds. Throughout the entire region of the trans-Alleghany, a +feeling of discontent and unrest prevailed—quite as much the +result of dissatisfaction with the central government which +permitted the wholesale restraint of trade, as of resentment +against the domination of Spain. +</P> + +<P> +No sooner had the shrewd and watchful Gardoqui, who was eager to +utilize the separatist sentiment of the western settlements in +the interest of his country, learned of Sevier's armed +insurrection against the authority of North Carolina than he +despatched an emissary to sound the leading men of Franklin and +the Cumberland settlements in regard to an alliance. This secret +emissary was Dr. James White, who had been appointed by the +United States Government as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for +the Southern Department on November 29, 1786. Reporting as +instructed to Don Estevan Miro, governor of Louisiana, White, the +corrupt tool of Spain, stated concerning his confidential mission +that the leaders of "Frankland" and "Cumberland district" had +"eagerly accepted the conditions" laid down by Gardoqui: to take +the oath of allegiance to Spain, and to renounce all submission +or allegiance whatever to any other sovereign or power. Satisfied +by the secret advices received, the Spanish minister reported to +the home authorities his confident belief that the Tennessee +backwoodsmen, if diplomatically handled, would readily throw in +their lot with Spain. +</P> + +<P> +After the fiasco of his siege of Tipton's home, Sevier had seized +upon the renewal of hostilities by the Cherokees as a means of +regaining his popularity. This he counted upon doing by rallying +his old comrades-in-arms under his standard and making one of his +meteoric, whirlwind onslaughts upon their ancient Indian foe. The +victory of this erstwhile popular hero, the beloved "Nolichucky +Jack of the Border," over the Indians at a town on the Hiwassee +"so raised him in the esteem of the people on the frontier," +reports Colonel Maxwell, "that the people began [once more] to +flock to his standard." Inspirited by this good turn in his +fortunes, Sevier readily responded to Dr. White's overtures. +</P> + +<P> +Alarmed early in the year over the unprovoked depredations and +murders by the Indians in several Tennessee counties and on the +Kentucky road, Sevier, Robertson, and Anthony Bledsoe had +persuaded Governor Samuel Johnston of North Carolina to address +Gardoqui and request him to exert his influence to prevent +further acts of savage barbarity. In letters to Governor +Johnston, to Robertson, and to Sevier, all of date April 18th, +Gardoqui expressed himself in general as being "extremely +surprised to know that there is a suspicion that the good +government of Spain is encouraging these acts of barbarity." The +letters to Robertson and Sevier, read between the lines as +suggestive reinforcements of Spain's secret proposals, possess +real significance. The letter to Sevier contains this dexterously +expressed sentiment: "His Majesty is very favorably inclined to +give the inhabitants of that region all the protection that they +ask for and, on my part, I shall take very great pleasure in +contributing to it on this occasion and other occasions." +</P> + +<P> +This letter, coupled with the confidential proposals of Dr. +White, furnished a convenient opening for correspondence with the +Spaniards; and in July Sevier wrote to Gardoqui indicating his +readiness to accede to their proposals. After secret conferences +with men who had supported him throughout the vicissitudes of his +ill-starred state, Sevier carefully matured his plans. The +remarkable letter of great length which he wrote to Gardoqui on +September 12, 1788, reveals the conspiracy in all its details and +presents in vivid colors the strong separatist sentiment of the +day. Sevier urgently petitions Gardoqui for the loan of a few +thousand pounds, to enable him to "make the most expedient and +necessary preparations for defense"; and offers to repay the loan +within a short time "by sending the products of this region to +the lower ports." Upon the vital matter of "delivering" the State +of Franklin to Spain, he forthrightly says: +</P> + +<P> +"Since my last of the 18th of July, upon consulting with the +principal men of this country, I have been particularly happy to +find that they are equally disposed and ready as I am to accept +your propositions and guarantees. You may be sure that the +pleasing hopes and ideas which the people of this country hold +with regard to the probability of an alliance with, and +commercial concessions from, you are very ardent, and that we are +unanimously determined on that score. The people of this region +have come to realize truly upon what part of the world and upon +which nation their future happiness and security depend, and they +immediately infer that their interest and prosperity depend +entirely upon the protection and liberality of your government.... +Being the first from this side of the Appalachian Mountains +to resort in this way to your protection and liberality, we feel +encouraged to entertain the greatest hope that we shall be +granted all reasonable aid by him who is so amply able to do it, +and to give the protection and help that is asked of him in this +petition. You know our delicate situation and the difficulties in +which we are in respect to our mother State which is making use +of every strategem to impede the development and prosperity of +this country.... Before I conclude, it may be necessary to +remind you that there will be no more favorable occasion than the +present one to put this plan into execution. North Carolina has +rejected the Constitution and moreover it seems to me that a +considerable time will elapse before she becomes a member of the +Union, if that event ever happens." +</P> + +<P> +Through Miro, Gardoqui was simultaneously conducting a similar +correspondence with General James Wilkinson. The object of the +Spanish conspiracy, matured as the result of this correspondence, +was to seduce Kentucky from her allegiance to the United States. +Despite the superficial similarity between the situation of +Franklin and Kentucky, it would be doing Sevier and his adherents +a capital injustice to place them in the category of the corrupt +Wilkinson and the malodorous Sebastian. Moreover, the +secessionists of Franklin, as indicated in the above letter, had +the excuse of being left virtually without a country. On the +preceding August 1st, North Carolina had rejected the +Constitution of the United States; and the leaders of Franklin, +who were sorely aggrieved by what they regarded as her +indifference and neglect, now felt themselves more than ever out +of the Union and wholly repudiated by the mother state. Again, +Sevier had the embittered feeling resultant from outlawry. +Because of his course in opposing the laws and government of +North Carolina and in the killing of several good citizens, +including the sheriff of Washington County, by his forces at +Sinking Creek, Sevier, through the action of Governor Johnston of +North Carolina, had been attainted of high treason. Under the +heavy burden of this grave charge, he felt his hold upon Franklin +relax. Further, an atrocity committed in the recent campaign +under Sevier's leadership—Kirk's brutal murder of Corn Tassel, a +noble old Indian, and other chieftains, while under the +protection of a flag of truce—had placed a bar sinister across +the fair fame of this stalwart of the border. Utter desperation +thus prompted Sevier's acceptance of Gardoqui's offer of the +protection of Spain. +</P> + +<P> +John Sevier's son, James, bore the letter of September 12th to +Gardoqui. By a strangely ironic coincidence, on the very day +(October 10, 1788) that Gardoqui wrote to Miro, recommending to +the attention of Spain Dr. White and James Sevier, the emissaries +of Franklin, with their plans and proposals, John Sevier was +arrested by Colonel Tipton at the Widow Brown's in Washington +County, on the charge of high treason. He was handcuffed and +borne off, first to Jonesborough and later to Morganton. But his +old friends and former comrades-in-arms, Charles and Joseph +McDowell, gave bond for his appearance at court; and Morrison, +the sheriff, who also had fought at King's Mountain, knocked the +irons from his wrists and released him on parole. Soon afterward +a number of Sevier's devoted friends, indignant over his arrest, +rode across the mountains to Morganton and silently bore him +away, never to be arrested again. In November an act of pardon +and oblivion with respect to Franklin was passed by the North +Carolina Assembly. Although Sevier was forbidden to hold office +under the state, the passage of this act automatically operated +to clear him of the alleged offense of high treason. With affairs +in Franklin taking this turn, it is little wonder that Gardoqui +and Miro paid no further heed to Sevier's proposal to accept the +protection of Spain. Sevier's continued agitation in behalf of +the independence of Franklin inspired Governor Johnston with the +fear that he would have to be "proceeded against to the last +extremity." But Sevier's opposition finally subsiding, he was +pardoned, given a seat in the North Carolina assembly, and with +extraordinary consideration honored with his former rank of +brigadier-general. +</P> + +<P> +When Dr. White reported to Miro that the leaders of "Frankland" +had eagerly accepted Gardoqui's conditions for an alliance with +Spain, he categorically added: "With regard to Cumberland +district, what I have said of Frankland applies to it with equal +force and truth." James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe had but +recently availed themselves of the good offices of Governor +Johnston of North Carolina in the effort to influence Gardoqui to +quiet the Creek Indians. The sagacious and unscrupulous half +breed Alexander McGillivray had placed the Creeks under the +protection of Spain in 1784; and shortly afterward they began to +be regularly supplied with ammunition by the Spanish authorities. +At first Spain pursued the policy of secretly encouraging these +Indians to resist the encroachments of the Americans, while she +remained on outwardly friendly terms with the United States. +During the period of the Spanish conspiracy, however, there is +reason to believe that Miro endeavored to keep the Indians at +peace with the borderers, as a friendly service, intended to pave +the way for the establishment of intimate relations between Spain +and the dwellers in the trans-Alleghany. Yet his efforts cannot +have been very effective; for the Cumberland settlements +continued to suffer from the ravages and depredations of the +Creeks, who remained "totally averse to peace, notwithstanding +they have had no cause of offence"; and Robertson and Bledsoe +reported to Governor Caswell (June 12, 1787): "It is certain, the +Chickasaws inform us, that Spanish traders offer a reward for +scalps of the Americans." The Indian atrocities became so +frequent that Robertson later in the summer headed a party on the +famous Coldwater Expedition, in which he severely chastised the +marauding Indians. Aroused by the loss of a number of chiefs and +warriors at the hands of Robertson's men, and instigated, as was +generally believed, by the Spaniards, the Creeks then prosecuted +their attacks with renewed violence against the Cumberland +settlements. +</P> + +<P> +Unprotected either by the mother state or by the national +government, unable to secure free passage to the Gulf for their +products, and sorely pressed to defend their homes, now seriously +endangered by the incessant attacks of the Creeks, the Cumberland +leaders decided to make secret overtures to McGillivray, as well +as to communicate to Miro, through Dr. White, their favorable +inclination toward the proposals of the one country which +promised them protection. In a letter which McGillivray wrote to +Miro (transmitted to Madrid, June 15, 1788) in regard to the +visit of Messrs. Hackett and Ewing, two trusty messengers sent by +Robertson and Bledsoe, he reports that the two delegates from the +district of Cumberland had not only submitted to him proposals of +peace but "had added that they would throw themselves into the +arms of His Majesty as subjects, and that Kentucky and Cumberland +are determined to free themselves from their dependence on +Congress, because that body can not protect either their +property, or favor their commerce, and they therefore believe +that they no longer owe obedience to a power which is incapable +of protecting them." Commenting upon McGillivray's communication, +Miro said in his report to Madrid (June 15, 1788): "I consider as +extremely interesting the intelligence conveyed to McGillivray by +the deputies on the fermentation existing in Kentucky, with +regard to a separation from the Union. Concerning the proposition +made to McGillivray by the inhabitants of Cumberland to become +the vassals of His Majesty, I have refrained from returning any +precise answer." +</P> + +<P> +In his long letter of reply to Robertson and Bledsoe, McGillivray +agreed to make peace between his nation, the Creeks, and the +Cumberland settlers. This letter was most favorably received and +given wide circulation throughout the West. In a most +ingratiating reply, offering McGillivray a fine gun and a lot in +Nashville, Robertson throws out the following broad suggestion, +which he obviously wishes McGillivray to convey to Miro: "In all +probability we cannot long remain in our present state, and if +the British or any commercial nation who may be in possession of +the mouth of the Mississippi would furnish us with trade, and +receive our produce there cannot be a doubt but the people on the +west side of the Appalachian mountains will open their eyes to +their real interest." Robertson actually had the district erected +out of the counties of Davidson, Sumner, and Tennessee given the +name of "Miro" by the Assembly of North Carolina in November, +1788—a significant symbol of the desires of the Cumberland +leaders. In a letter (April 23, 1789), Miro, who had just +received letters from Robertson (January 29th) and Daniel Smith +(March 4th) postmarked "District of Miro," observes: "The bearer, +Fagot, a confidential agent of Gen. Smith, informed me that the +inhabitants of Cumberland, or Miro, would ask North Carolina for +an act of separation the following fall, and that as soon as this +should be obtained other delegates would be sent from Cumberland +to New Orleans, with the object of placing that territory under +the domination of His Majesty. I replied to both in general +terms." +</P> + +<P> +Robertson, Bledsoe, and Smith were successful in keeping secret +their correspondence with McGillivray and Miro; and few were in +the secret of Sevier's effort to deliver the State of Franklin to +Spain. Joseph Martin was less successful in his negotiations; and +a great sensation was created throughout the Southern colonies +when a private letter from Joseph Martin to McGillivray (November +8, 1788) was intercepted. In this letter Martin said: "I must beg +that you write me by the first opportunity in answer to what I am +now going to say to you.... I hope to do honor to any part of +the world I settle in, and am determined to leave the United +States, for reasons that I can assign to you when we meet, but +durst not trust it to paper." The general assembly of Georgia +referred the question of the intercepted letter to the governor +of North Carolina (January 24, 1789); and the result was a +legislative investigation into Martin's conduct. Eleven months +later, the North Carolina assembly exonerated him. From the +correspondence of Joseph Martin and Patrick Henry, it would +appear that Martin, on Henry's advice, had acted as a spy upon +the Spaniards, in order to discover the views of McGillivray, to +protect the exposed white settlements from the Indians, and to +fathom the designs of the Spaniards against the United States. +</P> + +<P> +The sensational disclosures of Martin's intercepted letter had no +deterrent effect upon James Robertson in the attempted execution +of his plan for detaching the Cumberland settlements from North +Carolina. History has taken no account of the fact that Robertson +and the inhabitants now deliberately endeavored to secure an act +of separation from North Carolina. In the event of success, the +next move planned by the Cumberland leaders, as we have already +seen, was to send delegates to New Orleans for the purpose of +placing the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain. +</P> + +<P> +A hitherto unknown letter, from Robertson to (Miro), dated +Nashville, September 2, 1789, proves that a convention of the +people was actually held—the first overt step looking to an +alliance with Spain. In this letter Robertson says: +</P> + +<P> +"I must beg your Excellency's permission to take this early +opportunity of thanking you for the honor you did me in writing +by Mr. White. +</P> + +<P> +"I still hope that your Government, and these Settlements, are +destined to be mutually friendly and usefull, the people here are +impressed with the necessity of it. +</P> + +<P> +"We have just held a Convention; which has agreed that our +members shall insist on being Seperated from North Carolina. +</P> + +<P> +"Unprotected, we are to be obedient to the new Congress of the +United States; but we cannot but wish for a more interesting +Connection. +</P> + +<P> +"The United States afford us no protection. The district of Miro +is daily plundered and the inhabitants murdered by the Creeks, +and Cherokees, unprovoked. +</P> + +<P> +"For my own part, I conceive highly of the advantages of your +Government." +</P> + +<P> +A serious obstacle to the execution of the plans of Robertson and +the other leaders of the Cumberland settlements was the prompt +action of North Carolina. In actual conformity with the wishes of +the Western people, as set forth in the petition of Robertson and +Hayes, their representatives, made two years earlier, the +legislature of North Carolina in December passed the second act +of cession, by which the Western territory of North Carolina was +ceded to the United States. Instead of securing an act of +separation from North Carolina as the preparatory step to forming +what Robertson calls "a more interesting connection" with Spain, +Robertson and his associates now found themselves and the +transmontane region which they represented flung bodily into the +arms of the United States. Despite the unequivocal offer of the +calculating and desperate Sevier to "deliver" Franklin to Spain, +and the ingenious efforts of Robertson and his associates to +place the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain, the +Spanish court by its temporizing policy of evasion and indecision +definitely relinquished the ready opportunities thereby afforded, +of utilizing the powerful separatist tendencies of Tennessee for +the purpose of adding the empire upon the Western waters to the +Spanish domain in America. +</P> + +<P> +The year 1790 marks the end of an era the heroic age of the +pioneers of the Old Southwest. Following the acceptance of North +Carolina's deed of cession of her Western lands to the Union +(April 2, 1790) the Southwest Territory was erected on May 26th; +and William Blount, a North Carolina gentleman of eminence and +distinction, was appointed on June 8th to the post of governor of +the territory. Two years later (June 1, 1792) Kentucky was +admitted into the Union. +</P> + +<P> +It is a remarkable and inspiring circumstance, in testimony of +the martial instincts and unwavering loyalty of the transmontane +people, that the two men to whom the Western country in great +measure owed its preservation, the inciting and flaming spirits +of the King's Mountain campaign, were the unopposed first choice +of the people as leaders in the trying experiment of +Statehood—John Sevier of Tennessee and Isaac Shelby of Kentucky. +Had Franklin possessed the patient will of Kentucky, she might +well have preceded that region into the Union. It was not, +however, until June 1, 1796, that Tennessee, after a romantic and +arduous struggle, finally passed through the wide-flung portals +into the domain of national statehood. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Conquest of the Old Southwest, by +Archibald Henderson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST *** + +***** This file should be named 2390-h.htm or 2390-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/9/2390/ + +Produced by Dianne Bean. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.net/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.net), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.net + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</BODY> + +</HTML> + + diff --git a/old/20090327-2390-h.zip b/old/20090327-2390-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..406427c --- /dev/null +++ b/old/20090327-2390-h.zip diff --git a/old/20090327-2390.txt b/old/20090327-2390.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9997d66 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/20090327-2390.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6813 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Conquest of the Old Southwest, by Archibald Henderson + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net + + +Title: The Conquest of the Old Southwest + The Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers into Virginia, + the Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky, 1740-1790 + +Author: Archibald Henderson + +Posting Date: March 27, 2009 [EBook #2390] +Release Date: November, 2000 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST *** + + + + +Produced by Dianne Bean. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + + + + +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST: + + THE ROMANTIC STORY OF THE EARLY PIONEERS INTO VIRGINIA, + THE CAROLINAS, TENNESSEE, AND KENTUCKY 1740-1790 + + +BY + +ARCHIBALD HENDERSON, Ph.D., D.C.L. + + + Some to endure and many to fail, + Some to conquer and many to quail + Toiling over the Wilderness Trail. + + + + +NEW YORK + +THE CENTURY CO. + +1920 + + + + + TO THE HISTORIAN OF + OLD WEST AND NEW WEST + FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER + WITH ADMIRATION AND REGARD + + + + +The country might invite a prince from his palace, merely for the +pleasure of contemplating its beauty and excellence; but only add +the rapturous idea of property, and what allurements can the +world offer for the loss of so glorious a prospect?--Richard +Henderson. + +The established Authority of any government in America, and the +policy of Government at home, are both insufficient to restrain +the Americans.... They acquire no attachment to Place: But +wandering about Seems engrafted in their Nature; and it is a +weakness incident to it, that they Should for ever imagine the +Lands further off, are Still better than those upon which they +are already settled.--Lord Dunmore, to the Earl of Dartmouth. + + + +INTRODUCTION + +The romantic and thrilling story of the southward and westward +migration of successive waves of transplanted European peoples +throughout the entire course of the eighteenth century is the +history of the growth and evolution of American democracy. Upon +the American continent was wrought out, through almost superhuman +daring, incredible hardship, and surpassing endurance, the +formation of a new society. The European rudely confronted with +the pitiless conditions of the wilderness soon discovered that +his maintenance, indeed his existence, was conditioned upon his +individual efficiency and his resourcefulness in adapting himself +to his environment. The very history of the human race, from the +age of primitive man to the modern era of enlightened +civilization, is traversed in the Old Southwest throughout the +course of half a century. + +A series of dissolving views thrown upon the screen, picturing +the successive episodes in the history of a single family as it +wended its way southward along the eastern valleys, resolutely +repulsed the sudden attack of the Indians, toiled painfully up +the granite slopes of the Appalachians, and pitched down into the +transmontane wilderness upon the western waters, would give to +the spectator a vivid conception, in miniature, of the westward +movement. But certain basic elements in the grand procession, +revealed to the sociologist and the economist, would perhaps +escape his scrutiny. Back of the individual, back of the family, +even, lurk the creative and formative impulses of colonization, +expansion, and government. In the recognition of these social and +economic tendencies the individual merges into the group; the +group into the community; the community into a new society. In +this clear perspective of historic development the spectacular +hero at first sight seems to diminish; but the mass, the +movement, the social force which he epitomizes and interprets, +gain in impressiveness and dignity. + +As the irresistible tide of migratory peoples swept ever +southward and westward, seeking room for expansion and economic +independence, a series of frontiers was gradually thrust out +toward the wilderness in successive waves of irregular +indentation. The true leader in this westward advance, to whom +less than his deserts has been accorded by the historian, is the +drab and mercenary trader with the Indians. The story of his +enterprise and of his adventures begins with the planting of +European civilization upon American soil. In the mind of the +aborigines he created the passion for the fruits, both good and +evil, of the white man's civilization, and he was welcomed by the +Indian because he also brought the means for repelling the +further advance of that civilization. The trader was of +incalculable service to the pioneer in first spying out the land +and charting the trackless wilderness. The trail rudely marked by +the buffalo became in time the Indian path and the trader's +"trace"; and the pioneers upon the westward march, following the +line of least resistance, cut out their roads along these very +routes. It is not too much to say that had it not been for the +trader--brave, hardy, and adventurous however often crafty, +unscrupulous, and immoral--the expansionist movement upon the +American continent would have been greatly retarded. + +So scattered and ramified were the enterprises and expeditions of +the traders with the Indians that the frontier which they +established was at best both shifting and unstable. Following far +in the wake of these advance agents of the civilization which +they so often disgraced, came the cattle-herder or rancher, who +took advantage of the extensive pastures and ranges along the +uplands and foot-hills to raise immense herds of cattle. Thus was +formed what might be called a rancher's frontier, thrust out in +advance of the ordinary farming settlements and serving as the +first serious barrier against the Indian invasion. The westward +movement of population is in this respect a direct advance from +the coast. Years before the influx into the Old Southwest of the +tides of settlement from the northeast, the more adventurous +struck straight westward in the wake of the fur-trader, and here +and there erected the cattle-ranges beyond the farming frontier +of the piedmont region. The wild horses and cattle which roamed +at will through the upland barrens and pea-vine pastures were +herded in and driven for sale to the city markets of the East. + +The farming frontier of the piedmont plateau constituted the real +backbone of western settlement. The pioneering farmers, with the +adventurous instincts of the hunter and the explorer, plunged +deeper and ever deeper into the wilderness, lured on by the +prospect of free and still richer lands in the dim interior. +Settlements quickly sprang up in the neighborhood of military +posts or rude forts established to serve as safeguards against +hostile attack; and trade soon flourished between these +settlements and the eastern centers, following the trails of the +trader and the more beaten paths of emigration. The bolder +settlers who ventured farthest to the westward were held in +communication with the East through their dependence upon salt +and other necessities of life; and the search for salt-springs in +the virgin wilderness was an inevitable consequence of the desire +of the pioneer to shake off his dependence upon the coast. + +The prime determinative principle of the progressive American +civilization of the eighteenth century was the passion for the +acquisition of land. The struggle for economic independence +developed the germ of American liberty and became the +differentiating principle of American character. Here was a vast +unappropriated region in the interior of the continent to be had +for the seeking, which served as lure and inspiration to the man +daring enough to risk his all in its acquisition. It was in +accordance with human nature and the principles of political +economy that this unknown extent of uninhabited transmontane +land, widely renowned for beauty, richness, and fertility, should +excite grandiose dreams in the minds of English and Colonials +alike. England was said to be "New Land mad and everybody there +has his eye fixed on this country." Groups of wealthy or +well-to-do individuals organized themselves into land companies +for the colonization and exploitation of the West. The pioneer +promoter was a powerful creative force in westward expansion; and +the activities of the early land companies were decisive factors +in the colonization of the wilderness. Whether acting under the +authority of a crown grant or proceeding on their own authority, +the land companies tended to give stability and permanence to +settlements otherwise hazardous and insecure. + +The second determinative impulse of the pioneer civilization was +wanderlust--the passionately inquisitive instinct of the hunter, +the traveler, and the explorer. This restless class of nomadic +wanderers was responsible in part for the royal proclamation of +1763, a secondary object of which, according to Edmund Burke, was +the limitation of the colonies on the West, as "the charters of +many of our old colonies give them, with few exceptions, no +bounds to the westward but the South Sea." The Long Hunters, +taking their lives in their hands, fared boldly forth to a fabled +hunter's paradise in the far-away wilderness, because they were +driven by the irresistible desire of a Ponce de Leon or a De Soto +to find out the truth about the unknown lands beyond. + +But the hunter was not only thrilled with the passion of the +chase and of discovery; he was intent also upon collecting the +furs and skins of wild animals for lucrative barter and sale in +the centers of trade. He was quick to make "tomahawk claims" and +to assert "corn rights" as he spied out the rich virgin land for +future location and cultivation. Free land and no taxes appealed +to the backwoodsman, tired of paying quit-rents to the agents of +wealthy lords across the sea. Thus the settler speedily followed +in the hunter's wake. In his wake also went many rude and lawless +characters of the border, horse thieves and criminals of +different sorts, who sought to hide their delinquencies in the +merciful liberality of the wilderness. For the most part, +however, it was the salutary instinct of the homebuilder--the man +with the ax, who made a little clearing in the forest and built +there a rude cabin that he bravely defended at all risks against +continued assaults--which, in defiance of every restraint, +irresistibly thrust westward the thin and jagged line of the +frontier. The ax and the surveyor's chain, along with the rifle +and the hunting-knife, constituted the armorial bearings of the +pioneer. With individual as with corporation, with explorer as +with landlord, land-hunger was the master impulse of the era. + +The various desires which stimulated and promoted westward +expansion were, to be sure, often found in complete conjunction. +The trader sought to exploit the Indian for his own advantage, +selling him whisky, trinkets, and firearms in return for rich +furs and costly peltries; yet he was often a hunter himself and +collected great stores of peltries as the result of his solitary +and protracted hunting-expeditions. The rancher and the herder +sought to exploit the natural vegetation of marsh and upland, the +cane-brakes and pea-vines; yet the constantly recurring need for +fresh pasturage made him a pioneer also, drove him ever nearer to +the mountains, and furnished the economic motive for his westward +advance. The small farmer needed the virgin soil of the new +region, the alluvial river-bottoms, and the open prairies, for +the cultivation of his crops and the grazing of his cattle; yet +in the intervals between the tasks of farm life he scoured the +wilderness in search of game "and spied out new lands for future +settlement". + +This restless and nomadic race, says the keenly observant Francis +Baily, "delight much to live on the frontiers, where they can +enjoy undisturbed, and free from the control of any laws, the +blessings which nature has bestowed upon them." Independence of +spirit, impatience of restraint, the inquisitive nature, and the +nomadic temperament--these are the strains in the American +character of the eighteenth century which ultimately blended to +create a typical democracy. The rolling of wave after wave of +settlement westward across the American continent, with a +reversion to primitive conditions along the line of the farthest +frontier, and a marked rise in the scale of civilization at each +successive stage of settlement, from the western limit to the +eastern coast, exemplifies from one aspect the history of the +American people during two centuries. This era, constituting the +first stage in our national existence, and productive of a +buoyant national character shaped in democracy upon a free soil, +closed only yesterday with the exhaustion of cultivable free +land, the disappearance of the last frontier, and the recent +death of "Buffalo Bill". The splendid inauguration of the period, +in the region of the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and +Kentucky, during the second half of the eighteenth century, is +the theme of this story of the pioneers of the Old Southwest. + + + +CONTENTS + +INTRODUCTION + + I THE MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLES + II THE CRADLE OF WESTWARD EXPANSION + III THE BACK COUNTRY AND THE BORDER + IV THE INDIAN WAR + V IN DEFENSE OF CIVILIZATION + VI CRUSHING THE CHEROKEES + VII THE LAND COMPANIES + VIII THE LONG HUNTERS IN THE TWILIGHT ZONE + IX DANIEL BOONE AND WILDERNESS EXPLORATION + X DANIEL BOONE IN KENTUCKY + XI THE REGULATORS + XII WATAUGA--HAVEN OF LIBERTY + XIII OPENING THE GATEWAY--DUNMORE'S WAR + XIV RICHARD HENDERSON AND THE TRANSYLVANIA COMPANY + XV TRANSYLVANIA--A WILDERNESS COMMONWEALTH + XVI THE REPULSE OF THE RED MEN + XVII THE COLONIZATION OF THE CUMBERLAND + XVIII KING'S MOUNTAIN + XIX THE STATE OF FRANKLIN + XX THE LURE OF SPAIN--THE HAVEN OF STATEHOOD + + + + +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST + + + +CHAPTER I. The Migration of the Peoples + +Inhabitants flock in here daily, mostly from Pensilvania and +other parts of America, who are over-stocked with people and Mike +directly from Europe, they commonly seat themselves towards the +West, and have got near the mountains.--Gabriel Johnston, +Governor of North Carolina, to the Secretary of the Board of +Trade, February 15, 1751. + + +At the opening of the eighteenth century the tide of population +had swept inland to the "fall line", the westward boundary of the +established settlements. The actual frontier had been advanced by +the more aggressive pioneers to within fifty miles of the Blue +Ridge. So rapid was the settlement in North Carolina that in the +interval 1717-32 the population quadrupled in numbers. A map of +the colonial settlements in 1725 reveals a narrow strip of +populated land along the Atlantic coast, of irregular +indentation, with occasional isolated nuclei of settlements +further in the interior. The civilization thus established +continued to maintain a close and unbroken communication with +England and the Continent. As long as the settlers, for economic +reasons, clung to the coast, they reacted but slowly to the +transforming influences of the frontier.. Within a triangle of +continental altitude with its apex in New England, bounded on the +east by the Atlantic, and on the west by the Appalachian range, +lay the settlements, divided into two zones--tidewater and +piedmont. As no break occurred in the great mountain system south +of the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, the difficulties of cutting a +passage through the towering wall of living green long proved an +effective obstacle to the crossing of the grim mountain barrier. + +In the beginning the settlements gradually extended westward from +the coast in irregular outline, the indentations taking form +around such natural centers of attraction as areas of fertile +soil, frontier posts, mines, salt-springs, and stretches of +upland favorable for grazing. After a time a second advance of +settlement was begun in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, +running in a southwesterly direction along the broad terraces to +the east of the Appalachian Range, which in North Carolina lies +as far as two hundred and fifty miles from the sea. The Blue +Ridge in Virginia and a belt of pine barrens in North Carolina +were hindrances to this advance, but did not entirely check it. +This second streaming of the population thrust into the long, +narrow wedge of the piedmont zone a class of people differing in +spirit and in tendency from their more aristocratic and +complacent neighbors to the east. + +These settlers of the Valley of Virginia and the North Carolina +piedmont region--English, Scotch-Irish, Germans, Scotch, Irish, +Welsh, and a few French--were the first pioneers of the Old +Southwest. From the joint efforts of two strata of population, +geographically, socially, and economically distinct--tidewater +and piedmont, Old South and New South--originated and flowered +the third and greatest movement of westward expansion, opening +with the surmounting of the mountain barrier and ending in the +occupation and assumption of the vast medial valley of the +continent. + +Synchronous with the founding of Jamestown in Virginia, +significantly enough, was the first planting of Ulster with the +English and Scotch. Emigrants from the Scotch Lowlands, sometimes +as many as four thousand a year (1625), continued throughout the +century to pour into Ulster. "Those of the North of Ireland...," +as pungently described in 1679 by the Secretary of State, +Leoline Jenkins, to the Duke of Ormond, "are most Scotch and +Scotch breed and are the Northern Presbyterians and phanatiques, +lusty, able bodied, hardy and stout men, where one may see three +or four hundred at every meeting-house on Sunday, and all the +North of Ireland is inhabited by these, which is the popular +place of all Ireland by far. They are very numerous and greedy +after land." During the quarter of a century after the English +Revolution of 1688 and the Jacobite uprising in Ireland, which +ended in 1691 with the complete submission of Ireland to William +and Mary, not less than fifty thousand Scotch, according to +Archbishop Synge, settled in Ulster. Until the beginning of the +eighteenth century there was no considerable emigration to +America; and it was first set up as a consequence of English +interference with trade and religion. Repressive measures passed +by the English parliament (1665 1699), prohibiting the +exportation from Ire land to England and Scotland of cattle, +beef, pork, dairy products, etc., and to any country whatever of +manufactured wool, had aroused deep resentment among the +Scotch-Irish, who had built up a great commerce. This discontent +was greatly aggravated by the imposition of religious +disabilities upon the Presbyterians, who, in addition to having +to pay tithes for the support of the established church, were +excluded from all civil and military office (1704), while their +ministers were made liable to penalties for celebrating +marriages. + +This pressure upon a high-spirited people resulted inevitably in +an exodus to the New World. The principal ports by which the +Ulsterites entered America were Lewes and Newcastle (Delaware), +Philadelphia and Boston. The streams of immigration steadily +flowed up the Delaware Valley; and by 1720 the Scotch-Irish began +to arrive in Bucks County. So rapid was the rate of increase in +immigration that the number of arrivals soon mounted from a few +hundred to upward of six thousand, in a single year (1729); and +within a few years this number was doubled. According to the +meticulous Franklin, the proportion increased from a very small +element of the population of Pennsylvania in 1700 to one fourth +of the whole in 1749, and to one third of the whole (350,000) in +1774. Writing to the Penns in 1724, James Logan, Secretary of the +Province, caustically refers to the Ulster settlers on the +disputed Maryland line as "these bold and indigent strangers, +saying as their excuse when challenged for titles, that we had +solicited for colonists and they had come accordingly." The +spirit of these defiant squatters is succinctly expressed in +their statement to Logan that it "was against the laws of God and +nature that so much land should be idle while so many Christians +wanted it to work on and to raise their bread." + +The rising scale of prices for Pennsylvania lands, changing from +ten pounds and two shillings quit-rents per hundred acres in 1719 +to fifteen pounds ten shillings per hundred acres with a +quit-rent of a halfpenny per acre in 1732, soon turned the eyes +of the thrifty Scotch-Irish settlers southward and southwestward. +In Maryland in 1738 lands were offered at five pounds sterling +per hundred acres. Simultaneously, in the Valley of Virginia free +grants of a thousand acres per family were being made. In the +North Carolina piedmont region the proprietary, Lord Granville, +through his agents was disposing of the most desirable lands to +settlers at the rate of three shillings proclamation money for +six hundred and forty acres, the unit of land-division; and was +also making large free grants on the condition of seating a +certain proportion of settlers. "Lord Carteret's land in +Carolina," says North Carolina's first American historian, "where +the soil was cheap, presented a tempting residence to people of +every denomination. Emigrants from the north of Ireland, by the +way of Pennsylvania, flocked to that country; and a considerable +part of North Carolina ... is inhabited by those people or +their descendants." From 1740 onward, attracted by the rich lure +of cheap and even free lands in Virginia and North Carolina, a +tide of immigration swept ceaselessly into the valleys of the +Shenandoah, the Yadkin, and the Catawba. The immensity of this +mobile, drifting mass, which sometimes brought "more than 400 +families with horse waggons and cattle" into North Carolina in a +single year (1752-3), is attested by the fact that from 1732 to +1754, mainly as the result of the Scotch-Irish inundation, the +population of North Carolina more than doubled. + +The second important racial stream of population in the +settlement of the same region was composed of Germans, attracted +to this country from the Palatinate. Lured on by the highly +colored stories of the commercial agents for promoting +immigration--the "newlanders," who were thoroughly unscrupulous +in their methods and extravagant in their representations--a +migration from Germany began in the second decade of the +eighteenth century and quickly assumed alarming proportions. +Although certain of the emigrants were well-to-do, a very great +number were "redemptioners" (indentured servants), who in order +to pay for their transportation were compelled to pledge +themselves to several years of servitude. This economic condition +caused the German immigrant, wherever he went, to become a +settler of the back country, necessity compelling him to pass by +the more expensive lands near the coast. + +For well-nigh sixty years the influx of German immigrants of +various sects was very great, averaging something like fifteen +hundred a year into Pennsylvania alone from 1727 to 1775. Indeed, +Pennsylvania, one third of whose population at the beginning of +the Revolution was German, early became the great distributing +center for the Germans as well as for the Scotch-Irish. Certainly +by 1727 Adam Miller and his fellow Germans had established the +first permanent white settlement in the Valley of Virginia. By +1732 Jost Heydt, accompanied by sixteen families, came from York, +Pennsylvania, and settled on the Opeckon River, in the +neighborhood of the present Winchester. There is no longer any +doubt that "the portion of the Shenandoah Valley sloping to the +north was almost entirely settled by Germans." + +It was about the middle of the century that these pioneers of the +Old Southwest, the shrewd, industrious, and thrifty Pennsylvania +Germans (who came to be generally called "Pennsylvania Dutch" +from the incorrect translation of Pennsylvanische Deutsche), +began to pour into the piedmont region of North Carolina. In the +autumn, after the harvest was in, these ambitious Pennsylvania +pioneers would pack up their belongings in wagons and on beasts +of burden and head for the southwest, trekking down in the manner +of the Boers of South Africa. This movement into the fertile +valley lands of the Yadkin and the Catawba continued unabated +throughout the entire third quarter of the century. Owing to +their unfamiliarity with the English language and the solidarity +of their instincts, the German settlers at first had little share +in government. But they devotedly played their part in the +defense of the exposed settlements and often bore the brunt of +Indian attack. + +The bravery and hardihood displayed by the itinerant missionaries +sent out by the Pennsylvania Synod under the direction of Count +Zinzendorf (1742-8), and by the Moravian Church (1748-53), are +mirrored in the numerous diaries, written in German, happily +preserved to posterity in religious archives of Pennsylvania and +North Carolina. These simple, earnest crusaders, animated by pure +and unselfish motives, would visit on a single tour of a thousand +miles the principal German settlements in Maryland and Virginia +(including the present West Virginia). Sometimes they would make +an extended circuit through North Carolina, South Carolina, and +even Georgia, everywhere bearing witness to the truth of the +gospel and seeking to carry the most elemental forms of the +Christian religion, preaching and prayer, to the primitive +frontiersmen marooned along the outer fringe of white +settlements. These arduous journeys in the cause of piety place +this type of pioneer of the Old Southwest in alleviating contrast +to the often relentless and bloodthirsty figure of the rude +borderer. + +Noteworthy among these pious pilgrimages is the Virginia journey +of Brothers Leonhard Schnell and John Brandmuller (October 12 to +December 12, 1749). At the last outpost of civilization, the +scattered settlements in Bath and Alleghany counties, these +courageous missionaries--feasting the while solely on bear meat, +for there was no bread--encountered conditions of almost +primitive savagery, of which they give this graphic picture: +"Then we came to a house, where we had to lie on bear skins +around the fire like the rest.... The clothes of the people +consist of deer skins, their food of Johnny cakes, deer and bear +meat. A kind of white people are found here, who live like +savages. Hunting is their chief occupation." Into the valley of +the Yadkin in December, 1752, came Bishop Spangenberg and a party +of Moravians, accompanied by a surveyor and two guides, for the +purpose of locating the one hundred thousand acres of land which +had been offered them on easy terms the preceding year by Lord +Granville. This journey was remarkable as an illustration of +sacrifices willingly made and extreme hardships uncomplainingly +endured for the sake of the Moravian brotherhood. In the back +country of North Carolina near the Mulberry Fields they found the +whole woods full of Cherokee Indians engaged in hunting. A +beautiful site for the projected settlement met their delighted +gaze at this place; but they soon learned to their regret that it +had already been "taken up" by Daniel Boone's future +father-in-law, Morgan Bryan. + +On October 8, 1753, a party of twelve single men headed by the +Rev. Bernhard Adam Grube, set out from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, +to trek down to the new-found haven in the Carolina +hinterland--"a corner which the Lord has reserved for the +Brethren"--in Anson County. Following for the most part the great +highway extending from Philadelphia to the Yadkin, over which +passed the great throng sweeping into the back country of North +Carolina--through the Valley of Virginia and past Robert Luhny's +mill on the James River--they encountered many hardships along +the way. Because of their "long wagon," they had much difficulty +in crossing one steep mountain; and of this experience Brother +Grube, with a touch of modest pride, observes: "People had told +us that this hill was most dangerous, and that we would scarcely +be able to cross it, for Morgan Bryan, the first to travel this +way, had to take the wheels off his wagon and carry it piecemeal +to the top, and had been three months on the journey from the +Shanidore [Shenandoah] to the Etkin [Yadkin]." + +These men were the highest type of the pioneers of the Old +Southwest, inspired with the instinct of homemakers in a land +where, if idle rumor were to be credited, "the people lived like +wild men never hearing of God or His Word." In one hand they bore +the implement of agriculture, in the other the book of the gospel +of Jesus Christ. True faith shines forth in the simply eloquent +words: "We thanked our Saviour that he had so graciously led us +hither, and had helped us through all the hard places, for no +matter how dangerous it looked, nor how little we saw how we +could win through, everything always went better than seemed +possible." The promise of a new day--the dawn of the heroic +age--rings out in the pious carol of camaraderie at their +journey's end: + + 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. + + + +CHAPTER II. The Cradle of Westward Expansion + +In the year 1746 I was up in the country that is now Anson, +Orange and Rowan Counties, there was not then above one hundred +fighting men there is now at least three thousand for the most +part Irish Protestants and Germans and dailey increasing.--Matthew +Rowan, President of the North Carolina Council, to the +Board of Trade, June 28, 1753. + + +The conquest of the West is usually attributed to the ready +initiative, the stern self-reliance, and the libertarian instinct +of the expert backwoodsmen. These bold, nomadic spirits were +animated by an unquenchable desire to plunge into the wilderness +in search of an El Dorado at the outer verge of civilization, +free of taxation, quit-rents, and the law's restraint. They +longed to build homes for themselves and their descendants in a +limitless, free domain; or else to fare deeper and deeper into +the trackless forests in search of adventure. Yet one must not +overlook the fact that behind Boone and pioneers of his stamp +were men of conspicuous civil and military genius, constructive +in purpose and creative in imagination, who devoted their best +gifts to actual conquest and colonization. These men of large +intellectual mold-themselves surveyors, hunters, and +pioneers--were inspired with the larger vision of the +expansionist. Whether colonizers, soldiers, or speculators on the +grand scale, they sought to open at one great stroke the vast +trans-Alleghany regions as a peaceful abode for mankind. + +Two distinct classes of society were gradually drawing apart from +each other in North Carolina and later in Virginia--the pioneer +democracy of the back country and the upland, and the planter +aristocracy of the lowland and the tide-water region. From the +frontier came the pioneer explorers whose individual enterprise +and initiative were such potent factors in the exploitation of +the wilderness. From the border counties still in contact with +the East came a number of leaders. Thus in the heart of the Old +Southwest the two determinative principles already referred to, +the inquisitive and the acquisitive instincts, found a fortunate +conjunction. The exploratory passion of the pioneer, directed in +the interest of commercial enterprise, prepared the way for the +great westward migration. The warlike disposition of the hardy +backwoodsman, controlled by the exercise of military strategy, +accomplished the conquest of the trans-Alleghany country. + +Fleeing from the traditional bonds of caste and aristocracy in +England and Europe, from economic boycott and civil oppression, +from religious persecution and favoritism, many worthy members of +society in the first quarter of the eighteenth century sought a +haven of refuge in the "Quackerthal" of William Penn, with its +trustworthy guarantees of free tolerance in religious faith and +the benefits of representative self-government. From East +Devonshire in England came George Boone, the grandfather of the +great pioneer, and from Wales came Edward Morgan, whose daughter +Sarah became the wife of Squire Boone, Daniel's father. These +were conspicuous representatives of the Society of Friends, drawn +thither by the roseate representations of the great Quaker, +William Penn, and by his advanced views on popular government and +religious toleration. Hither, too, from Ireland, whither he had +gone from Denmark, came Morgan Bryan, settling in Chester County, +prior to 1719; and his children, William, Joseph, James, and +Morgan, who more than half a century later gave the name to +Bryan's Station in Kentucky, were destined to play important +roles in the drama of westward migration. In September, 1734, +Michael Finley from County Armagh, Ireland, presumably +accompanied by his brother Archibald Finley, settled in Bucks +County, Pennsylvania. According to the best authorities, +Archibald Finley was the father of John Finley, or Findlay as he +signed himself, Boone's guide and companion in his exploration of +Kentucky in 1769-71. To Pennsylvania also came Mordecai Lincoln, +great grandson of Samuel Lincoln, who had emigrated from England +to Hingham, Massachusetts, as early as 1637. This Mordecai +Lincoln, who in 1720 settled in Chester County, Pennsylvania, the +great-great-grandfather of President Lincoln, was the father of +Sarah Lincoln, who was wedded to William Boone, and of Abraham +Lincoln, who married Anne Boone, William's first cousin. Early +settlers in Pennsylvania were members of the Hanks family, one of +whom was the maternal grandfather of President Lincoln. + +No one race or breed of men can lay claim to exclusive credit for +leadership in the hinterland movement and the conquest of the +West. Yet one particular stock of people, the Ulster Scots, +exhibited with most completeness and picturesqueness a group of +conspicuous qualities and attitudes which we now recognize to be +typical of the American character as molded by the conditions of +frontier life. Cautious, wary, and reserved, these Scots +concealed beneath a cool and calculating manner a relentlessness +in reasoning power and an intensity of conviction which glowed +and burned with almost fanatical ardor. Strict in religious +observance and deep in spiritual fervor, they never lost sight of +the main chance, combining a shrewd practicality with a wealth of +devotion. It has been happily said of them that they kept the +Sabbath and everything else they could lay their hands on. In the +polity of these men religion and education went hand in hand; and +they habitually settled together in communities in order that +they might have teachers and preachers of their own choice and +persuasion. + +In little-known letters and diaries of travelers and itinerant +ministers may be found many quaint descriptions and faithful +characterizations of the frontier settlers in their habits of +life and of the scenes amidst which they labored. In a letter to +Edmund Fanning, the cultured Robin Jones, agent of Lord Granville +and Attorney-General of North Carolina, summons to view a piquant +image of the western border and borderers: "The inhabitants are +hospitable in their way, live in plenty and dirt, are stout, of +great prowess in manly athletics; and, in private conversation, +bold, impertinent, and vain. In the art of war (after the Indian +manner) they are well-skilled, are enterprising and fruitful of +strategies; and, when in action, are as bold and intrepid as the +ancient Romans. The Shawnese acknowledge them their superiors +even in their own way of fighting.... [The land] may be truly +called the land of the mountains, for they are so numerous that +when you have reached the summit of one of them, you may see +thousands of every shape that the imagination can suggest, +seeming to vie with each other which should raise his lofty head +to touch the clouds.... It seems to me that nature has been +wanton in bestowing her blessings on that country." + +An excellent pen-picture of educational and cultural conditions +in the backwoods of North Carolina, by one of the early settlers +in the middle of the century, exhibits in all their barren +cheerlessness the hardships and limitations of life in the +wilderness. The father of William Few, the narrator, had trekked +down from Maryland and settled in Orange County, some miles east +of the little hamlet of Hillsborough. "In that country at that +time there were no schools, no churches or parsons, or doctors or +lawyers; no stores, groceries or taverns, nor do I recollect +during the first two years any officer, ecclesiastical, civil or +military, except a justice of the peace, a constable and two or +three itinerant preachers.... These people had few wants, and +fewer temptations to vice than those who lived in more refined +society, though ignorant. They were more virtuous and more happy.... +A schoolmaster appeared and offered his services to teach +the children of the neighborhood for twenty shillings each per +year.... In that simple state of society money was but little +known; the schoolmaster was the welcome guest of his pupil, fed +at the bountiful table and clothed from the domestic loom.... +In that country at that time there was great scarcity of books." + +The journals of itinerant ministers through the Valley of +Virginia and the Carolina piedmont zone yield precious mementoes +of the people, their longing after the things of the spirit, and +their pitiful isolation from the regular preaching of the gospel. +These missionaries were true pioneers in this Old Southwest, +ardent, dauntless, and heroic--carrying the word into remote +places and preaching the gospel beneath the trees of the forest. +In his journal (1755-6), the Rev. Hugh McAden, born in +Pennsylvania of Scotch-Irish parentage, a graduate of Nassau Hall +(1753), makes the unconsciously humorous observation that +wherever he found Presbyterians he found people who "seemed +highly pleased, and very desirous to hear the word"; whilst +elsewhere he found either dissension and defection to Baptist +principles, or "no appearance of the life of religion." In the +Scotch-Irish Presbyterian settlements in what is now Mecklenburg +County, the cradle of American liberty, he found "pretty serious, +judicious people" of the stamp of Moses, William, and James +Alexander. While traveling in the upper country of South +Carolina, he relates with gusto the story of "an old gentleman +who said to the Governor of South Carolina, when he was in those +parts, in treaty with the Cherokee Indians that 'he had never +seen a shirt, been in a fair, heard a sermon, or seen a minister +in all his life.' Upon which the governor promised to send him up +a minister, that he might hear one sermon before he died." The +minister came and preached; and this was all the preaching that +had been heard in the upper part of South Carolina before Mr. +McAden's visit. + +Such, then, were the rude and simple people in the back country +of the Old Southwest--the deliberate and self-controlled English, +the aggressive, landmongering Scotch-Irish, the buoyant Welsh, +the thrifty Germans, the debonair French, the impetuous Irish, +and the calculating Scotch. The lives they led were marked by +independence of spirit, democratic instincts, and a forthright +simplicity. In describing the condition of the English settlers +in the backwoods of Virginia, one of their number, Doddridge, +says: "Most of the articles were of domestic manufacture. There +might have been incidentally a few things brought to the country +for sale in a primitive way, but there was no store for general +supply. The table furniture usually consisted of wooden vessels, +either turned or coopered. Iron forks, tin cups, etc., were +articles of rare and delicate luxury. The food was of the most +wholesome and primitive kind. The richest meat, the finest +butter, and best meal that ever delighted man's palate were here +eaten with a relish which health and labor only know. The +hospitality of the people was profuse and proverbial." + +The circumstances of their lives compelled the pioneers to become +self-sustaining. Every immigrant was an adept at many trades. He +built his own house, forged his own tools, and made his own +clothes. At a very early date rifles were manufactured at the +High Shoals of the Yadkin; Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, was an +expert gunsmith. The difficulty of securing food for the +settlements forced every man to become a hunter and to scour the +forest for wild game. Thus the pioneer, through force of sheer +necessity, became a dead shot--which stood him in good stead in +the days of Indian incursions and bloody retaliatory raids. +Primitive in their games, recreations, and amusements, which not +infrequently degenerated into contests of savage brutality, the +pioneers always set the highest premium upon personal bravery, +physical prowess, and skill in manly sports. At all public +gatherings, general musters, "vendues" or auctions, and even +funerals, whisky flowed with extraordinary freedom. It is worthy +of record that among the effects of the Rev. Alexander Craighead, +the famous teacher and organizer of Presbyterianism in +Mecklenburg and the adjoining region prior to the Revolution, +were found a punch bowl and glasses. + +The frontier life, with its purifying and hardening influence, +bred in these pioneers intellectual traits which constitute the +basis of the American character. The single-handed and successful +struggle with nature in the tense solitude of the forest +developed a spirit of individualism, restive under control. On +the other hand, the sense of sharing with others the arduous +tasks and dangers of conquering the wilderness gave birth to a +strong sense of solidarity arid of human sympathy. With the lure +of free lands ever before them, the pioneers developed a +restlessness and a nervous energy, blended with a buoyancy of +spirit, which are fundamentally American. Yet this same +untrammeled freedom occasioned a disregard for law and a defiance +of established government which have exhibited themselves +throughout the entire course of our history. Initiative, +self-reliance, boldness in conception, fertility in resource, +readiness in execution, acquisitiveness, inventive genius, +appreciation of material advantages--these, shot through with a +certain fine idealism, genial human sympathy, and a high romantic +strain--are the traits of the American national type as it +emerged from the Old Southwest. + + + +CHAPTER III. The Back Country and the Border + +Far from the bustle of the world, they live in the most +delightful climate, and richest soil imaginable; they are +everywhere surrounded with beautiful prospects and sylvan scenes; +lofty mountains, transparent streams, falls of water, rich +valleys, and majestic woods; the whole interspersed with an +infinite variety of flowering shrubs, constitute the landscape +surrounding them; they are subject to few diseases; are generally +robust; and live in perfect liberty; they are ignorant of want +and acquainted with but few vices. Their inexperience of the +elegancies of life precludes any regret that they possess not the +means of enjoying them, but they possess what many princes would +give half their dominion for, health, content, and tranquillity +of mind.--Andrew Burnaby: Travels Through North America. + + +The two streams of Ulstermen, the greater through Philadelphia, +the lesser through Charleston, which poured into the Carolinas +toward the middle of the century, quickly flooded the back +country. The former occupied the Yadkin Valley and the region to +the westward, the latter the Waxhaws and the Anson County region +to the northwest. The first settlers were known as the +"Pennsylvania Irish," because they had first settled in +Pennsylvania after migrating from the north of Ireland; while +those who came by way of Charleston were known as the +"Scotch-Irish." The former, who had resided in Pennsylvania long +enough to be good judges of land, shrewdly made their settlements +along the rivers and creeks. The latter, new arrivals and less +experienced, settled on thinner land toward the heads of creeks +and water courses. + +Shortly prior to 1735, Morgan Bryan, his wife Martha, and eight +children, together with other families of Quakers from +Pennsylvania, settled upon a large tract of land on the northwest +side of the Opeckon River near Winchester. A few years later they +removed up the Virginia Valley to the Big Lick in the present +Roanoke County, intent upon pushing westward to the very +outskirts of civilization. In the autumn of 1748, leaving behind +his brother William, who had followed him to Roanoke County, +Morgan Bryan removed with his family to the Forks of the Yadkin +River. The Morgans, with the exception of Richard, who emigrated +to Virginia, remained in Pennsylvania, spreading over +Philadelphia and Bucks counties; while the Hanks and Lincoln +families found homes in Virginia--Mordecai Lincoln's son, John, +the great-grandfather of President Lincoln, removing from Berks +to the Shenandoah Valley in 1765. On May 1, 1750, Squire Boone, +his wife Sarah (Morgan), and their eleven children--a veritable +caravan, traveling like the patriarchs of old--started south; and +tarried for a space, according to reliable tradition, on Linville +Creek in the Virginia Valley. In 1752 they removed to the Forks +of the Yadkin, and the following year received from Lord +Granville three tracts of land, all situated in Rowan County. +About the hamlet of Salisbury, which in 1755 consisted of seven +or eight log houses and the court house, there now rapidly +gathered a settlement of people marked by strong individuality, +sturdy independence, and virile self-reliance. The Boones and the +Bryans quickly accommodated themselves to frontier conditions and +immediately began to take an active part in the local affairs of +the county. Upon the organization of the county court Squire +Boone was chosen justice of the peace; and Morgan Bryan was soon +appearing as foreman of juries and director in road improvements. + +The Great Trading Path, leading from Virginia to the towns of the +Catawbas and other Southern Indians, crossed the Yadkin at the +Trading Ford and passed a mile southeast of Salisbury. Above +Sapona Town near the Trading Ford was Swearing Creek, which, +according to constant and picturesque tradition, was the spot +where the traders stopped to take a solemn oath never to reveal +any unlawful proceedings that might occur during their sojourn +among the Indians. In his divertingly satirical "History of the +Dividing Line" William Byrd in 1728 thus speaks of this locality: +"The Soil is exceedingly rich on both sides the Yadkin, abounding +in rank Grass and prodigiously large Trees; and for plenty of +Fish, Fowl and Venison, is inferior to No Part of the Northern +Continent. There the Traders commonly lie Still for some days, to +recruit their Horses' Flesh as well as to recover their own +spirits." In this beautiful country happily chosen for settlement +by Squire Boone--who erected his cabin on the east side of the +Yadkin about a mile and a quarter from Alleman's, now Boone's, +Ford--wild game abounded. Buffaloes were encountered in eastern +North Carolina by Byrd while running the dividing line; and in +the upper country of South Carolina three or four men with their +dogs could kill fourteen to twenty buffaloes in a single day." +Deer and bears fell an easy prey to the hunter; wild turkeys +filled every thicket; the watercourses teemed with beaver, otter, +and muskrat, as well as with shad and other delicious fish. +Panthers, wildcats, and wolves overran the country; and the +veracious Brother Joseph, while near the present Wilkesboro, +amusingly records: "The wolves wh. are not like those in Germany, +Poland and Lifland (because they fear men and don't easily come +near) give us such music of six different cornets the like of wh. +I have never heard in my life." So plentiful was the game that +the wild deer mingled with the cattle grazing over the wide +stretches of luxuriant grass. + +In the midst of this sylvan paradise grew up Squire Boone's son, +Daniel Boone, a Pennsylvania youth of English stock, Quaker +persuasion, and Baptist proclivities. Seen through a glorifying +halo after the lapse of a century and three quarters, he rises +before us a romantic figure, poised and resolute, simple, +benign--as naive and shy as some wild thing of the primeval +forest--five feet eight inches in height, with broad chest and +shoulders, dark locks, genial blue eyes arched with fair +eyebrows, thin lips and wide mouth, nose of slightly Roman cast, +and fair, ruddy countenance. Farming was irksome to this +restless, nomadic spirit, who on the slightest excuse would +exchange the plow and the grubbing hoe for the long rifle and +keen-edged hunting knife. In a single day during the autumn +season he would kill four or five deer; or as many bears as would +snake from two to three thousand pounds weight of bear-bacon. +Fascinated with the forest, he soon found profit as well as +pleasure in the pursuit of game; and at excellent fixed prices he +sold his peltries, most often at Salisbury, some thirteen miles +away, sometimes at the store of the old "Dutchman," George +Hartman, on the Yadkin, and occasionally at Bethabara, the +Moravian town sixty odd miles distant. Skins were in such demand +that they soon came to replace hard money, which was incredibly +scarce in the back country, as a medium of exchange. Upon one +occasion a caravan from Bethabara hauled three thousand pounds, +upon another four thousand pounds, of dressed deerskins to +Charleston. So immense was this trade that the year after Boone's +arrival at the Forks of Yadkin thirty thousand deerskins were +exported from the province of North Carolina. We like to think +that the young Daniel Boone was one of that band of whom Brother +Joseph, while in camp on the Catawba River (November 12, 1752) +wrote: "There are many hunters about here, who live like Indians, +they kill many deer selling their hides, and thus live without +much work." + +In this very class of professional hunters, living like Indians, +was thus bred the spirit of individual initiative and strenuous +leadership in the great westward expansionist movement of the +coming decade. An English traveler gives the following minute +picture of the dress and accoutrement of the Carolina +backwoodsman. + +"Their whole dress is very singular, and not very materially +different from that of the Indians; being a hunting shirt, +somewhat resembling a waggoner's frock, ornamented with a great +many fringes, tied round the middle with a broad belt, much +decorated also, in which is fastened a tomahawk, an instrument +that serves every purpose of defence and convenience; being a +hammer at one side and a sharp hatchet at the other; the shot bag +and powderhorn, carved with a variety of whimsical figures and +devices, hang from their necks over one shoulder; and on their +heads a flapped hat, of a reddish hue, proceeding from the +intensely hot beams of the sun. + +Sometimes they wear leather breeches, made of Indian dressed elk, +or deer skins, but more frequently thin trowsers. + +On their legs they have Indian boots, or leggings, made of coarse +woollen cloth, that either are wrapped round loosely and tied +with garters, or laced upon the outside, and always come better +than half-way up the thigh. + +On their feet they sometimes wear pumps of their own manufacture, +but generally Indian moccossons, of their own construction also, +which are made of strong elk's, or buck's skin, dressed soft as +for gloves or breeches, drawn together in regular plaits over the +toe, and lacing from thence round to the fore part of the middle +of the ancle, without a seam in them, yet fitting close to the +feet, and are indeed perfectly easy and pliant. + +Their hunting, or rifle shirts, they have also died in a variety +of colours, some yellow, others red, some brown, and many wear +them quite white." + +No less unique and bizarre, though less picturesque, was the +dress of the women of the region--in particular of Surry County, +North Carolina, as described by General William Lenoir: + +"The women wore linses [flax] petticoats and 'bedgowns' [like a +dressing-sack], and often went without shoes in the summer. Some +had bonnets and bedgowns made of calico, but generally of linsey; +and some of them wore men's hats. Their hair was commonly +clubbed. Once, at a large meeting, I noticed there but two women +that had on long gowns. One of these was laced genteelly, and the +body of the other was open, and the tail thereof drawn up and +tucked in her apron or coat-string." + +While Daniel Boone was quietly engaged in the pleasant pursuits +of the chase, a vast world-struggle of which he little dreamed +was rapidly approaching a crisis. For three quarters of a century +this titanic contest between France and England for the interior +of the continent had been waged with slowly accumulating force. +The irrepressible conflict had been formally inaugurated at Sault +Ste. Marie in 1671, when Daumont de Saint Lusson, swinging aloft +his sword, proclaimed the sovereignty of France over "all +countries, rivers, lakes, and streams ... both those which have +been discovered and those which may be discovered hereafter, in +all their length and breadth, bounded on the one side by the seas +of the North and of the West, and on the other by the South Sea." +Just three months later, three hardy pioneers of Virginia, +despatched upon their arduous mission by Colonel Abraham Wood in +behalf of the English crown, had crossed the Appalachian divide; +and upon the banks of a stream whose waters slipped into the Ohio +to join the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico, had carved the +royal insignia upon the blazed trunk of a giant of the forest, +the while crying: "Long live Charles the Second, by the grace of +God, King of England, Scotland, France, Ireland and Virginia and +of the territories thereunto belonging." + +La Salle's dream of a New France in the heart of America was +blotted out in his tragic death upon the banks of the River +Trinity (1687). Yet his mantle was to fall in turn upon the +square shoulders of Le Moyne d'Iberville and of his brother--the +good, the constant Bienville, who after countless and arduous +struggles laid firm the foundations of New Orleans. In the +precious treasury of Margry we learn that on reaching Rochelle +after his first voyage in 1699 Iberville in these prophetic words +voices his faith: "If France does not immediately seize this part +of America which is the most beautiful, and establish a colony +which is strong enough to resist any which England may have, the +English colonies (already considerable in Carolina) will so +thrive that in less than a hundred years they will be strong +enough to seize all America." But the world-weary Louis Quatorze, +nearing his end, quickly tired of that remote and unproductive +colony upon the shores of the gulf, so industriously described in +Paris as a "terrestrial paradise"; and the "paternal providence +of Versailles" willingly yielded place to the monumental +speculation of the great financier Antoine Crozat. In this Paris +of prolific promotion and amazed credulity, ripe for the colossal +scheme of Law, soon to blow to bursting-point the bubble of the +Mississippi, the very songs in the street echoed flamboyant, +half-satiric panegyrics upon the new Utopia, this Mississippi +Land of Cockayne: + + It's to-day no contribution + To discuss the Constitution + And the Spanish war's forgot + For a new Utopian spot; + And the very latest phase + Is the Mississippi craze. + +Interest in the new colony led to a great development of +southwesterly trade from New France. Already the French coureurs +de bois were following the water route from the Illinois to South +Carolina. Jean Couture, a deserter from the service in New +France, journeyed over the Ohio and Tennessee rivers to that +colony, and was known as "the greatest Trader and Traveller +amongst the Indians for more than Twenty years." In 1714 young +Charles Charleville accompanied an old trader from Crozat's +colony on the gulf to the great salt-springs on the Cumberland, +where a post for trading with the Shawanoes had already been +established by the French. But the British were preparing to +capture this trade as early as 1694, when Tonti warned Villermont +that Carolinians were already established on a branch of the +Ohio. Four years later, Nicholson, Governor of Maryland, was +urging trade with the Indians of the interior in the effort to +displace the French. At an early date the coast colonies began to +trade with the Indian tribes of the back country: the Catawbas of +the Yadkin Valley; the Cherokees, whose towns were scattered +through Tennessee; the Chickasaws, to the westward in northern +Mississippi; and the Choctaws farther to the southward. Even +before the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the South +Carolina settlements extended scarcely twenty miles from the +coast, English traders had established posts among the Indian +tribes four hundred miles to the west of Charleston. Following +the sporadic trading of individuals from Virginia with the inland +Indians, the heavily laden caravans of William Byrd were soon +regularly passing along the Great Trading Path from Virginia to +the towns of the Catawbas and other interior tribes of the +Carolinas, delighting the easily captivated fancy and provoking +the cupidity of the red men with "Guns, Powder, Shot, Hatchets +(which the Indians call Tomahawks), Kettles, red and blue Planes, +Duffields, Stroudwater blankets, and some Cutlary Wares, Brass +Rings and other Trinkets." In Pennsylvania, George Croghan, the +guileful diplomat, who was emissary from the Council to the Ohio +Indians (1748), had induced "all-most all the Ingans in the +Woods" to declare against the French; and was described by +Christopher Gist as a "meer idol among his countrymen, the Irish +traders." + +Against these advances of British trade and civilization, the +French for four decades had artfully struggled, projecting tours +of exploration into the vast medial valley of the continent and +constructing a chain of forts and trading-posts designed to +establish their claims to the country and to hold in check the +threatened English thrust from the east. Soon the wilderness +ambassador of empire, Celoron de Bienville, was despatched by the +far-visioned Galissoniere at Quebec to sow broadcast with +ceremonial pomp in the heart of America the seeds of empire, +grandiosely graven plates of lasting lead, in defiant yet futile +symbol of the asserted sovereignty of France. Thus threatened in +the vindication of the rights of their colonial sea-to-sea +charters, the English threw off the lethargy with which they had +failed to protect their traders, and in grants to the Ohio and +Loyal land companies began resolutely to form plans looking to +the occupation of the interior. But the French seized the English +trading-house at Venango which they converted into a fort; and +Virginia's protest, conveyed by a calm and judicious young man, a +surveyor, George Washington, availed not to prevent the French +from seizing Captain Trent's hastily erected military post at the +forks of the Ohio and constructing there a formidable work, named +Fort Duquesne. Washington, with his expeditionary force sent to +garrison Captain Trent's fort, defeated Jumonville and his small +force near Great Meadows (May, 1754); but soon after he was +forced to surrender Fort Necessity to Coulon de Villiers. + +The titanic struggle, fittingly precipitated in the backwoods of +the Old Southwest, was now on--a struggle in which the resolute +pioneers of these backwoods first seriously measured their +strength with the French and their copper-hued allies, and +learned to surpass the latter in their own mode of warfare. The +portentous conflict, destined to assure the eastern half of the +continent to Great Britain, is a grim, prophetic harbinger of the +mighty movement of the next quarter of a century into the +twilight zone of the trans-Alleghany territory: + + + +CHAPTER IV. The Indian War + +All met in companies with their wives and children, and set about +building little fortifications, to defend themselves from such +barbarian and inhuman enemies, whom they concluded would be let +loose upon them at pleasure.--The Reverend Hugh McAden--Diary, +July, 1755. + + +Long before the actual outbreak of hostilities powerful forces +were gradually converging to produce a clash between the +aggressive colonials and the crafty Indians. As the settlers +pressed farther westward into the domain of the red men, +arrogantly grazing their stock over the cherished hunting-grounds +of the Cherokees, the savages, who were already well disposed +toward the French, began to manifest a deep indignation against +the British colonists because of this callous encroachment upon +their territory. During the sporadic forays by scattered bands of +Northern Indians upon the Catawbas and other tribes friendly to +the pioneers the isolated settlements at the back part of the +Carolinas suffered rude and sanguinary onslaughts. In the summer +of 1753 a party of northern Indians warring in the French +interest made their appearance in Rowan County, which had just +been organized, and committed various depredations upon the +scattered settlements. To repel these attacks a band of the +Catawbas sallied forth, encountered a detached party of the +enemy, and slew five of their number. Among the spoils, +significantly enough, were silver crucifixes, beads, +looking-glasses, tomahawks and other implements of war, all of +French manufacture. + +Intense rivalry for the good will of the near-by southern tribes +existed between Virginia and South Carolina. In strong +remonstrance against the alleged attempt of Governor Dinwiddie of +Virginia to alienate the Cherokees, Catawbas, Muscogees, and +Chickasaws from South Carolina and to attach them to Virginia, +Governor Glen of South Carolina made pungent observations to +Dinwiddie: "South Carolina is a weak frontier colony, and in case +of invasion by the French would be their first object of attack. +We have not much to fear, however, while we retain the affection +of the Indians around us; but should we forfeit that by any +mismanagement on our part, or by the superior address of the +French, we are in a miserable situation. The Cherokees alone have +several thousand gunmen well acquainted with every inch of the +province ... their country is the key to Carolina." By a treaty +concluded at Saluda (November 24, 1753), Glen promised to build +the Cherokees a fort near the lower towns, for the protection of +themselves and their allies; and the Cherokees on their part +agreed to become the subjects of the King of Great Britain and +hold their lands under him. This fort, erected this same year on +the headwaters of the Savannah, within gunshot distance of the +important Indian town of Keowee, was named Fort Prince George. +"It is a square," says the founder of the fort (Governor Glen to +the Board of Trade, August 26, 1754), "with regular Bastions and +four Ravelins it is near Two hundred foot from Salient Angle to +Salient Angle and is made of Earth taken out of the Ditch, +secured with fachines and well rammed with a banquet on the +Inside for the men to stand upon when they fire over, the +Ravelins are made of Posts of Lightwood which is very durable, +they are ten foot in length sharp pointed three foot and a half +in the ground." The dire need for such a fort in the back country +was tragically illustrated by the sudden onslaught upon the +"House of John Gutry & James Anshers" in York County by a party +of sixty French Indians (December 16, 1754), who brutally +murdered sixteen of the twenty-one persons present, and carried +off as captives the remaining five." + +At the outbreak of the French and Indian War in 1754 North +Carolina voted twelve thousand pounds for the raising of troops +and several thousand pounds additional for the construction of +forts--a sum considerably larger than that voted by Virginia. A +regiment of two hundred and fifty men was placed under the +command of Colonel James Innes of the Cape Fear section; and the +ablest officer under him was the young Irishman from the same +section, Lieutenant Hugh Waddell. On June 3, 1754, Dinwiddie +appointed Innes, his close friend, commander-in-chief of all the +forces against the French; and immediately after the disaster at +Great Meadows (July, 1754), Innes took command. Within two months +the supplies for the North Carolina troops were exhausted; and as +Virginia then failed to furnish additional supplies, Colonel +Innes had no recourse but to disband his troops and permit them +to return home. Appointed governor of Fort Cumberland by General +Braddock, he was in command there while Braddock advanced on his +disastrous march. + +The lesson of Braddock's defeat (July 9, 1755) was memorable in +the history of the Old Southwest. Well might Braddock exclaim +with his last breath: "Who would have thought it? ... We shall +know better how to deal with them another time." Led on by the +reckless and fiery Beaujeu, wearing an Indian gorget about his +neck, the savages from the protection of trees and rough +defenses, a pre pared ambuscade, poured a galling fire into the +compact divisions of the English, whose scarlet coats furnished +ideal targets. The obstinacy of the British commanders in +refusing to permit their troops to fight Indian fashion was +suicidal; for as Herman Alriclis wrote Governor Morris of +Pennsylvania (July 22, 1755): "... the French and Indians had +cast an Intrenchment across the road before our Army which they +Discovered not Untill they came Close up to it, from thence and +both sides of the road the enemy kept a constant fireing on them, +our Army being so confused, they could not fight, and they would +not be admitted by the Genl or Sir John St. Clair, to break thro' +their Ranks and Take behind trees." Daniel Boone, who went from +North Carolina as a wagoner in the company commanded by Edward +Brice Dobbs, was on the battle-field; but Dobbs's company at the +time was scouting in the woods. When the fierce attack fell upon +the baggage a train, Boone succeeded in effecting his escape only +by cutting the traces of his team and fleeing on one of the +horses. To his dying day Boone continued to censure Braddock's +conduct, and reprehended especially his fatal neglect to employ +strong flank-guards and a sufficient number of Provincial scouts +thoroughly acquainted with the wilderness and all the wiles and +strategies of savage warfare. + +For a number of months following Braddock's defeat there was a +great rush of the frightened people southward. In a letter to +Dinwiddie, Washington expresses the apprehension that Augusta, +Frederick, and Hampshire County will soon be depopulated, as the +whole back country is in motion toward the southern colonies. +During this same summer Governor Arthur Dobbs of North Carolina +made a tour of exploration through the western part of the +colony, seeking a site for a fort to guard the frontier. The +frontier company of fifty men which was to garrison the projected +fort was placed under the command of Hugh Waddell, now promoted +to the rank of captain, though only twenty-one years old. In +addition to Waddell's company, armed patrols were required for +the protection of the Rowan County frontier; and during the +summer Indian alarms were frequent at the Moravian village of +Bethabara, whose inhabitants had heard with distress on March +31st of the slaughter of eleven Moravians on the Mahoni and of +the ruin of Gnadenhutten. Many of the settlers in the outlying +districts of Rowan fled for safety to the refuge of the little +village; and frequently every available house, every place of +temporary abode was filled with panic stricken refugees. So +persistent were the depredations of the Indians and so alarmed +were the scattered Rowan settlers by the news of the murders and +the destruction of Vaul's Fort in Virginia (June 25, 1756) that +at a conference on July 5th the Moravians "decided to protect our +houses with palisades, and make them safe before the enemy should +in vade our tract or attack us, for if the people were all going +to retreat we would be the last left on the frontier and the +first point of attack." By July 23d, they had constructed a +strong defense for their settlement, afterward called the "Dutch +Fort" by the Indians. The principal structure was a stockade, +triangular in plan, some three hundred feet on a side, enclosing +the principal buildings of the settlement; and the gateway was +guarded by an observation tower. The other defense was a stockade +embracing eight houses at the mill some distance away, around +which a small settlement had sprung up. + +During the same year the fort planned by Dobbs was erected upon +the site he had chosen--between Third and Fourth creeks; and the +commissioners Richard Caswell and Francis Brown, sent out to +inspect the fort, made the following picturesque report to the +Assembly (December 21, 1756): + +"That they had likewise viewed the State of Fort Dobbs, and found +it to be a good and Substantial Building of the Dimentions +following (that is to say) The Oblong Square fifty three feet by +forty, the opposite Angles Twenty four feet and Twenty-Two In +Height Twenty four and a half feet as by the Plan annexed +Appears, The Thickness of the Walls which are made of Oak Logs +regularly Diminished from sixteen Inches to Six, it contains +three floors and there may be discharged from each floor at one +and the same time about one hundred Musketts the same is +beautifully scituated in the fork of Fourth Creek a Branch of the +Yadkin River. And that they also found under Command of Cap' Hugh +Waddel Forty six Effective men Officers and Soldiers, the said +Officers and Soldiers Appearing well and in good Spirits." + +As to the erection of a fort on the Tennessee, promised the +Cherokees by South Carolina, difficulties between the governor of +that province and of Virginia in regard to matters of policy and +the proportionate share of expenses made effective cooperation +between the two colonies well-nigh impossible. Glen, as we have +seen, had resented Dinwiddie's efforts to win the South Carolina +Indians over to Virginia's interest. And Dinwiddie had been very +indignant when the force promised him by the Indians to aid +General Braddock did not arrive, attributing this defection in +part to Glen's negotiations for a meeting with the chieftains and +in part to the influence of the South Carolina traders, who kept +the Indians away by hiring them to go on long hunts for furs and +skinns. But there was no such contention between Virginia and +North Carolina. Dinwiddie and Dobbs arranged (November 6, 1755) +to send a commission from these colonies to treat with the +Cherokees and the Catawbas. Virginia sent two commissioners, +Colonel William Byrd, third of that name, and Colonel Peter +Randolph; while North Carolina sent one, Captain Hugh Waddell. +Salisbury, North Carolina, was the place of rendezvous. The +treaty with the Catawbas was made at the Catawba Town, presumably +the village opposite the mouth of Sugaw Creek, in York County, +South Carolina, on February 20-21, 1756; that with the Cherokees +on Broad River, North Carolina, March 13-17. As a result of the +negotiations and after the receipt of a present of goods, the +Catawbas agreed to send forty warriors to aid Virginia within +forty days; and the Cherokees, in return for presents and +Virginia's promise to contribute her proportion toward the +erection of a strong fort, undertook to send four hundred +warriors within forty days, "as soon as the said fort shall be +built." Virginia and North Carolina thus wisely cooperated to +"straighten the path" and "brighten the chain" between the white +and the red men, in important treaties which Have largely escaped +the attention of historians." + +On May 25, 1756, a conference was held at Salisbury between King +Heygler and warriors of the Catawba nation on the one side and +Chief Justice Henley, doubtless attended by Captain Waddell and +his frontier company, on the other. King Heygler, following the +lead set by the Cherokees, petitioned the Governor of North +Carolina to send the Catawbas some ammunition and to "build us a +fort for securing our old men, women and children when we turn +out to fight the Enemy on their coming." The chief justice +assured the King that the Catawbas would receive a necessary +supply of ammunition (one hundred pounds of gunpowder and four +hundred pounds of lead were later sent them) and promised to urge +with the governor their request to have a fort built as soon as +possible. Pathos not unmixed with dry humor tinges the eloquent +appeal of good old King Heygler, ever the loyal friend of the +whites, at this conference: + +"I desire a stop may be put to the selling of strong Liquors by +the White people to my people especially near the Indian nation. +IF THE WHITE PEOPLE MAKE STRONG DRINK, LET THEM. SELL IT TO ONE +ANOTHER, OR DRINK IT IN THEIR OWN FAMILIES. This will avoid a +great deal of mischief which otherwise will, happen from my +people getting drunk and quarrelling with the White people. I +have no strong prisons like you to confine them for it. Our only +way is to put them under ground and all these (pointing proudly +to his Warriors) will be ready to do that to those who shall +deserve it." + +In response to this request, the sum of four thousand pounds was +appropriated by the North Carolina Assembly for the erection of +"a Fort on our western frontier to protect and secure the +Catawbas" and for the support of two companies of fifty men each +to garrison this and another fort building on the sea coast. The +commissioners appointed for the purpose recommended (December 21, +1756) a site for the fort "near the 'Catawba nation"; and on +January 20, 1757, Governor Dobbs reported; "We are now building +a Fort in the midst of their towns at their own Request." The +fort thereupon begun must have stood near the mouth of the South +Fork of the Catawba River, as Dobbs says it was in the "midst" of +their towns, which are situated a "few miles north and south of +38 degrees" and might properly be included within a circle of +thirty miles radius." + +During the succeeding months many depredations were committed by +the Indians upon the exposed and scattered settlements. Had it +not been for the protection afforded by all these forts, by the +militia companies under Alexander Osborne of Rowan and Nathaniel +Alexander of Anson, and by a special company of patrollers under +Green and Moore, the back settlers who had been so outrageously +"pilfered" by the Indians would have "retired from the Frontier +into the inner settlements." + + + +CHAPTER V. In Defense of Civilization + +We give thanks and praise for the safety and peace vouchsafed us +by our Heavenly Father in these times of war. Many of our +neighbors, driven hither and yon like deer before wild beasts, +came to us for shelter, yet the accustomed order of our +congregation life was not disturbed, no, not even by the more +than 150 Indians who at sundry times passed by, stopping for a +day at a time and being fed by us.--Wachovia Community Diary, +1757 + + +With commendable energy and expedition Dinwiddie and Dobbs, +acting in concert, initiated steps for keeping the engagements +conjointly made by the two colonies with the Cherokees and the +Catawbas in the spring and summer of 1756. Enlisting sixty men, +"most of them Artificers, with Tools and Provisions," Major +Andrew Lewis proceeded in the late spring to Echota in the +Cherokee country. Here during the hot summer months they erected +the Virginia Fort on the path from Virginia, upon the northern +bank of the Little Tennessee, nearly opposite the Indian town of +Echota and about twenty-five miles southwest of Knoxville." While +the fort was in process of construction, the Cherokees were +incessantly tampered with by emissaries from the Nuntewees and +the Savannahs in the French interest, and from the French +themselves at the Alibamu Fort. So effective were these +machinations, supported by extravagant promises and doubtless +rich bribes, that the Cherokees soon were outspokenly expressing +their desire for a French fort at Great Tellico. + +Dinwiddie welcomed the departure from America of Governor Glen of +South Carolina, who in his opinion had always acted contrary to +the king's interest. From the new governor, William Henry +Lyttelton, who arrived in Charleston on June 1, 1756, he hoped to +secure effective cooperation in dealing with the Cherokees and +the Catawbas. This hope was based upon Lyttelton's recognition, +as stated in Dinwiddie's words, of the "Necessity of strict Union +between the whole Colonies, with't any of them considering their +particular Interest separate from the general Good of the whole." +After constructing the fort "with't the least assistance from +South Carolina," Major Lewis happened by accident upon a grand +council being held in Echota in September. At that time he +discovered to his great alarm that the machinations of the French +had already produced the greatest imaginable change in the +sentiment of the Cherokees. Captain Raymond Demere of the +Provincials, with two hundred English troops, had arrived to +garrison the fort; but the head men of all the Upper Towns were +secretly influenced to agree to write a letter to Captain Demere, +ordering him to return immediately to Charleston with all the +troops under his command. At the grand council, Atta-kulla-kulla, +the great Cherokee chieftain, passionately declared to the head +men, who listened approvingly, that "as to the few soldiers of +Captain Demere that was there, he would take their Guns, and give +them to his young men to hunt with and as to their clothes they +would soon be worn out and their skins would be tanned, and be of +the same colour as theirs, and that they should live among them +as slaves." With impressive dignity Major Lewis rose and +earnestly pleaded for the observance of the terms of the treaty +solemnly negotiated the preceding March. In response, the crafty +and treacherous chieftains desired Lewis to tell the Governor of +Virginia that "they had taken up the Hatchet against all Nations +that were Enemies to the English"; but Lewis, an astute student +of Indian Psychology, rightly surmised that all their glib +professions of friendship and assistance were "only to put a +gloss on their knavery." So it proved; for instead of the four +hundred warriors promised under the treaty for service in +Virginia, the Cherokees sent only seven warriors, accompanied by +three women. Al though the Cherokees petitioned Virginia for a +number of men to garrison the Virginia fort, Dinwiddie postponed +sending the fifty men provided for by the Virginia Assembly until +he could reassure himself in regard to the "Behaviour and +Intention" of the treacherous Indian allies. This proved to be a +prudent decision; for not long after its erection the Virginia +fort was destroyed by the Indians. + +Whether on account of the dissatisfaction expressed by the +Cherokees over the erection of the Virginia fort or because of a +recognition of the mistaken policy of garrisoning a work erected +by Virginia with troops sent from Charleston, South Carolina +immediately proceeded to build another stronghold on the southern +bank of the Tennessee at the mouth of Tellico River, some seven +miles from the site of the Virginia fort; and here were posted +twelve great guns, brought thither at immense labor through the +wilderness. To this fort, named Fort Loudoun in honor of Lord +Loudoun, then commander-in-chief of all the English forces in +America, the Indians allured artisans by donations of land; and +during the next three or four years a little settlement sprang up +there. + +The frontiers of Virginia suffered most from the incursions of +hostile Indians during the fourteen months following May 1, 1755. +In July, the Rev. Hugh McAden records that he preached in +Virginia on a day set apart for fasting and prayer "on account of +the wars and many murders, committed by the savage Indians on the +back inhabitants." On July 30th a large party of Shawano Indians +fell upon the New River settlement and wiped it out of existence. +William Ingles was absent at the time of the raid; and Mrs. +Ingles, who was captured, afterward effected her escape. The +following summer (June 25, 1756), Fort Vaux on the headwaters of +the Roanoke, under the command of Captain John Smith, was +captured by about one hundred French and Indians, who burnt the +fort, killed John Smith junior, John Robinson, John Tracey and +John Ingles, wounded four men, and captured twenty-two men, +women, and children. Among the captured was the famous Mrs. Mary +Ingles, whose husband, John Ingles, was killed; but after being +"carried away into Captivity, amongst whom she was barbarously +treated," according to her own statement, she finally escaped and +returned to Virginia." The frontier continued to be infested by +marauding bands of French and Indians; and Dinwiddie gloomily +confessed to Dobbs (July 22d): "I apprehend that we shall always +be harrass'd with fly'g Parties of these Banditti unless we form +an Expedit'n ag'st them, to attack 'em in y'r Towns." Such an +expedition, known as the Sandy River Expedition, had been sent +out in February to avenge the massacre of the New River settlers; +but the enterprise engaged in by about four hundred Virginians +and Cherokees under Major Andrew Lewis and Captain Richard +Pearis, proved a disastrous failure. Not a single Indian was +seen; and the party suffered extraordinary hardships and narrowly +escaped starvation. + +In conformity with his treaty obligations with the Catawbas, +Governor Dobbs commissioned Captain Hugh Waddell to erect the +fort promised the Catawbas at the spot chosen by the +commissioners near the mouth of the South Fork of the Catawba +River. This fort, for which four thousand pounds had been +appropriated, was for the most part completed by midsummer, 1757. +But owing, it appears, both to the machinations of the French and +to the intermeddling of the South Carolina traders, who desired +to retain the trade of the Catawbas for that province, Oroloswa, +the Catawba King Heygler, sent a "talk" to Governor Lyttelton, +requesting that North Carolina desist from the work of +construction and that no fort be built except by South Carolina. +Accordingly, Governor Dobbs ordered Captain Waddell to discharge +the workmen (August 11, 1757); and every effort was made for many +months thereafter to conciliate the Catawbas, erstwhile friends +of North Carolina. The Catawba fort erected by North Carolina was +never fully completed; and several years later South Carolina, +having succeeded in alienating the Catawbas from North Carolina, +which colony had given them the best possible treatment, built +for them a fort at the mouth of Line Creek on the east bank of +the Catawba River. + +In the spring and summer of 1758 the long expected Indian allies +arrived in Virginia, as many as four hundred by May--Cherokees, +Catawbas, Tuscaroras, and Nottaways. But Dinwiddie was wholly +unable to use them effectively; and in order to provide amusement +for them, he directed that they should go "a scalping" with the +whites--"a barbarous method of war," frankly acknowledged the +governor, "introduced by the French, which we are oblidged to +follow in our own defense." Most of the Indian allies +discontentedly returned home before the end of the year, but the +remainder waited until the next year, to take part in the +campaign against Fort Duquesne. Three North Carolina companies, +composed of trained soldiers and hardy frontiersmen, went through +this campaign under the command of Major Hugh Waddell, the +"Washington of North Carolina." Long of limb and broad of chest, +powerful, lithe, and active, Waddell was an ideal leader for this +arduous service, being fertile in expedient and skilful in the +employment of Indian tactics. With true provincial pride Governor +Dobbs records that Waddell "had great honor done him, being +employed in all reconnoitring parties, and dressed and acted as +an Indian; and his sergeant, Rogers, took the only Indian +prisoner, who gave Mr. Forbes certain intelligence of the forces +in Fort Duquesne, upon which they resolved to proceed." This +apparently trivial incident is remarkable, in that it proved to +be the decisive factor in a campaign that was about to be +abandoned. The information in regard to the state of the garrison +at Fort Duquesne, secured from the Indian, for the capture of +whom two leading officers had offered a reward of two hundred and +fifty pounds, emboldened Forbes to advance rather than to retire. +Upon reaching the fort (November 25th), he found it abandoned by +the enemy. Sergeant Rogers never received the reward promised by +General Forbes and the other English officer; but some time +afterward he was compensated by a modest sum from the colony of +North Carolina. + +A series of unfortunate occurrences, chiefly the fault of the +whites, soon resulted in the precipitation of a terrible Indian +outbreak. A party of Cherokees, returning home in May, 1758, +seized some stray horses on the frontier of Virginia--never +dreaming of any wrong, says an old historian, as they saw it +frequently done by the whites. The owners of the horses, hastily +forming a party, went in pursuit of the Indians and killed twelve +or fourteen of the number. The relatives of the slain Indians, +greatly incensed, vowed vengeance upon the whites. Nor was the +tactless conduct of Forbes calculated to quiet this resentment; +for when Atta-kulla-kulla and nine other chieftains deserted in +disgust at the treatment accorded them, they were pursued by +Forbes's orders, apprehended and disarmed. This rude treatment, +coupled with the brutal and wanton murder of some Cherokee +hunters a little earlier, by an irresponsible band of Virginians +under Captain Robert Wade, still further aggravated the Indians. + +Incited by the French, who had fled to the southward after the +fall of Fort Duquesne, parties of bloodthirsty young Indians +rushed down upon the settlements and left in their path death and +desolation along the frontiers of the Carolinas. On the upper +branch of the Yadkin and below the South Yadkin near Fort Dobbs +twenty-two whites fell in swift succession before the secret +onslaughts of the savages from the lower Cherokee towns. Many of +the settlers along the Yadkin fled to the Carolina Fort at +Bethabara and the stockade at the mill; and the sheriff of Rowan +County suffered siege by the Cherokees, in his home, until +rescued by a detachment under Brother Loesch from Bethabara. +While many families took refuge in Fort Dobbs, frontiersmen under +Captain Morgan Bryan ranged through the mountains to the west of +Salisbury and guarded the settlements from the hostile incursions +of the savages. So gravely alarmed were the Rowan settlers, +compelled by the Indians to desert their planting and crops, that +Colonel Harris was despatched post-haste for aid to Cape Fear, +arriving there on July 1st. With strenuous energy Captain +Waddell, then stationed in the east, rushed two companies of +thirty men each to the rescue, sending by water-carriage six +swivel guns and ammunition on before him; and these +reinforcements brought relief at last to the harassed Rowan +frontiers." During the remainder of the year, the borders were +kept clear by bold and tireless rangers-under the leadership of +expert Indian fighters of the stamp of Grifth Rutherford and +Morgan Bryan. + +When the Cherokee warriors who had wrought havoc along the North +Carolina border in April arrived at their town of Settiquo, they +proudly displayed the twenty-two scalps of the slain Rowan +settlers. Upon the demand for these scalps by Captain Demere at +Fort Loudon and under direction of Atta-kulla-kulla, the Settiquo +warriors surrendered eleven of the scalps to Captain Demere who, +according to custom in time of peace, buried them. New murders on +Pacolet and along the Virginia Path, which occurred shortly +afterward, caused gloomy forebodings; and it was plain, says a +contemporary gazette, that "the lower Cherokees were not +satisfied with the murder of the Rowan settlers, but intended +further mischief". On October 1st and again on October 31st, +Governor Dobbs received urgent requests from Governor Lyttelton, +asking that the North Carolina provincials and militia cooperate +to bring him assistance. Although there was no law requiring the +troops to march out of the province and the exposed frontiers of +North Carolina sorely needed protection, Waddell, now +commissioned colonel, assembled a force of five small companies +and marched to the aid of Governor Lyttelton. But early in +January, 1760, while on the march, Waddell received a letter from +Lyttelton, informing him that the assistance was not needed and +that a treaty of peace had been negotiated with the Cherokees. + + + +CHAPTER VI. Crushing the Cherokees + +Thus ended the Cherokee war, which was among the last humbling +strokes given to the expiring power of France in North America.--Hewatt: +An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the +Colonies of South Carolina and Georgia. 1779. + + +Governor Lyttelton's treaty of "peace", negotiated with the +Cherokees at the close of 1759, was worse than a crime: it was a +crass and hideous blunder. His domineering attitude and +tyrannical treatment of these Indians had aroused the bitterest +animosity. Yet he did not realize that it was no longer safe to +trust their word. No sooner did the governor withdraw his army +from the borders than the cunning Cherokees, whose passions had +been inflamed by what may fairly be called the treacherous +conduct of Lyttelton, rushed down with merciless ferocity upon +the innocent and defenseless families on the frontier. On +February 1, 1760, while a large party (including the family of +Patrick Calhoun), numbering in all about one hundred and fifty +persons, were removing from the Long Cane settlement to Augusta, +they were suddenly attacked by a hundred mounted Cherokees, who +slaughtered about fifty of them. After the massacre, many of the +children were found helplessly wandering in the woods. One man +alone carried to Augusta no less than nine of the pitiful +innocents, some horribly mutilated with the tomahawk, others +scalped, and all yet alive. + +Atrocities defying description continued to be committed, and +many people were slain. The Cherokees, under the leadership of +Si-lou-ee, or the Young Warrior of Estatoe, the Round O, Tiftoe, +and others, were baffled in their persistent efforts to capture +Fort Prince George. On February 16th the crafty Oconostota +appeared before the fort and under the pretext of desiring some +White man to accompany him on a visit to the governor on urgent +business, lured the commander, Lieutenant Coytomore, and two +attendants to a conference outside the gates. At a preconceived +signal a volley of shots rang out; the two attendants were +wounded, and Lieutenant Coytomore, riddled with bullets, fell +dead. Enraged by this act of treachery, the garrison put to death +the Indian hostages within. During the abortive attack upon the +fort, Oconostota, unaware of the murder of the hostages, was +heard shouting above the din of battle: "Fight strong, and you +shall be relieved." + +Now began the dark days along the Rowan border, which were so +sorely to test human endurance. Many refugees fortified +themselves in the different stockades; and Colonel Hugh Waddell +with his redoubtable frontier company of Indian-fighters awaited +the onslaught of the savages, who were reported to have passed +through the mountain defiles and to be approaching along the +foot-hills. The story of the investment of Fort Dobbs and the +splendidly daring sortie of Waddell and Bailey is best told in +Waddell's report to Governor Dobbs (February 29, 1760): + +"For several Days I observed a small party of Indians were +constantly about the fort, I sent out several parties after them +to no purpose, the Evening before last between 8 & 9 o'clock I +found by the Dogs making an uncommon Noise there must be a party +nigh a Spring which we sometimes use. As my Garrison is but +small, and I was apprehensive it might be a scheme to draw out +the Garrison, I took our Capt. Bailie who with myself and party +made up ten: We had not marched 300 yds. from the fort when we +were attacked by at least 60 or 70 Indians. I had given my party +Orders not to fire until I gave the word, which they punctually +observed: We rec'd the Indians' fire: When I perceived they had +almost all fired, I ordered my party to fire which We did not +further than 12 steps each loaded with a Bullet and 7 Buck Shot, +they had nothing to cover them as they were advancing either to +tomahawk us or make us Prisoners: They found the fire very hot +from so small a Number which a good deal confused them: I then +ordered my party to retreat, as I found the Instant our skirmish +began another party had attacked the fort, upon our reinforcing +the garrison the Indians were soon repulsed with I am sure a +considerable Loss, from what I myself saw as well as those I can +confide in they cou'd not have less than 10 or 12 killed and +wounded; The next Morning we found a great deal of Blood and one +dead whom I suppose they cou'd not find in the night. On my side +I had 2 Men wounded one of whom I am afraid will die as he is +scalped, the other is in way of Recovery, and one boy killed near +the fort whom they durst not advance to scalp. I expected they +would have paid me another visit last night, as they attack all +Fortifications by Night, but find they did not like their +Reception." + +Alarmed by Waddell's "offensive-defensive," the Indians abandoned +the siege. Robert Campbell, Waddell's ranger, who was scalped in +this engagement, subsequently recovered from his wounds and was +recompensed by the colony with the sum of twenty pounds. + +In addition to the frontier militia, four independent companies +were now placed under Waddell's command. Companies of volunteers +scoured the woods in search of the lurking Indian foe. These +rangers, who were clad in hunting-shirts and buckskin leggings, +and who employed Indian tactics in fighting, were captained by +such hardy leaders as the veteran Morgan Bryan, the intrepid +Griffith Ruthe ford, the German partisan, Martin Phifer +(Pfeiffer), and Anthony Hampton, the father of General Wade +Hampton. They visited periodically a chain of "forest castles" +erected by the settlers--extending all the way from Fort Dobbs +and the Moravian fortifications in the Wachau to Samuel +Stalnaker's stockade on the Middle Fork of the Holston in +Virginia. About the middle of March, thirty volunteer Rowan +County rangers encountered a band of forty Cherokees, who +fortified themselves in a deserted house near the Catawba River. +The famous scout and hunter, John Perkins, assisted by one of his +bolder companions, crept up to the house and flung lighted +torches upon the roof. One of the Indians, as the smoke became +suffocating and the flames burned hotter, exclaimed: "Better for +one to die bravely than for all to perish miserably in the +flames," and darting forth, dashed rapidly hither and thither, in +order to draw as many shots as possible. This act of superb +self-sacrifice was successful; and while the rifles of the +whites, who riddled the brave Indian with balls, were empty, the +other savages made a wild dash for liberty. Seven fell thus under +the deadly rain of bullets; but many escaped. Ten of the Indians, +all told, lost their scalps, for which the volunteer rangers were +subsequently paid one hundred pounds by the colony of North +Carolina. + +Beaten back from Fort Dobbs, sorely defeated along the Catawba, +hotly pursued by the rangers, the Cherokees continued to lurk in +the shadows of the dense forests, and at every opportunity to +fall suddenly upon way faring settlers and isolated cabins remote +from any stronghold. On March 8th William Fish, his son, and +Thompson, a companion, were riding along the "trace," in search +of provisions for a group of families fortified on the Yadkin, +when a flight of arrows hurtled from the cane-brake, and Fish and +his son fell dead. Although pierced with two arrows, one in the +hip and one clean through his body, Thompson escaped upon his +fleet horse; and after a night of ghastly suffering finally +reached the Carolina Fort at Bethabara. The good Dr. Bonn, by +skilfully extracting the barbed shafts from his body, saved +Thompson's life. The pious Moravians rejoiced over the recovery +of the brave messenger, whose sensational arrival gave them +timely warning of the close proximity of the Indians. While +feeding their cattle, settlers were shot from ambush by the +lurking foe; and on March 11th, a family barricaded within a +burning house, which they were defending with desperate courage, +were rescued in the nick of time by the militia. No episode from +Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales surpasses in melancholy +interest Harry Hicks's heroic defense of his little fort on Bean +Island Creek. Surrounded by the Indians, Hicks and his family +took refuge within the small outer palisade around his humble +home. Fighting desperately against terrific odds, he was finally +driven from his yard into his log cabin, which he continued to +defend with dauntless courage. With every shot he tried to send a +redskin to the happy hunting-grounds; and it was only after his +powder was exhausted that he fell, fighting to the last, beneath +the deadly tomahawk. So impressed were the Indians by his bravery +that they spared the life of his wife and his little son; and +these were afterward rescued by Waddell when he marched to the +Cherokee towns in 1761. + +The kindly Moravians had always entertained with generous +hospitality the roving bands of Cherokees, who accordingly held +them in much esteem and spoke of Bethabara as "the Dutch Fort, +where there are good people and much bread." But now, in these +dread days, the truth of their daily text was brought forcibly +home to the Moravians: "Neither Nehemiah nor his brethren put off +their clothes, but prayed as they watched." With Bible in one +hand and rifle in the other, the inhabitant of Wachovia sternly +marched to religious worship. No Puritan of bleak New England +ever showed more resolute courage or greater will to defend the +hard-won outpost of civilization than did the pious Moravian of +the Wachau. At the new settlement of Bethania on Easter Day, more +than four hundred souls, including sixty rangers, listened +devoutly to the eloquent sermon of Bishop Spangenberg concerning +the way of salvation--the while their arms, stacked without the +Gemein Haus, were guarded by the watchful sentinel. On March 14th +the watchmen at Bethania with well-aimed shots repelled the +Indians, whose hideous yells of baffled rage sounded down the +wind like "the howling of a hundred wolves". Religion was no +protection against the savages; for three ministers journeying to +the present site of Salem were set upon by the red men--one +escaping, another suffering capture, and the third, a Baptist, +losing his life. A little later word came to Fort Dobbs that John +Long and Robert Gillespie of Salisbury had been shot from ambush +and scalped--Long having been pierced with eight bullets and +Gillespie with seven. + +There is one beautiful incident recorded by the Moravians, which +has a truly symbolic significance. While the war was at its +height, a strong party of Cherokees, who had lost their chief, +planned in retaliation to attack Bethabara. "When they went +home," sets forth the Moravian Diary, "they said they had been to +a great town, where there were a great many people, where the +bells rang often, and during the night, time after time, a horn +was blown, so that they feared to attack the town and had taken +no prisoners." The trumpet of the watchman, announcing the +passing of the hour, had convinced the Indians that their plans +for attack were discovered; and the regular evening bell, +summoning the pious to prayer, rang in the stricken ears of the +red men like the clamant call to arms. + +Following the retirement from office of Governor Lyttelton, +Lieutenant-Governor Bull proceeded to prosecute the war with +vigor. On April 1, 1760, twelve hundred men under Colonel +Archibald Montgomerie arrived at Charleston, with instructions to +strike an immediate blow and to relieve Fort Loudon, then +invested by the Cherokees. With his own force, two hundred and +ninety-five South Carolina Rangers, forty picked men of the new +"levies," and "a good number of guides," Montgomerie moved from +Fort Ninety-Six on May 28th. On the first of June, crossing +Twelve-Mile River, Montgomerie began the campaign in earnest, +devastating and burning every Indian village in the Valley of +Keowee, killing and capturing more than a hundred of the +Cherokees, and destroying immense stores of corn. Receiving no +reply to his summons to the Cherokees of the Middle and Upper +Towns to make peace or suffer like treatment, Montgomerie took up +his march from Fort Prince George on June 24th, resolved to carry +out his threat. On the morning of the 27th, he was drawn into an +ambuscade within six miles of Et-chow-ee, eight miles south of +the present Franklin, North Carolina, a mile and a half below +Smith's Bridge, and was vigorously attacked from dense cover by +some six hundred and thirty warriors led by Si-lou-ee. Fighting +with Indian tactics, the Provincial Rangers under Patrick Calhoun +particularly distinguished themselves; and the bloodcurdling +yells of the painted savages were responded to by the wild huzzas +of the kilted Highlanders who, waving their Scotch bonnets, +impetuously charged the redskins and drove them again and again +from their lurking-places. Nevertheless Montgomerie lost from +eighty to one hundred in killed and wounded, while the loss of +the Indians was supposed to be about half the loss of the whites. +Unable to care for his wounded and lacking the means of removing +his baggage, Montgomerie silently withdrew his forces. In so +doing, he acknowledged defeat, since he was compelled to abandon +his original intention of relieving the beleaguered garrison of +Fort London. + +Captain Demere and his devoted little band, who had been +resolutely holding out, were now left to their tragic fate. After +the bread was exhausted, the garrison was reduced to the +necessity of eating dogs and horses; and the loyal aid of the +Indian wives of some of the garrison, who secretly brought them +supplies of food daily, enabled them to hold out still longer. +Realizing at last the futility of prolonging the hopeless +contest, Captain Demere surrendered the fort on August 8, 1760. +At daylight the next morning, while on the march to Fort Prince +George, the soldiers were set upon by the treacherous Cherokees, +who at the first onset killed Captain Demere and twenty-nine +others. A humane chieftain, Outassitus, says one of the gazettes +of the day, "went around the field calling upon the Indians to +desist, and making such representations to them as stopped the +further progress and effects of their barbarous and brutal rage," +which expressed itself in scalping and hacking off the arms and +legs of the defenseless whites. Atta-kulla-kulla, who was +friendly to the whites, claimed Captain Stuart, the second +officer, as his captive, and bore him away by stealth. After nine +days' journey through the wilderness they encountered an advance +party under Major Andrew Lewis, sent out by Colonel Byrd, head of +a relieving army, to rescue and succor any of the garrison who +might effect their escape. Thus Stuart was restored to his +friends. This abortive and tragic campaign, in which the victory +lay conclusively with the Indians, ended when Byrd disbanded his +new levies and Montgomerie sailed from Charleston for the north +(August, 1760). + +During the remainder of the year, the province of North Carolina +remained free of further alarms from the Indians. But the view +was generally entertained that one more joint Effort of North +Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia would have to be made in +order to humble the Cherokees. At the sessions of the North +Carolina Assembly in November and again in December, matters in +dispute between Governor Dobbs and the representatives of the +people made impossible the passage of a proposed aid bill, +providing for five hundred men to cooperate with Virginia and +South Carolina. Nevertheless volunteers in large numbers +patriotically marched from North Carolina to Charleston and the +Congaree (December, 1760, to April, 1761), to enlist in the +famous regiment being organized by Colonel Thomas Middleton. On +March 31, 1761, Governor Dobbs called together the Assembly to +act upon a letter received from General Amherst, outlining a more +vigorous plan of campaign appropriate to the succession of a +young and vigorous sovereign, George III. An aid bill was passed, +providing twenty thousand pounds for men and supplies; and one +regiment of five companies of one hundred men each, under the +command of Colonel Hugh Waddell, was mustered into service for +seven months' duty, beginning May 1, 1761. + +On July 7, 1761, Colonel James Grant, detached from the main army +in command of a force of twenty-six hundred men, took up his +march from Fort Prince George. Attacked on June 10th two miles +south of the spot where Montgomerie was engaged the preceding +year, Grant's army, after a vigorous engagement lasting several +hours, drove off the Indians. The army then proceeded at leisure +to lay waste the fifteen towns of the Middle Settlements; and, +after this work of systematic devastation was over, returned to +Fort Prince George. Peace was concluded in September as the +result of this campaign; and in consequence the frontier was +pushed seventy miles farther to the west. + +Meantime, Colonel Waddell with his force of five hundred North +Carolinians had acted in concert with Colonel William Byrd, +commanding the Virginia detachment. The combined forces went into +camp at Captain Samuel Stalnaker's old place on the Middle Fork +of Holston. Because of his deliberately dilatory policy, Byrd was +superseded in the command by Colonel Adam Stephen. Marching their +forces to the Long Island of Holston, Stephen and Waddell erected +there Fort Robinson, in compliance with the instructions of +Governor Fauquier, of Virginia. The Cherokees, heartily tired of +the war, now sued for peace, which was concluded, independent of +the treaty at Charleston, on November 19, 1761. + +The successful termination of this campaign had an effect of +signal importance in the development of the expansionist spirit. +The rich and beautiful lands which fell under the eye of the +North Carolina and Virginia pioneers under Waddell, Byrd, and +Stephen, lured them irresistibly on to wider casts for fortune +and bolder explorations into the unknown, beckoning West. + + + +CHAPTER VII. The Land Companies + +It was thought good policy to settle those lands as fast as +possible, and that the granting them to men of the first +consequence who were likeliest and best able to procure large +bodies of people to settle on them was the most probable means of +effecting the end proposed.--Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia +to the Earl of Hillsborough: 1770. + + +Although for several decades the Virginia traders had been +passing over the Great Trading Path to the towns of the Cherokees +and the Catawbas, it was not until the early years of the +eighteenth century that Virginians of imaginative vision directed +their eyes to the westward, intent upon crossing the mountains +and locating settlements as a firm barrier against the +imperialistic designs of France. Acting upon his oft-expressed +conviction that once the English settlers had established +themselves at the source of the James River "it would not be in +the power of the French to dislodge them," Governor Alexander +Spotswood in 1716, animated with the spirit of the pioneer, led +an expedition of fifty men and a train of pack-horses to the +mountains, arduously ascended to the summit of the Blue Ridge, +and claimed the country by right of discovery in behalf of his +sovereign. In the journal of John Fontaine this vivacious account +is given of the historic episode: "I graved my name on a tree by +the river side; and the Governor buried a bottle with a paper +enclosed on which he writ that he took possession of this place +in the name and for King George the First of England. We had a +good dinner, and after it we got the men together and loaded all +their arms and we drank the King's health in Burgundy and fired a +volley, and all the rest of the Royal Family in claret and a +volley. We drank the Governor's health and fired another volley." + +By this jovial picnic, which the governor afterward commemorated +by presenting to each of the gentlemen who accompanied him a +golden horseshoe, inscribed with the legend, Sic juvat +transcendere montes, Alexander Spotswood anticipated by a third +of a century the more ambitious expedition on behalf of France by +Celoron de Bienville (see Chapter III), and gave a memorable +object-lesson in the true spirit of westward expansion. During +the ensuing years it began to dawn upon the minds of men of the +stamp of William Byrd and Joshua Gee that there was imperative +need for the establishment of a chain of settlements in the +trans-Alleghany, a great human wall to withstand the advancing +wave of French influence and occupation. By the fifth decade of +the century, as we have seen, the Virginia settlers, with their +squatter's claims and tomahawk rights, had pushed on to the +mountains; and great pressure was brought to bear upon the +council to issue grants for vast tracts of land in the uncharted +wilderness of the interior. + +At this period the English ministry adopted the aggressive policy +already mentioned in connection with the French and Indian war, +indicative of a determination to contest with France the right to +occupy the interior of the continent. This policy had been +inaugurated by Virginia with the express purpose of stimulating +the adoption of a similar policy by North Carolina and +Pennsylvania. Two land companies, organized almost +simultaneously, actively promoted the preliminaries necessary to +settlement, despatching parties under expert leadership to +discover the passes through the mountains and to locate the best +land in the trans-Alleghany. + +In June, 1749, a great corporation, the Loyal Land Company of +Virginia, received a grant of eight hundred thousand acres above +the North Carolina line and west of the mountains. Dr. Thomas +Walker, an expert surveyor, who in company with several other +gentlemen had made a tour of exploration through eastern +Tennessee and the Holston region in 1748, was chosen as the agent +of this company. Starting from his home in Albemarle County, +Virginia, March 6, 1750, accompanied by five stalwart pioneers, +Walker made a tour of exploration to the westward, being absent +four months and one week. On this journey, which carried the +party as far west as the Rockcastle River (May 11th) and as far +north as the present Paintsville, Kentucky, they named many +natural objects, such as mountains and rivers, after members of +the party. Their two principal achievements were the erection of +the first house built by white men between the Cumberland +Mountains and the Ohio River a feat, however, which led to no +important developments; and the discovery of the wonderful gap in +the Alleghanies to which Walker gave the name Cumberland, in +honor of the ruthless conqueror at Culloden, the "bloody duke." + +In 1748 the Ohio Company was organized by Colonel Thomas Lee, +president of the Virginia council, and twelve other gentlemen, of +Virginia and Maryland. In their petition for five hundred +thousand acres, one of the declared objects of the company was +"to anticipate the French by taking possession of that country +southward of the Lakes to which the French had no right...." +By the royal order of May 19, 1749, the company was awarded two +hundred thousand acres, free of quit-rent for ten years; and the +promise was made of an additional award of the remainder +petitioned for, on condition of seating a hundred families upon +the original grant and the building and maintaining of a fort. +Christopher Gist, summoned from his remote home on the Yadkin in +North Carolina, was instructed "to search out and discover the +Lands upon the river Ohio & other adjoining branches of the +Mississippi down as low as the great Falls thereof." In this +journey, which began at Colonel Thomas Cresap's, in Maryland, in +October, 1750, and ended at Gist's home on May 18, 1751, Gist +visited the Lower Shawnee Town and the Lower Blue Licks, ascended +Pilot Knob almost two decades before Find lay and Boone, from the +same eminence, "saw with pleasure the beautiful level of +Kentucky," intersected Walker's route at two points, and crossed +Cumberland Mountain at Pound Gap on the return journey. This was +a far more extended journey than Walker's, enabling Gist to +explore the fertile valleys of the Muskingum, Scioto, and Miami +rivers and to gain a view of the beautiful meadows of Kentucky. + +It is eminently significant of the spirit of the age, which was +inaugurating an era of land hunger unparalleled in American +history, that the first authentic records of the trans-Alleghany +were made by surveyors who visited the country as the agents of +great land companies. The outbreak of the French and Indian War +so soon afterward delayed for a decade and more any important +colonization of the West. Indeed, the explorations and findings +of Walker and Gist were almost unknown, even to the companies +they represented. But the conclusion of peace in 1763, which gave +all the region between the mountains and the Mississippi to the +British, heralded the true beginning of the westward expansionist +movement in the Old Southwest, and inaugurated the constructive +leadership of North Carolina in f he occupation and colonization +of the imperial domain of Kentucky and the Ohio Valley. + +In the middle years of the century many families of Virginia +gentry removed to the back country of North Carolina in the +fertile region ranging from Williamsborough on the east to +Hillsborough on the west. There soon arose in this section of the +colony a society marked by intellectual distinction, social +graces, and the leisured dignity of the landlord and the large +planter. So conspicuous for means, intellect, culture, and +refinement were the people of this group, having "abundance of +wealth and leisure for enjoyment," that Governor Josiah Martin, +in passing through this region some years later, significantly +observes: "They have great preeminence, as well with respect to +soil and cultivation, as to the manners and condition of the +inhabitants, in which last respect the difference is so great +that one would be led to think them people of another region." +This new wealthy class which was now turning its gaze toward the +unoccupied lands along the frontier was "dominated by the +democratic ideals of pioneers rather than by the aristocratic +tendencies of slave-holding planters." From the cross-fertilization +of the ideas of two social groups--this back-country +gentry, of innate qualities of leadership, democratic +instincts, economic independence, and expansive tendencies, and +the primitive pioneer society of the frontier, frugal in taste, +responsive to leadership, bold, ready, and thorough in +execution--there evolved the militant American expansion in the Old +Southwest. + +A conspicuous figure in this society of Virginia emigrants was a +young man named Richard Henderson, whose father had removed with +his family from Hanover County, Virginia, to Bute, afterward +Granville County, North Carolina, in 1742. Educated at home by a +private tutor, he began his career as assistant of his father, +Samuel Henderson, the High Sheriff of Granville County; and after +receiving a law-license, quickly acquired an extensive practice. +"Even in the superior courts where oratory and eloquence are as +brilliant and powerful as in Westminster hall," records an +English acquaintance, "he soon became distinguished and eminent, +and his superior genius shone forth with great splendour, and +universal applause." This young attorney, wedded to the daughter +of an Irish lord, often visited Salisbury on his legal circuit; +and here he became well acquainted with Squire Boone, one of the +"Worshipfull Justices," and often appeared in suits before him. +By his son, the nomadic Daniel Boone, conspicuous already for his +solitary wanderings across the dark green mountains to the +sun-lit valleys and boundless hunting-grounds beyond, Henderson +was from time to time regaled with bizarre and fascinating tales +of western exploration; and Boone, in his dark hour of poverty +and distress, when he was heavily involved financially, turned +for aid to this friend and his partner, who composed the law-firm +of Williams and Henderson. + +Boone's vivid descriptions of the paradise of the West stimulated +Henderson's imaginative mind and attracted his attention to the +rich possibilities of unoccupied lands there. While the Board of +Trade in drafting the royal proclamation of October 7, 1763, +forbade the granting of lands in the vast interior, which was +specifically reserved to the Indians, it was clearly not their +intention to set permanent western limits to the colonies. The +prevailing opinion among the shrewdest men of the period was well +expressed by George Washington, who wrote his agent for +preempting western lands: "I can never look upon that +proclamation in any other light (but I say this between +ourselves) than as a temporary expedient to quiet the minds of +the Indians." And again in 1767: "It (the proclamation of 1763) +must fall, of course, in a few years, especially when those +Indians consent to our occupying the lands. Any person, +therefore, who neglects the present opportunity of hunting out +good lands, and in some measure marking out and distinguishing +them for his own, in order to keep others from settling them, +will never regain it." Washington had added greatly to his +holdings of bounty lands in the West by purchasing at trivial +prices the claims of many of the officers and soldiers. Three +years later we find him surveying extensive tracts along the Ohio +and the Great Kanawha, and, with the vision of the expansionist, +making large plans for the establishment of a colony to be seated +upon his own lands. Henderson, too, recognized the importance of +the great country west of the Appalachians. He agreed with the +opinion of Benjamin Franklin, who in 1756 called it "one of the +finest in North America for the extreme richness and fertility of +the land, the healthy temperature of the air and the mildness of +the climate, the plenty of hunting, fishing and fowling, the +facility of trade with the Indians and the vast convenience of +inland navigation or water carriage." Henderson therefore +proceeded to organize a land company for the purpose of acquiring +and colonizing a large domain in the West. This partnership, +which was entitled Richard Henderson and Company, was composed of +a few associates, including Richard Henderson, his uncle and +law-partner, John Williams, and, in all probability, their close +friends Thomas and Nathaniel Hart of Orange County, North +Carolina, immigrants from Hanover County, Virginia. + +Seizing the opportunity presented just after the conclusion of +peace, the company engaged Daniel Boone as scout and surveyor. He +was instructed, while hunting and trapping on his own account, to +examine, with respect to their location and fertility, the lands +which he visited, and to report his findings upon his return. The +secret expedition must have been transacted with commendable +circumspection; for although in after years it became common +knowledge among his friends that he had acted as the company's +agent, Boone himself consistently refrained from betraying the +confidence of his employers. Upon a similar mission, Gist had +carefully concealed from the suspicious Indians the fact that he +carried a compass, which they wittily termed "land stealer"; and +Washington likewise imposed secrecy upon his land agent Crawford, +insisting that the operation be carried on under the guise of +hunting game." The discreet Boone, taciturn and given to keeping +his own counsel, in one instance at least deemed it advantageous +to communicate the purpose of his mission to some hunters, well +known to him, in order to secure the results of their information +in regard to the best lands they had encountered in the course of +their hunting expedition. Boone came among the hunters, known as +the "Blevens connection," at one of their Tennessee station camps +on their return from a long hunt in Kentucky, in order, as +expressed in the quaint phraseology of the period, to be +"informed of the geography and locography of these woods, saying +that he was employed to explore them by Henderson & Company." The +acquaintance which Boone on this occasion formed with a member of +the party, Henry Scaggs, the skilled hunter and explorer, was +soon to bear fruit; for shortly afterward Scaggs was employed as +prospector by the same land company. In 1764 Scaggs had passed +through Cumberland Gap and hunted for the season on the +Cumberland; and accordingly the following year, as the agent of +Richard Henderson and Company, he was despatched on an extended +exploration to the lower Cumberland, fixing his station at the +salt lick afterward known as Mansker's Lick. + +Richard Henderson thus, it appears, "enlisted the Harts and +others in an enterprise which his own genius planned," says Peck, +the personal acquaintance and biographer of Boone, "and then +encouraged several hunters to explore the country and learn where +the best lands lay." Just why Henderson and his associates did +not act sooner upon the reports brought back by the +hunters--Boone and Scaggs and Callaway, who accompanied Boone in +1764 in the interest of the land company "is not known; but in +all probability the fragmentary nature of these reports, however +glowing and enthusiastic, was sufficient cause for the delay of +five years before the land company, through the agency of Boone +and Findlay, succeeded in having a thorough exploration inside of +the Kentucky region. Delay was also caused by rival claims to the +territory. In the Virginia Gazette of December 1, 1768, Henderson +must have read with astonishment not unmixed with dismay that +"the Six Nations and all their tributaries have granted a vast +extent of country to his majesty, and the Proprietaries of +Pennsylvania, and settled an advantageous boundary line between +their hunting country and this, and the other colonies to the +Southward as far as the Cherokee River, for which they received +the most valuable present in goods and dollars that was ever +given at any conference since the settlement of America." The +news was now bruited about through the colony of North Carolina, +that the Cherokees were hot in their resentment because the +Northern Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees and the +perpetual disputants for the vast Middle Ground of Kentucky, had +received at the Treaty of Fort Stanwix, November 5, 1768, an +immense compensation from the crown for the territory which they, +the Cherokees, claimed from time immemorial. Only three weeks +before, John Stuart, Superintendent for Indian Affairs in the +Southern Department, had negotiated with the Cherokees the Treaty +of Hard Labor, South Carolina (October 14th), by which Governor +Tryon's line of 1767, from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, was +continued direct to Colonel Chiswell's mine, the present +Wytheville, Virginia, and thence in a straight Brie to the mouth +of the Great Kanawha. Thus at the close of the year 1768 the +crown through both royal governor and superintendent of Indian +affairs acknowledged in fair and open treaty the right of the +Cherokees, whose Tennessee villages guarded the gateway, to the +valley lands east of the mountain barrier as well as to the dim +mid-region of Kentucky. In the very act of negotiating the Treaty +of Fort Stanwix, Sir William Johnson privately acknowledged that +possession of the trans-Alleghany could be legally obtained only +by extinguishing the title of the Cherokees. + +These conflicting claims soon led to collisions between the +Indians and the company's settlers. In the spring of 1769 +occurred one of those incidents in the westward advance which, +though slight in itself, was to have a definite bearing upon the +course of events in later years. In pursuance of his policy, as +agent of the Loyal Land Company, of promoting settlement upon the +company's lands, Dr. Thomas Walker, who had visited Powell's +Valley the preceding year and come into possession of a very +large tract there, simultaneously made proposals to one party of +men including the Kirtleys, Captain Rucker, and others, and to +another party led by Joseph Martin, trader of Orange County, +Virginia, afterward a striking figure in the Old Southwest. The +fevered race by these bands of eighteenth-century "sooners" for +possession of an early "Cherokee Strip" was won by the latter +band, who at once took possession and began to clear; so that +when the Kirtleys arrived, Martin coolly handed them "a letter +from Dr. Walker that informed them that if we got to the valley +first, we were to have 21,000 acres of land, and they were not to +interfere with us." Martin and his companions were delighted with +the beautiful valley at the base of the Cumberland, quickly "eat +and destroyed 23 deer--15 bears--2 buffaloes and a great quantity +of turkeys," and entertained gentlemen from Virginia and Maryland +who desired to settle more than a hundred families there. The +company reckoned, however, without their hosts, the Cherokees, +who, fortified by the treaty of Hard Labor (1768) which left this +country within the Indian reservation, were determined to drive +Martin and his company out. While hunting on the Cumberland +River, northwest of Cumberland Gap, Martin and his company were +surrounded and disarmed by a party of Cherokees who said they had +orders from Cameron, the royal agent, to rob all white men +hunting on their lands. When Martin and his party arrived at +their station in Powell's Valley, they found it broken up and +their goods stolen by the Indians, which left them no recourse +but to return to the settlements in Virginia. It was not until +six years later that Martin, under the stable influence of the +Transylvania Company, was enabled to return to this spot and +erect there the station which was to play an integral part in the +progress of westward expansion. + +Before going on to relate Boone's explorations of Kentucky under +the auspices of the land company, it will be convenient to turn +back for a moment and give some account of other hunters and +explorers who visited that territory between the time of its +discovery by Walker and Gist and the advent of Boone. + + + +CHAPTER VIII. The Long Hunters in the Twilight Zone + +The long Hunters principally resided in the upper countries of +Virginia & North Carolina on New River & Holston River, and when +they intended to make a long Hunt (as they calls it) they +Collected near the head of Holston near whare Abingdon now +stands....--General William Hall. + + +Before the coming of Walker and Gist in 1750 and 1751 +respectively, the region now called Kentucky had, as far as we +know, been twice visited by the French, once in 1729 when +Chaussegros de Lery and his party visited the Big Bone Lick, and +again in the summer of 1749 when the Baron de Longueuil with four +hundred and fifty-two Frenchmen and Indians, going to join +Bienville in an expedition against "the Cherickees and other +Indians lying at the back of Carolina and Georgia," doubtless +encamped on the Kentucky shore of the Ohio. Kentucky was also +traversed by John Peter Salling with his three adventurous +companions in their journey through the Middle West in 1742. But +all these early visits, including the memorable expeditions of +Walker and Gist, were so little known to the general public that +when John Filson wrote the history of Kentucky in 1784 he +attributed its discovery to James McBride in 1754. More +influential upon the course of westward expansion was an +adventure which occurred in 1752, the very year in which the +Boones settled down in their Vadkin home. + +In the autumn of 1752, a Pennsylvania trader, John Findlay, with +three or four companions, descended the Ohio River in a canoe as +far as the falls at the present Louisville, Kentucky, and +accompanied a party of Shawnees to their town of +Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, eleven miles east of what is now Winchester. + +This was the site of the "Indian Old Corn Field," the Iroquois +name for which ("the place of many fields," or "prairie") was +Ken-take, whence came the name of the state. + +Five miles east of this spot, where still may be seen a mound and +an ellipse showing the outline of the stockade, is the famous +Pilot Knob, from the summit of which the fields surrounding the +town lie visible in their smooth expanse. During Findlay's stay +at the Indian town other traders from Pennsylvania and Virginia, +who reported that they were "on their return from trading with +the Cuttawas (Catawbas), a nation who live in the Territories of +Carolina," assembled in the vicinity in January, 1753. Here, as +the result of disputes arising from their barter, they were set +upon and captured by a large party of straggling Indians +(Coghnawagas from Montreal) on January 26th; but Findlay and +another trader named James Lowry were so fortunate as to escape +and return through the wilderness to the Pennsylvania +settlements." The incident is of important historic significance; +for it was from these traders, who must have followed the Great +Warriors' Path to the country of the Catawbas, that Findlay +learned of the Ouasioto (Cumberland) Gap traversed by the Indian +path. His reminiscences of this gateway to Kentucky, of the site +of the old Indian town on Lulbegrud Creek, a tributary of the Red +River, and of the Pilot Knobwere sixteen years later to fire +Boone to his great tour of exploration in behalf of the +Transylvania Company. + +During the next two decades, largely because of the hostility of +the savage tribes, only a few traders and hunters from the east +ranged through the trans-Alleghany. But in 1761, a party of +hunters led by a rough frontiersman, Elisha Walden, penetrated +into Powell's Valley, followed the Indian trail through +Cumberland Gap, explored the Cumberland River, and finally +reached the Laurel Mountain where, encountering a party of +Indians, they deemed it expedient to return. With Walden went +Henry Scaggs, afterward explorer for the Henderson Land Company, +William Elevens and Charles Cox, the famous Virginia hunters, one +Newman, and some fifteen other stout pioneers. Their itinerary +may be traced from the names given to natural objects in honor of +members of the party--Walden's Mountain and Walden's Creek, +Scaggs' Ridge and Newman's Ridge. Following the peace of 1763, +which made travel in this region moderately safe once more, the +English proceeded to occupy the territory which they had won. In +1765 George Croghan with a small party, on the way to prepare the +inhabitants of the Illinois country for transfer to English +sovereignty, visited the Great Bone Licks of Kentucky (May 30th, +31st); and a year later Captain Harry Gordon, chief engineer in +the Western Department in North America, visited and minutely +described the same licks and the falls. But these, and numerous +other water-journeys and expeditions of which no records were +kept, though interesting enough in themselves, had little bearing +upon the larger phases of westward expansion and colonization. + +The decade opening with the year 1765 is the epoch of bold and +ever bolder exploration--the more adventurous frontiersmen of the +border pushing deep into the wilderness in search of game, lured +on by the excitements of the chase and the profit to be derived +from the sale of peltries. In midsummer, 1766, Captain James +Smith, Joshua Horton, Uriah Stone, William Baker, and a young +mulatto slave passed through Cumberland Gap, hunted through the +country south of the Cherokee and along the Cumberland and +Tennessee rivers, and as Smith reports "found no vestige of any +white man." During the same year a party of five hunters from +South Carolina, led by Isaac Lindsey, penetrated the Kentucky +wilderness to the tributary of the Cumberland, named Stone's +River by the former party, for one of their number. Here they +encountered two men, who were among the greatest of the western +pioneers, and were destined to leave their names in historic +association with the early settlement of Kentucky, James Harrod +and Michael Stoner, a German, both of whom had descended the Ohio +from Fort Pitt. With the year 1769 began those longer and more +extended excursions into the interior which were to result in +conveying at last to the outside world graphic and detailed +information concerning "the wonderful new country of Cantucky." +In the late spring of this year Hancock and Richard Taylor (the +latter the father of President Zachary Taylor), Abraham +Hempinstall, and one Barbour, all true-blue frontiersmen, left +their homes in Orange County, Virginia, and hunted extensively in +Kentucky and Arkansas. Two of the party traveled through Georgia +and East and West Florida; while the other two hunted on the +Washita during the winter of 1770-1. Explorations of this type +became increasingly hazardous as the animosity of the Indians +increased; and from this time onward for a number of years almost +all the parties of roving hunters suffered capture or attack by +the crafty red men. In this same year Major John McCulloch, +living on the south branch of the Potomac, set out accompanied by +a white man-servant and a negro, to explore the western country. +While passing down the Ohio from Pittsburgh McCulloch was +captured by the Indians near the mouth of the Wabash and carried +to the present site of Terre Haute, Indiana. Set free after four +or five months, he journeyed in company with some French +voyageurs first to Natchez and then to New Orleans, whence he +made the sea voyage to Philadelphia. Somewhat later, Benjamin +Cleveland (afterward famous in the Revolution), attended by four +companions, set out from his home on the upper Yadkin to explore +the Kentucky wilderness. After passing through Cumberland Gap, +they encountered a band of Cherokees who plundered them of +everything they had, even to their hats and shoes, and ordered +them to leave the Indian hunting-grounds. On their return journey +they almost starved, and Cleveland, who was reluctantly forced to +kill his faithful little hunting-dog, was wont to declare in +after years that it was the sweetest meat he ever ate. + +Fired to adventure by the glowing accounts brought back by Uriah +Stone, a much more formidable band than any that had hitherto +ventured westward--including Uriah Stone as pilot, Gasper +Mansker, John Rains, Isaac Bledsoe, and a dozen others--assembled +in June, 1769, in the New River region. "Each Man carried two +horses," says an early pioneer in describing one of these +parties, "traps, a large supply of powder and led, and a small +hand vise and bellows, files and screw plate for the purpose of +fixing the guns if any of them should get out of fix." Passing +through Cumberland Gap, they continued their long journey until +they reached Price's Meadow, in the present Wayne County, +Kentucky, where they established their encampment. In the course +of their explorations, during which they gave various names to +prominent natural features, they established their "station camp" +on a creek in Sumner County, Tennessee, whence originated the +name of Station Camp Creek. Isaac Bledsoe and Gasper Mansker, +agreeing to travel from here in opposite directions along a +buffalo trace passing near the camp, each succeeded in +discovering the famous salt-lick which bears his name--namely +Bledsoe's Lick and Mansker's Lick. The flat surrounding the lick, +about one hundred acres in extent, discovered by Bledsoe, +according to his own statement "was principally Covered with +buffelows in every direction--not hundreds but thousands." As he +sat on his horse, he shot down two deer in the lick; but the +buffaloes blindly trod them in the mud. They did not mind him and +his horse except when the wind blew the scent in their nostrils, +when they would break and run in droves. Indians often lurked in +the neighbourhood of these hunters--plundering their camp, +robbing them, and even shooting down one of their number, Robert +Crockett, from ambush. After many trials and vicissitudes, which +included a journey to the Spanish Natchez and the loss of a great +mass of peltries when they were plundered by Piomingo and a war +party of Chickasaws, they finilly reached home in the late spring +of 1770." + +The most notable expedition of this period, projected under the +auspices of two bold leaders extraordinarily skilled in +woodcraft, Joseph Drake and Henry Scaggs, was organized in the +early autumn of 1770. This imposing band of stalwart hunters from +the New River and Holston country, some forty in number, garbed +in hunting shirts, leggings, and moccasins, with three +pack-horses to each man, rifles, ammunition, traps, dogs, +blankets, and salt, pushed boldly through Cumberland Gap into the +heart of what was later justly named the "Dark and Bloody Ground" +(see Chapter XIV)--"not doubting," says an old border chronicler, +"that they were to be encountered by Indians, and to subsist on +game." From the duration of their absence from home, they +received the name of the Long Hunters--the romantic appellation +by which they are known in the pioneer history of the Old +Southwest. Many natural objects were named by this party--in +particular Dick's River, after the noted Cherokee hunter, Captain +Dick, who, pleased to be recognized by Charles Scaggs, told the +Long Hunters that on HIS river, pointing it out, they would find +meat plenty--adding with laconic signifigance: "Kill it and go +home." From the Knob Lick, in Lincoln County, as reported by a +member of the party, "they beheld largely over a thousand +animals, including buffaloe, elk, bear, and deer, with many wild +turkies scattered among them; all quite restless, some playing, +and others busily employed in licking the earth.... The +buffaloe and other animals had so eaten away the soil, that they +could, in places, go entirely underground." Upon the return of a +detachment to Virginia, fourteen fearless hunters chose to +remain; and one day, during the absence of some of the band upon +a long exploring trip, the camp was attacked by a straggling +party of Indians under Will Emery, a halfbreed Cherokee. Two of +the hunters were carried into captivity and never heard of again; +a third managed to escape. In embittered commemoration of the +plunder of the camp and the destruction of the peltries, they +inscribed upon a poplar, which had lost its bark, this emphatic +record, followed by their names: + +2300 Deer Skins lost Ruination by God + +Undismayed by this depressing stroke of fortune, they continued +their hunt in the direction of the lick which Bledsoe had +discovered the preceding year. Shortly after this discovery, a +French voyageur from the Illinois who had hunted and traded in +this region for a decade, Timothe de Monbreun, subsequently +famous in the history of Tennessee, had visited the lick and +killed an enormous number of buffaloes for their tallow and +tongues with which he and his companion loaded a keel boat and +descended the Cumberland. An early pioneer, William Hall, learned +from Isaac Bledsoe that when "the long hunters Crossed the ridge +and came down on Bledsoe's Creek in four or five miles of the +Lick the Cane had grown up so thick in the woods that they +thought they had mistaken the place until they Came to the Lick +and saw what had been done.... One could walk for several +hundred yards a round the Lick and in the lick on buffellows +Skuls, & bones and the whole flat round the Lick was bleached +with buffellows bones, and they found out the Cause of the Canes +growing up so suddenly a few miles around the Lick which was in +Consequence of so many buffellows being killed." + +This expedition was of genuine importance, opening the eyes of +the frontiersmen to the charms of the country and influencing +many to settle subsequently in the West, some in Tennessee, some +in Kentucky. The elaborate and detailed information brought back +by Henry Scaggs exerted an appreciable influence, no doubt, in +accelerating the plans of Richard Henderson and Company for the +acquisition and colonization of the trans-Alleghany. But while +the "Long Hunters" were in Tennessee and Kentucky the same region +was being more extensively and systematically explored by Daniel +Boone. To his life, character, and attainments, as the typical +"long hunter" and the most influential pioneer we may now turn +our particular attention. + + + +CHAPTER IX. Daniel Boone and Wilderness Exploration + +Here, where the hand of violence shed the blood of the innocent; +where the horrid yells of the savages, and the groans of the +distressed, sounded in our ears, we now hear the praises and +adorations of our Creator; where wretched wigwams stood, the +miserable abodes of savages, we behold the foundations of cities +laid, that, in all probability, will equal the glory of the +greatest upon earth.--Daniel Boone, 1781. + + +The wandering life of a border Nimrod in a surpassingly beautiful +country teeming with game was the ideal of the frontiersman of +the eighteenth century. AS early as 1728, while running the +dividing line between North Carolina and Virginia, William Byrd +encountered along the North Carolina frontier the typical figure +of the professional hunter: "a famous Woodsman, call'd +Epaphroditus Bainton. This Forester Spends all his time in +ranging the Woods, and is said to make great Havock among the +Deer, and other Inhabitants of the Forest, not much wilder than +himself." By the middle of the century, as he was threading his +way through the Carolina piedmont zone, the hunter's paradise of +the Yadkin and Catawba country, Bishop Spangenberg found ranging +there many hunters, living like Indians, who killed thousands of +deer each year and sold the skins in the local markets or to the +fur-traders from Virginia whose heavy pack-trains with their +tinkling bells constantly traversed the course of the Great +Trading Path. The superlative skill of one of these hunters, both +as woodsman and marksman, was proverbial along the border. The +name of Daniel Boone became synonymous with expert huntsmanship +and almost uncanny wisdom in forest lore. The bottoms of the +creek near the Boone home, three miles west of present +Mocksville, contained a heavy growth of beech, which dropped +large quantities of its rich nuts or mast, greatly relished by +bears; and this creek received its name, Bear Creek, because +Daniel and his father killed in its rich bottoms ninety-nine +bears in a single hunting-season. After living for a time with +his young wife, Rebecca Bryan, in a cabin in his father's yard, +Daniel built a home of his own upon a tract of land, purchased +from his father on October 12, 1759, and lying on Sugar Tree, a +tributary of Dutchman's Creek. Here he dwelt for the next five +years, with the exception of the period of his temporary removal +to Virginia during the terrible era of the Indian war. Most of +his time during the autumn and winter, when he was not engaged in +wagoning or farming, he spent in long hunting-journeys into the +mountains to the west and northwest. During the hunting-season of +1760 he struck deeper than ever before into the western mountain +region and encamped in a natural rocky shelter amidst fine +hunting-grounds, in what is now Washington County in east +Tennessee. Of the scores of inscriptions commemorative of his +hunting-feats, which Boone with pardonable pride was accustomed +throughout his life time to engrave with his hunting-knife upon +trees and rocks, the earliest known is found upon a leaning beech +tree, only recently fallen, near his camp and the creek which +since that day has borne his name. This is a characteristic and +enduring record in the history of American exploration + + D. Boon + CillED A. BAR On + Tree + in The + yEAR + 1760 + +Late in the summer of the following year Boone marched under the +command of the noted Indian-fighter of the border, Colonel Hugh +Waddell, in his campaign against the Cherokees. From the lips of +Waddell, who was outspoken in his condemnation of Byrd's futile +delays in road-cutting and fort-building, Boone learned the true +secret of success in Indian warfare, which was lost upon +Braddock, Forbes, and later St. Clair: that the art of defeating +red men was to deal them a sudden and unexpected blow, before +they had time either to learn the strength of the force employed +against them or to lay with subtle craft their artful ambuscade. + +In the late autumn of 1761, Daniel Boone and Nathaniel Gist, the +son of Washington's famous guide, who were both serving under +Waddell, temporarily detached themselves from his command and led +a small party on a "long hunt" in the Valley of the Holston, +While encamping near the site of Black's Fort, subsequently +built, they were violently assailed by a pack of fierce wolves +which they had considerable difficulty in beating off; and from +this incident the locality became known as Wolf Hills (now +Abingdon, Virginia). + + +From this time forward Boone's roving instincts had full sway. +For many months each year he threaded his way through that +marvelously beautiful country of western North Carolina +felicitously described as the Switzerland of America. Boone's +love of solitude and the murmuring forest was surely inspired by +the phenomenal beauties of the country' through which he roamed +at will. Blowing Rock on one arm of a great horseshoe of +mountains and Tryon Mountain upon the other arm, overlooked an +enormous, primeval bowl, studded by a thousand emerald-clad +eminences. There was the Pilot Mountain, the towering and +isolated pile which from time immemorial had served the +aborigines as a guide in their forest wanderings; there was the +dizzy height of the Roan on the border; there was Mt. Mitchell, +portentous in its grandeur, the tallest peak on the continent +east of the Rockies; and there was the Grandfather, the oldest +mountain on earth according to geologists, of which it has been +written: + + Oldest of all terrestrial things--still holding + Thy wrinkled forehead high; + Whose every scam, earth's history enfolding, + Grim science doth defy! + + Thou caught'st the far faint ray from Sirius rising, + When through space first was hurled + The primal gloom of ancient voids surprising, + This atom, called the World! + +What more gratifying to the eye of the wanderer than the +luxuriant vegetation and lavish profusion of the gorgeous flowers +upon the mountain slopes, radiant rhododendron, rosebay, and +laurel, and the azalea rising like flame; or the rare beauties of +the water--the cataract of Linville, taking its shimmering leap +into the gorge, and that romantic river poetically celebrated in +the lines: + + Swannanoa, nymph of beauty, + I would woo thee in my rhyme, + Wildest, brightest, loveliest river + Of our sunny Southern clime. + * * * + Gone forever from the borders + But immortal in thy name, + Are the Red Men of the forest + Be thou keeper of their fame! + Paler races dwell beside thee, + Celt and Saxon till thy lands + Wedding use unto thy beauty + Linking over thee their hands. + +The long rambling excursions which Boone made through western +North Carolina and eastern Tennessee enabled him to explore every +nook and corner of the rugged and beautiful mountain region. +Among the companions and contemporaries with whom he hunted and +explored the country were his little son James and his brother +Jesse; the Linville who gave the name to the beautiful falls; +Julius Caesar Dugger, whose rock house stood near the head of Elk +Creek; and Nathaniel Gist, who described for him the lofty +gateway to Kentucky, through which Christopher Gist had passed in +1751. Boone had already heard of this gateway, from Findlay, and +it was one of the secret and cherished ambitions of his life to +scale the mountain wall of the Appalachians and to reach that +high portal of the Cumberland which beckoned to the mysterious +new Eden beyond. Although hunting was an endless delight to Boone +he was haunted in the midst of this pleasure, as was Kipling's +Explorer, by the lure of the undiscovered: + +Till a voice as bad as conscience, rang interminable changes +On one everlasting whisper day and night repeated--so: +'Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the +ranges--'Something lost behind the ranges. Lost and waiting for you. Go.' + +Of Boone's preliminary explorations for the land company known as +Richard Henderson and Company, an account has already been given; +and the delay in following them up has been touched on and in +part explained. Meanwhile Boone transferred his efforts for a +time to another field. Toward the close of the summer of 1765 a +party consisting of Major John Field, William Hill, one +Slaughter, and two others, all from Culpeper County, Virginia, +visited Boone and induced him to accompany them on the "long +Journey" to Florida, whither they were attracted by the liberal +offer of Colonel James Grant, governor of the eastern section, +the Florida of to-day. On this long and arduous expedition they +suffered many hardships and endured many privations, found little +game, and on one occasion narrowly escaped starvation. They +explored Florida from St. Augustine to Pensacola; and Boone, who +relished fresh scenes and a new environment, purchased a house +and lot in Pensacola in anticipation of removal thither. But upon +his return home, finding his wife unwilling to go, Boone once +more turned his eager eye toward the West, that mysterious and +alluring region beyond the great range, the fabled paradise of +Kentucky. + +The following year four young men from the Yadkin, Benjamin +Cutbird, John Stewart (Boone's brother-in-law who afterwards +accompanied him to Kentucky), John Baker, and James Ward made a +remarkable journey to the westward, crossing the Appalachian +mountain chain over some unknown route, and finally reaching the +Mississippi. The significance of the journey, in its bearing upon +westward expansion, inheres in the fact that while for more than +half a century the English traders from South Carolina had been +winning their way to the Mississippi along the lower routes and +Indian trails, this was the first party from either of the +Carolinas, as far as is known, that ever reached the Mississippi +by crossing the great mountain barrier. When Cutbird, a superb +woodsman and veritable Leather stocking, narrated to Boone the +story of his adventures, it only confirmed Boone in his +determination to find the passage through the mountain chain +leading to the Mesopotamia of Kentucky. + +Such an enterprise was attended by terrible dangers. During 1766 +and 1767 the steady encroachments of the white settlers upon the +ancestral domain which the Indians reserved for their imperial +hunting-preserve aroused bitter feelings of resentment among the +red men. Bloody reprisal was often the sequel to such +encroachment. The vast region of Tennessee and the +trans-Alleghany was a twilight zone, through which the savages +roamed at will. From time to time war parties of northern +Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees, scouted through +this no-man's land and even penetrated into the western region of +North Carolina, committing murders and depredations upon the +Cherokees and the whites indiscriminately. During the summer of +1766, while Boone's friend and close connection, Captain William +Linville, his son John, and another young man, named John +Williams, were in camp some ten miles below Linville Falls, they +were unexpectedly fired upon by a hostile band of Northern +Indians, and before they had time to fire a shot, a second volley +killed both the Linvilles and severely wounded Williams, who +after extraordinary sufferings finally reached the settlements." +In May, 1767, four traders and a half-breed child of one of them +were killed in the Cherokee country. In the summer of this year +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina laid out the boundary +line of the Cherokees, and upon his return issued a proclamation +forbidding any purchase of land from the Indians and any issuance +of grants for land within one mile of the boundary line. Despite +this wise precaution, seven North Carolina hunters who during the +following September had lawlessly ventured into the mountain +region some sixty miles beyond the boundary were fired upon, and +several of them killed, by the resentful Cherokees Undismayed by +these signs of impending danger, undeterred even by the tragic +fate of the Linvilles, Daniel Boone, with the determination of +the indomitable pioneer, never dreamed of relinquishing his +long-cherished design. Discouraged by the steady disappearance of +game under the ruthless attack of innumerable hunters, Boone +continued to direct his thoughts toward the project of exploring +the fair region of Kentucky. The adventurous William Hill, to +whom Boone communicated his purpose, readily consented to go with +him; and in the autumn of 1768 Boone and Hill, accompanied, it is +believed, by Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, set forth upon their +almost inconceivably hazardous expedition. They crossed the Blue +Ridge and the Alleghanies, the Holston and Clinch rivers near +their sources, and finally reached the head waters of the West +Fork of the Big Sand. Surmising from its course that this stream +must flow into the Ohio, they pushed on a hundred miles to the +westward and finally, by following a buffalo path, reached a +salt-spring in what is now Floyd County, in the extreme eastern +section of Kentucky. Here Boone beheld great droves of buffalo +that visited the salt-spring to drink the water or lick the +brackish soil. After spending the winter in hunting and trapping, +the Boones and Hill, discouraged by the forbidding aspect of the +hill-country which with its dense growth of laurel was +exceedingly difficult to penetrate, abandoned all hope of finding +Kentucky by this route and wended their arduous way back to the +Yadkin. + +The account of Boone's subsequent accomplishment of his purpose +must be postponed to the next chapter. + + + +CHAPTER X. Daniel Boone in Kentucky + +He felt very much as Columbus did, gazing from his caravel on San +Salvador; as Cortes, looking down, from the crest of Ahualco, on +the Valley of Mexico; or Vasco Nunez, standing alone on the peak +of Darien, and stretching his eyes over the hitherto undiscovered +waters of the Pacific.---William Gilmore Simms: Views and +Reviews. + + +A chance acquaintance formed by Daniel Boone, during the French +and Indian War, with the Irish lover of adventure, John Findlay, +was the origin of Boone's cherished longing to reach the El +Dorado of the West. In this slight incident we may discern the +initial inspiration for the epochal movement of westward +expansion. Findlay was a trader and horse peddler, who had early +migrated to Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He had been licensed a trader +with the Indians in 1747. During the same year he was married to +Elizabeth Harris, daughter of John Harris, the Indian-trader at +Harris's Ferry on the Susquehanna River, after whom Harrisburg +was named. During the next eight years Findlay carried on his +business of trading in the interior. Upon the opening of the +French and Indian War he was probably among "the young men about +Paxtang who enlisted immediately," and served as a waggoner in +Braddock's expedition. Over the campfires, during the ensuing +campaign in 1765, young Boone was an eager listener to Findlay's +stirring narrative of his adventures in the Ohio Valley and on +the wonderfully beautiful levels of Kentucky in 1752. The fancies +aroused in his brooding mind by Findlay's moving recital and his +description of an ancient passage through the Ouasioto or +Cumberland Gap and along the course of the Warrior's Path, +inspired him with an irrepressible longing to reach that alluring +promised land which was the perfect realization of the hunter's +paradise. + +Thirteen years later, while engaged in selling pins, needles, +thread, and Irish linens in the Yadkin country, Findlay learned +from the Pennsylvania settlers at Salisbury or at the Forks of +the Yadkin of Boone's removal to the waters of the upper Yadkin. +At Boone's rustic home, in the winter of 1768-9, Findlay visited +his old comrade-in-arms of Braddock's campaign. On learning of +Boone's failure during the preceding year to reach the Kentucky +levels by way of the inhospitable Sandy region, Findlay again +described to him the route through the Ouasioto Gap traversed +sixteen years before by Pennsylvania traders in their traffic +with the Catawbas. Boone, as we have seen, knew that Christopher +Gist, who had formerly lived near him on the upper Yadkin, had +found some passage through the lofty mountain defiles; but he had +never been able to discover the passage. Findlay's renewed +descriptions of the immense herds of buffaloes he had seen in +Kentucky, the great salt-licks where they congregated, the +abundance of bears, deer, and elk with which the country teemed, +the innumerable flocks of wild turkeys, geese, and ducks, aroused +in Boone the hunter's passion for the chase; while the beauty of +the lands, as mirrored in the vivid fancy of the Irishman, +inspired him with a new longing to explore the famous country +which had, as John Filson records, "greatly engaged Mr. Findlay's +attention." + +In the comprehensive designs of Henderson, now a judge, for +securing a "graphic report of the trans-Alleghany region in +behalf of his land company", Boone divined the means of securing +the financial backing for an expedition of considerable size and +ample equipment. In numerous suits for debt, aggregating hundreds +of dollars, which had been instituted against Boone by some of +the leading citizens of Rowan, Williams and Henderson had acted +as Boone's attorneys. In order to collect their legal fees, they +likewise brought suit against Boone; but not wishing to press the +action against the kindly scout who had hitherto acted as their +agent in western exploration, they continued the litigation from +court to court, in lieu of certain "conditions performed" on +behalf of Boone, during his unbroken absence, by his attorney in +this suit, Alexander Martin. Summoned to appear in 1769 at the +March term of court at Salisbury, Boone seized upon the occasion +to lay before Judge Henderson the designs for a renewed and +extended exploration of Kentucky suggested by the golden +opportunity of securing the services of Findlay as guide. Shortly +after March 6th, when Judge Henderson reached Salisbury, the +conference, doubtless attended by John Stewart, Boone's +brother-in-law, John Findlay, and Boone, who were all present at +this term of court, must have been held, for the purpose of +devising ways and means for the expedition. Peck, the only +reliable contemporary biographer of the pioneer, who derived many +facts from Boone himself and his intimate acquaintances, draws +the conclusion (1847): "Daniel Boone was engaged as the master +spirit of this exploration, because in his judgment and fidelity +entire confidence could be reposed.... He was known to +Henderson and encouraged by him to make the exploration, and to +examine particularly the whole country south of the Kentucky--or +as then called the Louisa River." As confidential agent of the +land company, Boone carried with him letters and instructions for +his guidance upon this extended tour of exploration." + +On May 1, 1769, with Findlay as guide, and accompanied by four of +his neighbors, John Stewart, a skilled woodsman, Joseph Holden, +James Mooney, and William Cooley, Boone left his "peaceable +habitation" on the upper Yadkin and began his historic journey +"in quest of the country of Kentucky." Already heavily burdened +with debts, Boone must have incurred considerable further +financial obligations to Judge Henderson and Colonel Williams, +acting for the land company, in order to obtain the large amount +of supplies requisite for so prolonged an expedition. Each of the +adventurers rode a good horse of strength and endurance; and +behind him were securely strapped the blanket, ammunition, salt, +and cooking-utensils so indispensable for a long sojourn in the +wilderness. In Powell's Valley they doubtless encountered the +party led thither by Joseph Martin (see Chapter VII), and there +fell into the "Hunter's Trail" commented on in a letter written +by Martin only a fortnight before the passing of Boone's +cavalcade. Crossing the mountain at the Ouasioto Gap, they made +their first "station camp" in Kentucky on the creek, still named +after that circumstance, on the Red Lick Fork. After a +preliminary journey for the purpose of locating the spot, Findlay +led the party to his old trading-camp at Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, +where then (June 7, 1769) remained but charred embers of the +Indian huts, with some of the stockading and the gate-posts still +standing. In Boone's own words, he and Findlay at once "proceeded +to take a more thorough survey of the country;" and during the +autumn and early winter, encountering on every hand apparently +inexhaustible stocks of wild game and noting the ever-changing +beauties of the country, the various members of the party made +many hunting and exploring journeys from their "station camp" as +base. On December 22, 1769, while engaged in a hunt, Boone and +Stewart were surprised and captured by a large party of +Shawanoes, led by Captain Will, who were returning from the +autumn hunt on Green River to their villages north of the Ohio. +Boone and Stewart were forced to pilot the Indians to their main +camp, where the savages, after robbing them of all their peltries +and supplies and leaving them inferior guns and little +ammunition, set off to the northward. They left, on parting, this +menacing admonition to the white intruders: "Now, brothers, go +home and stay there. Don't come here any more, for this is the +Indians' hunting-ground, and all the animals, skins, and furs are +ours. If you are so foolish as to venture here again, you may be +sure the wasps and yellow jackets will sting you severely." + +Chagrined particularly by the loss of the horses, Boone and +Stewart for two days pursued the Indians in hot haste. Finally +approaching the Indians' camp by stealth in the dead of night, +they secured two of the horses, upon which they fled at top +speed. In turn they were immediately pursued by a detachment of +the Indians, mounted upon their fleetest horses; and suffered the +humiliation of recapture two days later. Indulging in wild +hilarity over the capture of the crestfallen whites, the Indians +took a bell from one of the horses and, fastening it about +Boone's neck, compelled him under the threat of brandished +tomahawks to caper about and jingle the bell, jeering at him the +while with the derisive query, uttered in broken English: "Steal +horse, eh?" With as good grace as they could summon--wry smiles +at best--Boone and Stewart patiently endured these humiliations, +following the Indians as captives. Some days later (about January +4, 1770), while the vigilance of the Indians was momentarily +relaxed, the captives suddenly plunged into a dense canebrake and +in the subsequent confusion succeeded in effecting their escape. +Finding their camp deserted upon their return, Boone and Stewart +hastened on and finally overtook their companions. Here Boone was +both surprised and delighted to encounter his brother Squire, +loaded down with supplies. Having heard nothing from Boone, the +partners of the land company had surmised that he and his party +must have run short of ammunition, flour, salt, and other things +sorely needed in the wilderness; and because of their desire that +the party should remain, in order to make an exhaustive +exploration of the country, Squire Boone had been sent to him +with supplies. Findlay, Holden, Mooney, and Cooley returned to +the settlements; but Stewart, Squire Boone, and Alexander Neely, +who had accompanied Squire, threw in their lot with the intrepid +Daniel, and fared forth once more to the stirring and bracing +adventures of the Kentucky wilderness. In Daniel Boone's own +words, he expected "from the furs and peltries they had an +opportunity of taking ... to recruit his shattered +circumstances; discharge the debts he had contracted by the +adventure; and shortly return under better auspices, to settle +the newly discovered country." + +Boone and his party now stationed themselves near the mouth of +the Red River, and soon provided themselves, against the hard. +ships of the long winter, with jerk, bear's oil, buffalo tallow, +dried buffalo tongues, fresh meat, and marrow-bones as food, and +buffalo robes and bearskins as shelter from the inclement +weather. Neely had brought with him, to while away dull hours, a +copy of "Gulliver's Travels"; and in describing Neely's +successful hunt for buffalo one day, Boone in after years +amusingly deposed: "In the year 1770 I encamped on Red River with +five other men, and we had with us for our amusement the History +of Samuel Gulliver's Travels, wherein he gave an account of his +young master, Glumdelick, careing him on market day for a show to +a town called Lulbegrud. A young man of our company called +Alexander Neely came to camp and told us he had been that day to +Lulbegrud, and had killed two Brobdignags in their capital." Far +from unlettered were pioneers who indulged together in such +literary chat and gave to the near-by creek the name (after Dean +Swift's Lorbrugrud) of Lulbegrud which name, first seen on +Filson's map of Kentucky (1784), it bears to this day. From one +of his long, solitary hunts Stewart never returned; and it was +not until five years later, while cutting out the Transylvania +Trail, that Boone and his companions discovered, near the old +crossing at Rockcastle, Stewart's remains in a standing hollow +sycamore. The wilderness never gave up its tragic secret. + +The close of the winter and most of the spring were passed by the +Boones, after Neely's return to the settlements, in exploration, +hunting, and trapping beaver and otter, in which sport Daniel +particularly excelled. Owing to the drain upon their ammunition, +Squire was at length compelled to return to the settlements for +supplies; and Daniel, who remained alone in the wilderness to +complete his explorations for the land company, must often have +shared the feelings of Balboa as, from lofty knob or towering +ridge, he gazed over the waste of forest which spread from the +dim out lines of the Alleghanies to the distant waters of the +Mississippi. He now proceeded to make those remarkable solitary +explorations of Kentucky which have given him immortality--through +the valley of the Kentucky and the Licking, and along the +"Belle Riviere" (Ohio) as low as the falls. He visited the Big +Bone Lick and examined the wonderful fossil remains of the +mammoth found there. Along the great buffalo roads, worn several +feet below the surface of the ground, which led to the Blue +Licks, he saw with amazement and delight thousands of huge shaggy +buffalo gamboling, bellowing, and making the earth rumble beneath +the trampling of their hooves. One day, while upon a cliff near +the junction of the Kentucky and Dick's Rivers, he suddenly found +himself hemmed in by a party of Indians. Seizing his only chance +of escape, he leaped into the top of a maple tree growing beneath +the cliffs and, sliding to safety full sixty feet below, made his +escape, pursued by the sound of a chorus of guttural "Ughs" from +the dumbfounded savages. + +Finally making his way back to the old camp, Daniel was rejoined +there by Squire on July 27, 1770. During the succeeding months, +much of their time was spent in hunting and prospecting in +Jessamine County, where two caves are still known as Boone's +caves. Eventually, when ammunition and supplies had once more run +low, Squire was compelled a second time to return to the +settlements. Perturbed after a time by Squire's failure to rejoin +him at the appointed time, Daniel started toward the settlements, +in search of him; and by a stroke of good fortune encountered him +along the trail. Overjoyed at this meeting (December, 1770) the +indomitable Boones once more plunged into the wilderness, +determined to conclude their explorations by examining the +regions watered by the Green and Cumberland rivers and their +tributaries. In after years, Gasper Mansker, the old German +scout, was accustomed to describe with comic effect the +consternation created among the Long Hunters, while hunting one +day on Green River, by a singular noise which they could not +explain. Stealthily slipping from tree to tree, Mansker finally +beheld with mingled surprise and amusement a hunter, bareheaded, +stretched flat upon his back on a deerskin spread on the ground, +singing merrily at the top of his voice! It was Daniel Boone, +joyously whiling away the solitary hours in singing one of his +favorite songs of the border. In March, 1771, after spending some +time in company with the Long Hunters, the Boones, their horses +laden with furs, set their faces homeward. On their return +journey, near Cumberland Gap, they had the misfortune to be +surrounded by a party of Indians who robbed them of their guns +and all their peltries. With this humiliating conclusion to his +memorable tour of exploration, Daniel Boone, as he himself says, +"once more reached home after experiencing hardships which would +defy credulity in the recital." + +Despite the hardships and the losses, Boone had achieved the +ambition of years: he had seen Kentucky, which he "esteemed a +second paradise." The reports of his extended explorations, which +he made to Judge Henderson, were soon communicated to the other +partners of the land company; and their letters of this period, +to one another, bristle with glowing and minute descriptions of +the country, as detailed by their agent. Boone was immediately +engaged to act in the company's behalf to sound the Cherokees +confidentially with respect to their willingness to lease or sell +the beautiful hunting-grounds of the trans-Alleghany. The high +hopes of Henderson and his associates at last gave promise of +brilliant realization. Daniel Boone's glowing descriptions of +Kentucky excited in their minds, says a gifted early chronicler, +the "spirit of an enterprise which in point of magnitude and +peril, as well as constancy and heroism displayed in its +execution, has never been paralleled in the history of America." + + + +CHAPTER XI. The Regulators + +It is not a persons labour, nor yet his effects that will do, but +if he has but one horse to plow with, one bed to lie on, or one +cow to give a little milk for his children, they must all go to +raise money which is not to be had. And lastly if his personal +estate (sold at one tenth of its value) will not do, then his +lands (which perhaps has cost him many years of toil and labour) +must go the same way to satisfy, these cursed hungry +caterpillars, that are eating and will eat out the bowels of our +Commonwealth, if they be not pulled down from their nests in a +very short time.--George Sims: A Serious Address to the +Inhabitants of Granville County, containing an Account of our +deplorable Situation we suffer .... and some necessary Hints with +Respect to a Reformation. June 6, 1765. + + +It is highly probable that even at the time of his earlier +explorations in behalf of Richard Henderson and Company, Daniel +Boone anticipated speedy removal to the West. Indeed, in the very +year of his first tour in their interest, Daniel and his wife +Rebeckah sold all their property in North Carolina, consisting of +their home and six hundred and forty acres of land, and after +several removals established themselves upon the upper Yadkin. +This removal and the later western explorations just outlined +were due not merely to the spirit of adventure and discovery. +Three other causes also were at work. In the first place there +was the scarcity of game. For fifteen years the shipments of +deerskins from Bethabara to Charleston steadily increased; and +the number of skins bought by Gammern, the Moravian storekeeper, +ran so high that in spite of the large purchases made at the +store by the hunters he would sometimes run entirely out of +money. Tireless in the chase, the far roaming Boone was among +"the hunters, who brought in their skins from as far away as the +Indian lands"; and the beautiful upland pastures and mountain +forests, still teeming with deer and bear, doubtless lured him to +the upper Yadkin, where for a time in the immediate neighborhood +of his home abundance of game fell before his unerring rifle. +Certainly the deer and other game, which were being killed in +enormous numbers to satisfy the insatiable demand of the traders +at Salisbury, the Forks, and Bethabara, became scarcer and +scarcer; and the wild game that was left gradually fled to the +westward. Terrible indeed was the havoc wrought among the elk; +and it was reported that the last elk was killed in western North +Carolina as early as 1781. + +Another grave evil of the time with which Boone had to cope in +the back country of North Carolina was the growth of undisguised +outlawry, similar to that found on the western plains of a later +era. This ruthless brigand age arose as the result of the +unsettled state of the country and the exposed condition of the +settlements due to the Indian alarms. When rude borderers, +demoralized by the enforced idleness attendant upon fort life +during the dark days of Indian invasion, sallied forth upon +forays against the Indians, they found much valuable +property--horses, cattle, and stock--left by their owners when +hurriedly fleeing to the protection of the frontier stockades. +The temptations thus afforded were too great to resist; and the +wilder spirits of the backwoods, with hazy notions of private +rights, seized the property which they found, slaughtered the +cattle, sold the horses, and appropriated to their own use the +temporarily abandoned household goods and plantation tools. The +stealing of horses, which were needed for the cultivation of the +soil and useful for quickly carrying unknown thieves beyond the +reach of the owner and the law, became a common practice; and was +carried on by bands of outlaws living remote from one another and +acting in collusive concert. + +Toward the end of July, 1755, when the Indian outrages upon the +New River settlements in Virginia had frightened away all the +families at the Town Fork in the Yadkin country, William Owen, a +man of Welsh stock, who had settled in the spring of 1752 in the +upper Yadkin near the Mulberry Fields, was suspected of having +robbed the storekeeper on the Meho. Not long afterward a band of +outlaws who plundered the exposed cabins in their owners' +absence, erected a rude fort in the mountain region in the rear +of the Yadkin settlements, where they stored their ill-gotten +plunder and made themselves secure from attack. Other members of +the band dwelt in the settlements, where they concealed their +robber friends by day and aided them by night in their nefarious +projects of theft and rapine. + +The entire community was finally aroused by the bold depredations +of the outlaws; and the most worthy settlers of the Yadkin +country organized under the name of Regulators to break up the +outlaw band. When it was discovered that Owen, who was well known +at Bethabara, had allied himself with the highwaymen, one of the +justices summoned one hundred men; and seventy, who answered the +call, set forth on December 26, 1755, to seek out the outlaws and +to destroy their fortress. Emboldened by their success, the +latter upon one occasion had carried off a young girl of the +settlements. Daniel Boone placed himself at the head of one of +the parties, which included the young girl's father, to go to her +rescue; and they fortunately succeeded in effecting the release +of the frightened maiden. One of the robbers was apprehended and +brought to Salisbury, where he was thrown into prison for his +crimes. Meanwhile a large amount of plunder had been discovered +at the house of one Cornelius Howard; and the evidences of his +guilt so multiplied against him that he finally confessed his +connection with the outlaw band and agreed to point out their +fort in the mountains. + +Daniel Boone and George Boone joined the party of seventy men, +sent out by the colonial authorities under the guidance of +Howard, to attack the stronghold of the bandits. Boone afterward +related that the robbers' fort was situated in the most fitly +chosen place for such a purpose that he could imagine--beneath an +overhanging cliff of rock, with a large natural chimney, and a +considerable area in front well stockaded. The frontiersmen +surrounded the fort, captured five women and eleven children, and +then burned the fort to the ground. Owen and his wife, +Cumberland, and several others were ultimately made prisoners; +but Harman and the remainder of the band escaped by flight. Owen +and his fellow captives were then borne to Salisbury, +incarcerated in the prison there, and finally (May, 1756) +condemned to the gallows. Owen sent word to the Moravians, +petitioning them to adopt his two boys and to apprentice one to a +tailor, the other to a carpenter. But so infuriated was Owen's +wife by Howard's treachery that she branded him as a second +Judas; and this at once fixed upon him the sobriquet "Judas" +Howard-a sobriquet he did not live long to bear, for about a year +later he was ambushed and shot from his horse at the crossing of +a stream. He thus paid the penalty of his betrayal of the outlaw +band. For a number of years, the Regulators continued to wage war +against the remaining outlaws, who from time to time committed +murders as well as thefts. As late as January, 1768, the +Regulators caught a horse thief in the Hollows of Surry County +and brought him to Bethabara, whence Richter and Spach took him +to the jail at Salisbury. After this year, the outlaws were heard +of no more; and peace reigned in the settlements. + +Colonel Edmund Fanning--of whom more anon--declared that the +Regulation began in Anson County which bordered upon South +Carolina. Certain it is that the upper country of that province +was kept in an uproar by civil disturbances during this early +period. Owing to the absence of courts in this section, so remote +from Charleston, the inhabitants found it necessary, for the +protection of property and the punishment of outlaws, to form an +association called, like the North Carolina society, the +Regulation. Against this association the horse thieves and other +criminals made common cause, and received tacit support from +certain more reputable persons who condemned "the irregularity of +the Regulators." The Regulation which had been thus organized in +upper South Carolina as early as 1764 led to tumultuous risings +of the settlers; and finally in the effort to suppress these +disorders, the governor, Lord Charles Montagu, appointed one +Scovil, an utterly unworthy representative, to carry out his +commands. After various disorders, which became ever more +unendurable to the law-abiding, matters came to a crisis (1769) +as the result of the high-handed proceedings of Scovil, who +promiscuously seized and flung into prison all the Regulators he +could lay hands on. In the month of March the back country rose +in revolt against Scovil and a strong body of the settlers was on +the point of attacking the force under his command when an +eleventh-hour letter arrived from Montagu, dismissing Scovil from +office. Thus was happily averted, by the narrowest of margins, a +threatened precursor of the fight at Alamance in 1771 (see +Chapter XII). As the result of the petition of the Calhouns and +others, courts were established in 1760, though not opened until +four years later. Many horse thieves were apprehended, tried, and +punished. Justice once more held full sway. + +Another important cause for Boone's removal from the neighborhood +of Salisbury into the mountain fastnesses was the oppressive +administration of the law by corrupt sheriffs, clerks, and +tax-gatherers, and the dissatisfaction of the frontier squatters +with the owners of the soil. At the close of the year 1764 +reports reached the town of Wilmington, after the adjournment of +the assembly in November, of serious disturbances in Orange +County, due, it was alleged, to the exorbitant exactions of the +clerks, registers, and some of the attorneys. As a result of this +disturbing news, Governor Dobbs issued a proclamation forbidding +any officer to take illegal fees. Troubles had been brewing in +the adjacent county of Granville ever since the outbreak of the +citizens against Francis Corbin, Lord Granville's agent (January +24, 1759), and the issuance of the petition of Reuben Searcy and +others (March 23d) protesting against the alleged excessive fees +taken and injustices practised by Robert (Robin) Jones, the +famous lawyer. These disturbances were cumulative in their +effect; and the people at last (1765 ) found in George Sims, of +Granville, a fit spokesman of their cause and a doughty champion +of popular rights. In his "Serious Address to the Inhabitants of +Granville County, containing an Account of our deplorable +Situation we suffer ... and some necessary Hints with Respect +to a Reformation," recently brought to light, he presents a +crushing indictment of the clerk of the county court, Samuel +Benton, the grandfather of Thomas Hart Benton. After describing +in detail the system of semi-peonage created by the merciless +exactions of lawyers and petty court officials, and the +insatiable greed of "these cursed hungry caterpillars," Sims with +rude eloquence calls upon the people to pull them down from their +nests for the salvation of the Commonwealth. + +Other abuses were also recorded. So exorbitant was the charge for +a marriage-license, for instance, that an early chronicler +records "The consequence was that some of the inhabitants on the +head-waters of the Yadkin took a short cut. They took each other +for better or for worse; and considered themselves as married +without further ceremony." The extraordinary scarcity of currency +throughout the colony, especially in the back country, was +another great hardship and a perpetual source of vexation. All +these conditions gradually became intolerable to the uncultured +but free spirited men of the back country. Events were slowly +converging toward a crisis in government and society. Independent +in spirit, turbulent in action, the backwoodsmen revolted not +only against excessive taxes, dishonest sheriffs, and +extortionate fees, but also against the rapacious practices of +the agents of Lord Granville. These agents industriously picked +flaws in the titles to the lands in Granville's proprietary upon +which the poorer settlers were seated; and compelled them to pay +for the land if they had not already done so, or else to pay the +fees twice over and take out a new patent as the only remedy of +the alleged defect in their titles. In Mecklenburg County the +spirit of backwoods revolt flamed out in protest against the +proprietary agents. Acting under instructions to survey and close +bargains for the lands or else to eject those who held them, +Henry Eustace McCulloh, in February, 1765, went into the county +to call a reckoning. The settlers, many of whom had located +without deeds, indignantly retorted by offering to buy only at +their own prices, and forbade the surveyors to lay out the +holdings when this smaller price was declined. They not only +terrorized into acquiescence those among them who were willing to +pay the amount charged for the lands, but also openly declared +that they would resist by force any sheriff in ejectment +proceedings. On May 7th an outbreak occurred; and a mob, led by +Thomas Polk, set upon John Frohock, Abraham Alexander, and +others, as they were about to survey a parcel of land, and gave +them a severe thrashing, even threatening the young McCulloh with +death. + +The choleric backwoodsmen, instinctively in agreement with +Francis Bacon, considered revenge as a sort of wild justice. +Especial objects of their animosity were the brothers Frohock, +John and Thomas, the latter clerk of the court at Salisbury, and +Edmund Fanning, a cultured gentleman-adventurer, associate +justice of the superior court. So rapacious and extortionate were +these vultures of the courts who preyed upon the vitals of the +common people, that they were savagely lampooned by Rednap +Howell, the backwoods poet-laureate of the Regulation. The temper +of the back country is well caught in Howell's lines anent this +early American "grafter", the favorite of the royal governor: + + When Fanning first to Orange came, + He looked both pale and wan; + An old patched coat was on his back, + An old mare he rode on. + + Both man and mare wan't worth five pounds, + As I've been often told; + But by his civil robberies, + He's laced his coat with gold. + +The germs of the great westward migration in the coming decade +were thus working among the people of the back country. If the +tense nervous energy of the American people is the transmitted +characteristic of the border settlers, who often slept with +loaded rifle in hand in grim expectation of being awakened by the +hideous yells, the deadly tomahawk, and the lurid firebrand of +the savage, the very buoyancy of the national character is in +equal measure "traceable to the free democracy founded on a +freehold inheritance of land." The desire for free land was the +fundamental factor in the development of the American democracy. +No colony exhibited this tendency more signally than did North +Carolina in the turbulent days of the Regulation. The North +Carolina frontiersmen resented the obligation to pay quit-rents +and firmly believed that the first occupant of the soil had an +indefeasible right to the land which he had won with his rifle +and rendered productive by the implements of toil. Preferring the +dangers of the free wilderness to the paying of tribute to +absentee landlords and officials of an intolerant colonial +government, the frontiersman found title in his trusty rifle +rather than in a piece of parchment, and was prone to pay his +obligations to the owner of the soil in lead rather than in gold. + + + +CHAPTER XII. Watauga--Haven of Liberty + +The Regulators despaired of seeing better times and therefore +quitted the Province. It is said 1,500 departed since the Battle +of Alamance and to my knowledge a great many more are only +waiting to dispose of their plantations in order to follow +them.--Reverend Morgan Edwards, 1772. + + +The five years (1766-1771) which saw the rise, development, and +ultimate defeat of the popular movement known as the Regulation, +constitute a period not only of extraordinary significance in +North Carolina but also of fruitful consequences in the larger +movements of westward expansion. With the resolute intention of +having their rulers "give account of their stewardship," to +employ their own words, the Sandy Creek Association of Baptists +(organized in 1758), in a series of papers known as Regulators' +Advertisements (1766-8) proceeded to mature, through popular +gatherings, a rough form of initiative and referendum. At length, +discouraged in its efforts, and particularly in the attempt to +bring county officials to book for charging illegal fees, this +association ceased actively to function. It was the precursor of +a movement of much more drastic character and formidable +proportions, chiefly directed against Colonel Edmund Fanning and +his associates. This movement doubtless took its name, "the +Regulation," from the bands of men already described who were +organized first in North Carolina and later in South Carolina, to +put down highwaymen and to correct many abuses in the back +country, such as the tyrannies of Scovil and his henchmen. +Failing to secure redress of their grievances through legal +channels, the Regulators finally made such a powerful +demonstration in support of their refusal to pay taxes that +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina, in 1768, called out the +provincial militia, and by marching with great show of force +through the disaffected regions, succeeded temporarily in +overawing the people and thus inducing them to pay their +assessments. + +The suits which had been brought by the Regulators against Edmund +Fanning, register, and Francis Nash, clerk, of Orange County, +resulted in both being "found guilty of taking too high fees." +Fanning immediately resigned his commission as register; while +Nash, who in conjunction with Fanning had fairly offered in 1766 +to refund to any one aggrieved any fee charged by him which the +Superior Court might hold excessive, gave bond for his appearance +at the next court. Similar suits for extortion against the three +Froliocks in Rowan County in 1769 met with failure, however; and +this outcome aroused the bitter resentment of the Regulators, as +recorded by Herman Husband in his "Impartial Relation." During +this whole period the insurrectionary spirit of the people, who +felt themselves deeply aggrieved but recognized their inability +to secure redress, took the form of driving local justices from +the bench and threatening court officials with violence. + +At the session of the Superior Court at Hillsborough, September +22, 1770, an elaborate petition prepared by the Regulators, +demanding unprejudiced juries and the public accounting for taxes +by the sheriffs, was handed to the presiding justice by James +Hunter, a leading Regulator. This justice was our acquaintance, +Judge Richard Henderson, of Granville County, the sole high +officer in the provincial government from the entire western +section of the colony. In this petition occur these trenchant +words: "As we are serious and in good earnest and the cause +respects the whole body of the people it would be loss of time to +enter into arguments on particular points for though there are a +few men who have the gift and art of reasoning, yet every man has +a feeling and knows when he has justice done him as well as the +most learned." On the following Monday (September 24th), upon +convening of court, some one hundred and fifty Regulators, led by +James Hunter, Herman Husband, Rednap Howell, and others, armed +with clubs, whips, and cudgels, surged into the court-room and +through their spokesman, Jeremiah Fields, presented a statement +of their grievances. "I found myself," says Judge Henderson, +"under a necessity of attempting to soften and turn away the fury +of these mad people, in the best manner in my power, and as such +could well be, pacify their rage and at the same time preserve +the little remaining dignity of the court." + +During an interim, in which the Regulators retired for +consultation, they fell without warning upon Fanning and gave him +such rough treatment that he narrowly escaped with his life. The +mob, now past control, horsewhipped a number of leading lawyers +and citizens gathered there at court, and treated others, notably +the courtly Mr. Hooper of Boston, "with every mark of contempt +and insult." Judge Henderson was assured by Fields that no harm +should come to him provided he would conduct the court in +accordance with the behest of the Regulators: namely, that no +lawyer, save the King's Attorney, should be admitted to the +court, and that the Regulators' cases should be tried with new +jurors chosen by the Regulators. With the entire little village +terrorized by this campaign of "frightfulness," and the court +wholly unprotected, Judge Henderson reluctantly acknowledged to +himself that "the power of the judiciary was exhausted." +Nevertheless, he says, "I made every effort in my power +consistent with my office and the duty the public is entitled to +claim to preserve peace and good order." Agreeing under duress to +resume the session the following day, the judge ordered an +adjournment. But being unwilling, on mature reflection, to permit +a mockery of the court and a travesty of justice to be staged +under threat and intimidation, he returned that night to his home +in Granville and left the court adjourned in course. Enraged by +the judge's escape, the Regulators took possession of the court +room the following morning, called over the cases, and in futile +protest against the conditions they were powerless to remedy, +made profane entries which may still be seen on the record: +"Damned rogues," "Fanning pays cost but loses nothing," "Negroes +not worth a damn, Cost exceeds the whole," "Hogan pays and be +damned," and, in a case of slander, "Nonsense, let them argue for +Ferrell has gone hellward." + +The uprising of these bold and resolute, simple and imperfectly +educated people, which had begun as a constitutional struggle to +secure justice and to prevent their own exploitation by dishonest +lawyers of the county courts, now gave place to open anarchy and +secret incendiarism. In the dead of night, November 12th and +14th, Judge Henderson's barn, stables, and dwelling house were +fired by the Regulators and went up in flames. Glowing with a +sense of wrong, these misguided people, led on by fanatical +agitators, thus vented their indiscriminate rage, not only upon +their op pressors, but also upon men wholly innocent of injuring +them--men of the stamp of William Hooper, afterward signer of the +Declaration of Independence, Alexander Martin, afterward governor +and United States Senator, and Richard Henderson, popular +representative of the back country and a firm champion of due +process of law. It is perhaps not surprising in view of these +events that Governor Tryon and the ruling class, lacking a +sympathy broad enough to ensure justice to the oppressed people, +seemed to be chiefly impressed with the fact that a widespread +insurrection was in progress, threatening not only life and +property, but also civil government itself. The governor called +out the militia of the province and led an army of well nigh one +thousand men and officers against the Regulators, who had +assembled at Alamance to the number of two thousand. Tryon stood +firm upon the demands that the people should submit to government +and disperse at a designated hour. The Regulators, on their side, +hoped to secure the reforms they desired by intimidating the +governor with a great display of force. The battle was a tragic +fiasco for the Regulators, who fought bravely, but without +adequate arms or real leadership. With the conclusion of this +desultory action, a fight lasting about two hours (May 16, 1771), +the power of the Regulators was completely broken." + + +Among these insurgents there was a remarkable element, an element +whose influence upon the course of American history has been but +imperfectly understood which now looms into prominence as the +vanguard of the army of westward expansion. There were some of +the Regulators who, though law-abiding and conservative, were +deeply imbued with ideas of liberty, personal independence, and +the freedom of the soil. Through the influence of Benjamin +Franklin, with whom one of the leaders of the group, Herman +Husband, was in constant correspondence, the patriotic ideas then +rapidly maturing into revolutionary sentiments furnished the +inspiration to action. As early as 1766, the Sandy Creek leaders, +referred to earlier in this chapter, issued a call to each +neighborhood to send delegates to a gathering for the purpose of +investigating the question "whether the free men of this country +labor under any abuses of power or not." The close connection +between the Sandy Creek men and the Sons of Liberty is amply +demonstrated in this paper wherein the Sons of Liberty in +connection with the "stamp law" are praised: for "redeeming us +from Tyranny" and for having "withstood the lords in Parliament +in behalf of true liberty." Upon the records of the Dutchman's +Creek Church, of "regular" Baptists, at the Forks of the Yadkin, +to which Daniel Boone's family belonged, may be found this +memorable entry, recognizing the "American Cause" well-nigh a +year before the declaration of independence at Philadelphia: "At +the monthly meeting it was agreed upon concerning the American +Cause, if any of the brethren see cause to join it they have the +liberty to do it without being called to an account by the +church. But whether they join or do not join they should be used +with brotherly love. + +The fundamental reasons underlying the approaching westward +hegira are found in the remarkable petition of the Regulators of +An son County (October 9, 1769), who request that "Benjamin +Franklin or some other known PATRIOT" be appointed agent of the +province in London to seek redress at the source. They exposed +the basic evil in the situation by pointing out that, in +violation of the law restricting the amount of land that might be +granted to each person to six hundred and forty acres, much of +the most fertile territory in the province had been distributed +in large tracts to wealthy landlords. In consequence "great +numbers of poor people are necessitated to toil in the +cultivation of the bad Lands whereon they hardly can subsist." It +was these poor people, "thereby deprived of His Majesties +liberality and Bounty," who soon turned their gaze to the +westward and crossed the mountains in search of the rich, free +lands of the trans-Alleghany region. + +This feverish popular longing for freedom, stimulated by the +economic pressure of thousands of pioneers who were annually +entering North Carolina, set in motion a wave of migration across +the mountains in 1769. Long before Alamance, many of the true +Americans, distraught by apparently irremediable injustices, +plunged fearlessly into the wilderness, seeking beyond the +mountains a new birth of liberty, lands of their own selection +free of cost or quit-rents, and a government of their own +choosing and control."' The glad news of the rich valleys beyond +the mountains early lured such adventurous pioneers as Andrew +Greer and Julius Caesar Dugger to the Watauga country. The +glowing stories, told by Boone, and disseminated in the back +country by Henderson, Williams, and the Harts, seemed to give +promise to men of this stamp that the West afforded relief from +oppressions suffered in North Carolina. During the winter of +1768-9 there was also a great rush of settlers from Virginia into +the valley of the Holston. A party from Augusta County, led by +men who had been delighted with the country viewed seven years +before when they were serving under Colonel William Byrd against +the Cherokees, found that this region, a wilderness on their +outward passage in 1768, was dotted with cabins on every spot +where the grazing was good, upon their return the following year. +Writing to Hillsborough on October 18, 1770, concerning the "many +hundred families" in the region from Green River to the branches +of the Holston, who refused to comply with the royal proclamation +of 1763, Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia reports that "very +little if any Quit Rents have been received for His Majesty's use +from that Quarter for some time past"--the people claiming that +"His Majesty hath been pleased to withdraw his protection from +them since 1763." + +In the spring of 1770, with the express intention of discovering +suitable locations for homes for himself and a number of others, +who wished to escape the accumulating evils of the times, James +Robertson of Orange County, North Carolina, made an arduous +journey to the pleasing valley of the Watauga. Robertson, who was +born in Brunswick County, Virginia, June 28, 1742, of excellent +Scotch-Irish ancestry, was a noteworthy figure of a certain +type--quiet, reflective, conservative, wise, a firm believer in the +basic principles of civil Liberty and the right of local +self-government. Robertson spent some time with a man named +Honeycut in the Watauga region, raised a crop of corn, and chose +for himself and his friends suitable locations for settlement. +Lost upon his return in seeking the mountain defiles traversed by +him on the outward journey, Robertson probably escaped death from +starvation only through the chance passing of two hunters who +succored him and set him upon the right path. On arriving in +Orange he found political and social conditions there much worse +than before, many of the colonists declining to take the +obligatory oath of allegiance to the British Crown after the +Battle of Alamance, preferring to carve out for themselves new +homes along the western waters. Some sixteen families of this +stamp, indignant at the injustices and oppressions of British +rule, and stirred by Robertson's description of the richness and +beauty of the western country, accompanied him to Watauga shortly +after the battle. + +This vanguard of the army of westward advance, independent +Americans in spirit with a negligible sprinkling of Loyalists, +now swept in a great tide into the northeastern section of +Tennessee. The men of Sandy Creek, actuated by independent +principles but out of sympathy with the anarchic side of the +Regulation, left the colony almost to a man. "After the defeat of +the Regulators," says the historian of the Sandy Creek +Association, "thousands of the oppressed, seeing no hope of +redress for their grievances, moved into and settled east +Tennessee. A large proportion of these were of the Baptist +population. Sandy Creek Church which some time previous to 1771, +numbered 606, was afterward reduced to fourteen members!" This +movement exerted powerful influence in stimulating westward +expansion. Indeed, it was from men of Regulating principles--Boone, +Robertson, and the Searcys--who vehemently condemned the +anarchy and incendiarism of 1770, that Judge Henderson received +powerful cooperation in the opening up of Kentucky and Tennessee. + +The several treaties concerning the western boundary of white +settlement, concluded in close succession by North Carolina, +Virginia, and the Crown with the Southern and Northern Indians, +had an important bearing upon the settlement of Watauga. The +Cherokee boundary line, as fixed by Governor Tryon (1767) and by +John Stuart (1768), ran from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, +thence straight to Chiswell's Mine, and thence direct to the +mouth of the Great Kanawha River. By the treaty at Fort Stanwix +(November 5, 1768), in the negotiation of which Virginia was +represented by Dr. Thomas Walker and Major Andrew Lewis, the Six +Nations sold to the Crown their shadowy claim to a vast tract of +western country, including in particular all the land between the +Ohio and the Tennessee Rivers. The news of the cession resulted +in a strong southwestward thrust of population, from the +neighborhood of Abingdon, in the direction of the Holston Valley. +Recognizing that hundreds of these settlers were beyond the line +negotiated by Stuart, but on lands not yet surveyed, Governor +Botetourt instructed the Virginia commissioners to press for +further negotiations, through Stuart, with the Cherokees. +Accordingly, on October 18, 1770, a new treaty was made at +Lochaber, South Carolina, by which a new line back of Virginia +was established, beginning at the intersection of the North +Carolina-Cherokee line (a point some seventy odd miles east of +Long Island), running thence in a west course to a point six +miles east of Long Island, and thence in a direct course to the +confluence of the Great Kanawha and Ohio Rivers. At the time of +the treaty, it was agreed that the Holston River, from its +intersection with the North Carolina-Virginia line, and down the +course of the same, should be a temporary southern boundary of +Virginia until the line should be ascertained by actual survey. A +strong influx of population into the immense new triangle thus +released for settlement brought powerful pressure to bear upon +northern Tennessee, the point of least resistance along the +western barrier. Singularly enough, this advance was not opposed +by the Cherokees, whose towns were strung across the extreme +southeast corner of Tennessee. + +When Colonel John Donelson ran the line in the latter part of +1771, The Little Carpenter, who with other Indian chiefs +accompanied the surveying party, urged that the line agreed upon +at Lochaber should break off at the head of the Louisa River, and +should run thence to the mouth thereof, and thence up the Ohio to +the mouth of the Great Kanawha. For this increase in the +territory of Virginia they of course expected additional payment. +As a representative of Virginia, Donelson agreed to the proposed +alteration in the boundary line; and accordingly promised to send +the Cherokees, in the following spring, a sum alleged by them to +have been fixed at five hundred pounds, in compensation for the +additional area. This informal agreement, it is believed, was +never ratified by Virginia; nor was the promised compensation +ever paid the Cherokees. + +Under the belief that the land belonged to Virginia, Jacob Brown +with one or two families from North Carolina settled in 1771 upon +a tract of land on the northern bank of the Nonachunheh +(corruption, Nolichucky) River. During the same year, an +experimental line run westward from Steep Rock and Beaver Creek +by Anthony Bledsoe showed that upon the extension of the boundary +line, these settlers would fall within the bounds of North +Carolina. Although thus informally warned of the situation, the +settlers made no move to vacate the lands. But in the following +year, after the running of Donelson's line, Alexander Cameron, +Stuart's deputy, required "all persons who had made settlements +beyond the said line to relinquish them." Thus officially warned, +Brown and his companions removed to Watauga. Cameron's order did +not apply, however, to the settlement, to the settlement north of +the Holston River, south and east of Long Island; and the +settlement in Carter's Valley, although lying without the +Virginia boundary, strangely enough remained unmolested. The +order was directed at the Watauga settlers, who were seated south +of the Holston River in the Watauga Valley. + +The plight in which the Watauga settlers now found themselves was +truly desperate; and the way in which they surmounted this +apparently insuperable difficulty is one of the most striking and +characteristic events in the pre-Revolutionary history of the Old +Southwest. It exhibits the indomitable will and fertile resource +of the American character at the margin of desperation. The +momentous influence of the Watauga settlers, inadequately +reckoned hitherto by historians, was soon to make itself +powerfully felt in the first epochal movement of westward +expansion. + + + +CHAPTER XIII. Opening the Gateway--Dunmore's War + +Virginia, we conceive, can claim this Country [Kentucky] with the +greatest justice and propriety, its within the Limits of their +Charter. They Fought and bled for it. And had it not been for the +memorable Battle, at the Great Kanaway those vast regions had yet +continued inaccessable.--The Harrodsburg Petition. June 7-15, +1776. + + +It was fortunate for the Watauga settlers that the Indians and +the whites were on the most peaceful terms with each other at the +time the Watauga Valley was shown, by the running of the boundary +line, to lie within the Indian reservation. With true American +self reliance, the settlers met together for deliberation and +counsel, and deputed James Robertson and John Been, as stated by +Tennessee's first historian, "to treat with their landlords, and +agree upon articles of accommodation and friendship. The attempt +succeeded. For though the Indians refused to give up the land +gratuitously, they consented, for a stipulated amount of +merchandise, muskets, and other articles of convenience, to lease +all the country on the waters of the Watauga." In addition to the +land thus leased for ten years, several other tracts were +purchased from the Indians by Jacob Brown, who reoccupied his +former location on the Nolichucky. + +In taking this daring step, the Watauga settlers moved into the +spotlight of national history. For the inevitable consequence of +leasing the territory was the organization of a form of +government for the infant settlement. Through his familiarity +with the North Carolina type of "association," in which the +settlers had organized for the purpose of "regulating" abuses, +and his acquaintance with the contents of the "Impartial +Relation," in which Husband fully expounded the principles and +practices of this association, Robertson was peculiarly fitted +for leadership in organizing this new government. The convention +at which Articles of Association, unfortunately lost, were drawn +up, is noteworthy as the first governmental assemblage of +free-born American citizens ever held west of the Alleghanies. +The government then established was the first free and +independent government, democratic in spirit, representative in +form, ever organized upon the American continent. In describing +this mimic republic, the royal Governor of Virginia says: "They +appointed magistrates, and framed laws for their present +occasion, and to all intents and purposes, erected themselves +into, though an inconsiderable, yet a separate State." The most +daring spirit in this little state was the young John Sevier, of +French Huguenot family (originally spelled Xavier), born in +Augusta County, Virginia, on September 23, 1745. It was from +Millerstown in Shenandoah County where he was living the +uneventful life of a small farmer, that he emigrated (December, +1773) to the Watauga region. With his arrival there begins one of +the most fascinating and romantic careers recorded in the varied +arid stirring annals of the Old Southwest. In this daring and +impetuous young fellow, fair-haired, blue-eyed, magnetic, +debonair--of powerful build, splendid proportions, and athletic +skill--we hold the gallant exemplar of the truly heroic life of +the border. The story of his life, thrilling in the extreme, is +rich in all the multi-colored elements which impart romance to +the arduous struggle of American civilization in the opening +years of the republic. + +The creative impulses in the Watauga commonwealth are hinted at +by Dunmore, who serves, in the letter above quoted, that Watauga +"sets a dangerous example to the people America, of forming +governments distinct from and independent of his Majesty's +authority." + +It is true that the experiment was somewhat limited. The +organization of the Watauga association, which constituted a +temporary expedient to meet a crisis in the affairs of a frontier +community cut off by forest wilderness and mountain barriers from +the reach of the arm of royal or provincial government, is not to +be compared with the revolutionary assemblage at Boonesborough, +May 23, 1775, or with the extraordinary demands for inde pendence +in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, during the same month. +Nevertheless the Watauga settlers defied both North Carolina and +the Crown, by adopting the laws of Virginia and by ignoring +Governor Josiah Martin's proclamation (March 26, 1774) "requiring +the said settlers immediately to retire from the Indian +Territories." Moreover, Watauga really was the parent of a series +of mimic republics in the Old Southwest, gradually tending toward +higher forms of organization, with a larger measure of individual +liberty. Watauga, Transylvania, Cumberland, Franklin represent +the evolving political genius of a free people under the creative +leadership of three constructive minds--James Robertson, John +Sevier, and Richard Henderson. Indeed, Watauga furnished to Judge +Henderson precisely the "dangerous example" of which Dunmore +prophetically speaks. + +Immediately upon his return in 1771 from the extended exploration +of Kentucky, Daniel Boone as already noted was engaged as secret +agent, to treat with the Cherokees for the lease or purchase of +the trans-Alleghany region, on behalf of Judge Henderson and his +associates. Embroiled in the exciting issues of the Regulation +and absorbed by his confining duties as colonial judge, Henderson +was unable to put his bold design into execution until after the +expiration of the court itself which ceased to exist in 1773. +Disregarding the royal proclamation of 1763 and Locke's +Fundamental Constitutions for the Carolinas, which forbade +private parties to purchase lands from the Indians, Judge +Henderson applied to the highest judicial authorities in England +to know if there was any law in existence forbidding purchase of +lands from the Indian tribes. Lord Mansfield gave Judge Henderson +the "sanction of his great authority in favor of the purchase." +Lord Chancellor Camden and Mr. Yorke had officially advised the +King in 1757, in regard to the petition of the East Indian +Company, "that in respect to such territories as have been, or +shall be acquired by treaty or grant from the Great Mogul, or any +of the Indian princes or governments, your Majesty's letters +patent are NOT NECESSARY; the property of the soil vesting in the +company by the Indian grant subject only to your Majesties right +of sovereignty over the settlements, as English settlements, and +over the inhabitants, as English subjects, who carry with them +your Majesties laws wherever they form colonies, and receive your +Majesties protection by virtue of your royal charters." This +opinion, with virtually no change, was rendered in regard to the +Indian tribes of North America by the same two authorities, +certainly as early as 1769; and a true copy, made in London, +April 1, 1772, was transmitted to Judge Henderson. Armed with the +legal opinions received from England, Judge Henderson was fully +persuaded that there was no legal bar whatsoever to his seeking +to acquire by purchase from the Cherokees the vast domain of the +trans-Alleghany. A golden dream of empire, with its promise of an +independent republic in the form of a proprietary colony, casts +him under the spell of its alluring glamour. + +In the meantime, the restless Boone, impatient over the delay in +the consummation of Judge Henderson's plans, resolved to +establish himself in Kentucky upon his own responsibility. +Heedless of the question of title and the certain hazards +incident to invading the territory of hostile savages, Boone +designated a rendezvous in Powell's Valley where he and his party +of five families were to be met by a band under the leadership of +his connections, the Bryans, and another company led by Captain +William Russell, a daring pioneer of the Clinch Valley. A small +detachment of Boone's party was fiercely attacked by Shawanoes in +Powell's Valley on October 10, 1773, and almost all were killed, +including sons of Boone and Russell, and young John and Richard +Mendenhall of Guilford County, North Carolina. As the result of +this bloody repulse, Boone's attempt to settle in Kentucky at +this time was definitely abandoned. His failure to effect a +settlement in Kentucky was due to that characteristic disregard +of the territorial rights of the Indians which was all too common +among the borderers of that period. + +This failure was portentous of the coming storm. The reign of the +Long Hunters was over. Dawning upon the horizon was the day of +stern adventurers, fixed in the desperate and lawless resolve to +invade the trans-Alleghany country and to battle savagely with +the red man for its possession. More successful than Boone was +the McAfee party, five in number, from Botetourt County, +Virginia, who between May 10th and September 1, 1773, safely +accomplished a journey through Kentucky and carefully marked +well-chosen sites for future location." An ominous incident of +the time was the veiled warning which Cornstalk, the great +Shawanoe chieftain, gave to Captain Thomas Bullitt, head of a +party of royal surveyors, sent out by Lord Dunmore, Governor of +Virginia. Cornstalk at Chillicothe, June 7, 1773, warned Bullitt +concerning the encroachments of the whites, "designed to deprive +us," he said, "of the hunting of the country, as usual ... the +hunting we stand in need of to buy our clothing." During the +preceding summer, George Rogers Clark, an aggressive young +Virginian, with a small party, had descended the Ohio as low as +Fish Creek, where he built a cabin; and in this region for many +months various parties of surveyors were busily engaged in +locating and surveying lands covered by military grants. Most +significant of the ruthless determination of the pioneers to +occupy by force the Kentucky area was the action of the large +party from Monongahela, some forty in number, led by Captain +James Harrod, who penetrated to the present Miller County, where +in June, 1774, they made improvements and actually laid out a +town. + +A significant, secretly conducted movement, of which historians +have taken but little account, was now in progress under the +manipulation of Virginia's royal governor. As early as 1770 Dr. +John Connolly proposed the establishment of an extensive colony +south of the Ohio; and the design of securing such territory from +the Indians found lodgment in the mind of Lord Dunmore. But this +design was for the moment thwarted when on October 28, 1773, an +order was issued from the Privy Council chamber in Whitehall +granting an immense territory, including all of the present West +Virginia and the land alienated to Virginia by Donelson's +agreement with the Cherokees (1772), to a company including +Thomas Walpole, Samuel Wharton, Benjamin Franklin, and others. +This new colony, to be named "Vandalia," seemed assured. A clash +between Dunmore and the royal authorities was imminent; for +Virginia under her sea-to-sea charter claimed the vast middle +region of the continent, extending without known limit to west +and northwest. Moreover, Dunmore was interested in great land +speculations on his own account; and while overtly vindicating +Virginia's claim to the trans-Alleghany by despatching parties of +surveyors to the western wilderness to locate and survey lands +covered by military grants, he with the collusion of certain +members of the "Honourable Board," his council, as charged by +Washington, was more than "lukewarm," secretly restricting as +rigorously as he dared the extent and number of the soldiers' +allotments. According to the famous Virginia Remonstrance, he was +in league with "men of great influence in some of the neighboring +states" to secure, under cover of purchases from the Indians, +large tracts of country between the Ohio and the Mississippi." In +shaping his plans Dunmore had the shrewd legal counsel of Patrick +Henry, who was equally intent upon making for himself a private +purchase from the Cherokees. It was Henry's legal opinion that +the Indiana purchase from the Six Nations by the Pennsylvania +traders at Fort Stanwix (November 5, 1768) was valid; and that +purchase by private individuals from the Indians gave full and +ample title. In consequence of these facts, William Murray, in +behalf of himself and his associates of the Illinois Land +Company, and on the strength of the Camden Yorke decision, +purchased two large tracts, on the Illinois and Ohio +respectively, from the Illinois Indians (July 5, 1773); and in +order to win the support of Dunmore, who was ambitious to make a +fortune in land speculation, organized a second company, the +Wabash (Ouabache) Land Company, with the governor as the chief +share-holder. In response to Murray's petition on behalf of the +Illinois Land Company, Dunmore (May, 1774) recommended it to Lord +Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies, and urged that it +be granted; and in a later letter he disingenuously disclaimed +any personal interest in the Illinois speculation. + +The party of surveyors sent out under the direction of Colonel +William Preston, on the request of Washington and other leading +eastern men, in 1774 located lands covered by military grants on +the Ohio and in the Kentucky area for prominent Virginians, +including Washington, Patrick Henry, William Byrd, William +Preston, Arthur Campbell, William Fleming, and Andrew Lewis, +among others, and also a large tract for Dr. Connolly. Certain of +these grants fell within the Vandalia area; and in his reply +(September 10, 1774) to Dunmore's letter, Lord Dartmouth sternly +censured Dunmore for allowing these grants, and accused the white +settlers of having brought on, by such unwarrantable aggressions, +the war then raging with the Indians. This charge lay at the door +of Dunmore himself; and there is strong evidence that Dunmore +personally fomented the war, ostensibly in support of Virginia's +charter rights, but actually in order to further his own +speculative designs." Dunmore's agent, Dr. Connolly, heading a +party posing as Virginia militia, fired without provocation upon +a delegation of Shawanoe chiefs assembled at Fort Pitt (January, +1774). Taking advantage of the alarming situation created by the +conflict of the claims of Virginia and Pennsylvania, Connolly, +inspired by Dunmore without doubt, then issued an incendiary +circular (April 21, 1774), declaring a state of war to exist. +Just two weeks before the Battle of the Great Kanawha, Patrick +Henry categorically stated, in conversation with Thomas Wharton: + +"that he was at Williamsburg with Ld. D. when Dr. Conolly first +came there, that Conolly is a chatty, sensible man, and informed +Ld. Dunmore of the extreme richness of the lands which lay on +both sides of the Ohio; that the prohibitory orders which had +been sent him relative to the land on the hither side (or +Vandalia) had caused him to turn his thoughts to the opposite +shore, and that as his Lordship was determined to settle his +family in America he was really pursueing this war, in order to +obtain by purchase or treaty from the natives a tract of +territory on that side; he then told me that he was convinced +from every authority that the law knew, that a purchase from the +natives was as full and ample a title as could be obtained, that +they had Lord Camden and Mr. York's opinion on that head, which +opinion with some others that Ld. Dunmore had consulted, and with +the knowledge Conolly had given him of the quality of the country +and his determined resolution to settle his family on this +continent, were the real motives or springs of the present +expedition." + +At this very time, Patrick Henry, in conjunction with William +Byrd 3d and others, was negotiating for a private purchase of +lands from the Cherokees; and when Wharton, after answering +Henry's inquiry as to where he might buy Indian goods, remarked: +"It's not possible you mean to enter the Indian trade at this +period," Henry laughingly replied: "The wish-world is my hobby +horse." "From whence I conclude," adds Wharton, "he has some +prospect of making a purchase of the natives, but where I know +not." + +The war, thus promulgated, we believe, at Dunmore's secret +instigation and heralded by a series of ghastly atrocities, came +on apace. After the inhuman murder of the family of Logan, the +Indian chieftain, by one Greathouse and his drunken companions +(April 30th), Logan, who contrary to romantic views was a +blackhearted and vengeful savage, harried the Tennessee and +Virginia borders, burning and slaughtering. Unable to arouse the +Cherokees, owing to the opposition of Atta-kulla-kulla, Logan as +late as July 21st said in a letter to the whites: "The Indians +are not angry, only myself," and not until then did Dunmore begin +to give full execution to his warlike plans. The best woodsmen of +the border, Daniel Boone and the German scout Michael Stoner, +having been despatched on July 27th by Colonel William Preston to +warn the surveyors of the trans-Alleghany, made a remarkable +journey on foot of eight hundred miles in sixty-one days. +Harrod's company at Harrodsburg, a company of surveyors at +Fontainebleau, Floyd's party on the Kentucky, and the surveyors +at Mann's Lick, this warned, hurried in to the settlements and +were saved. Meanwhile, Dunmore, in command of the Virginia +forces, invaded territory guaranteed to the Indians by the royal +proclamation of 1763 and recently (1774) added to the province of +Quebec, a fact of which he was not aware, conducted a vigorous +campaign, and fortified Camp Charlotte, near Old Chillicothe. +Andrew Lewis, however, in charge of the other division of +Dunmore's army, was the one destined to bear the real brunt and +burden of the campaign. His division, recruited from the very +flower of the pioneers of the Old Southwest, was the most +representative body of borderers of this region that up to this +time had assembled to measure strength with the red men. It was +an army of the true stalwarts of the frontier, with fringed +leggings and hunting-capes, rifles and powder-horns, +hunting-knives and tomahawks. + +The Battle of the Great Kanawha, at Point Pleasant, was fought on +October 10, 1774, between Lewis's force, eleven hundred strong, +and the Indians, under Cornstalk, somewhat inferior in numbers. +It was a desultory action, over a greatly extended front and in +very brushy country between Crooked Creek and the Ohio. +Throughout the long day, the Indians fought with rare craft and +stubborn bravery--loudly cursing the white men, cleverly picking +off their leaders, and derisively inquiring, in regard to the +absence of the fifes: "Where are your whistles now?" Slowly +retreating, they sought to draw the whites into an ambuscade and +at a favorable moment to "drive the Long Knives like bullocks +into the river." No marked success was achieved on either side +until near sunset, when a flank movement directed by young Isaac +Shelby alarmed the Indians, who mistook this party for the +expected reinforcement under Christian, and retired across the +Ohio. In the morning the whites were amazed to discover that the +Indians, who the preceding day so splendidly heeded the echoing +call of Cornstalk, "Be strong! Be strong!", had quit the +battlefield and left the victory with the whites. + +The peace negotiated by Dunmore was durable. The governor had +accomplished his purpose, defied the authority of the crown, and +vindicated the claim of Virginia, to the enthusiastic +satisfaction of the backwoodsmen. While tendering their thanks to +him and avowing their allegiance to George III, at the close of +the campaign, the borderers proclaimed their resolution to exert +all their powers "for the defense of American liberty, and for +the support of her just rights and privileges, not in any +precipitous, riotous or tumultuous manner, but when regularly +called forth by the unanimous voice of our countrymen." Dunmore's +War is epochal, in that it procured for the nonce a state of +peace with the Indians, which made possible the advance of Judge +Henderson over the Transylvania Trail in 1775, and, through his +establishment of the Transylvania Fort at Boonesborough, the +ultimate acquisition by the American Confederation of the +imperial domain of the trans-Alleghany. + + + +CHAPTER XIV. Richard Henderson and the Transylvania Company + +I happened to fall in company, and have a great deal of +conversation with one of the most singular and extraordinary +persons and excentric geniuses in America, and perhaps in the +world. His name is Richard Henderson.--J. F. D. Smyth: A Tour in +the United States of America. + + +Early in 1774, chastened by his own disastrous failure the +preceding autumn, Boone advised Judge Henderson that the time was +auspicious for opening negotiations with the Cherokees for +purchasing the trans-Alleghany region." In organizing a company +for this purpose, Henderson chose men of action and resource, +leaders in the colony, ready for any hazard of life and fortune +in this gigantic scheme of colonization and promotion. The new +men included, in addition to the partners in the organization +known as Richard Henderson and Company, were Colonel John +Luttrell, destined to win laurels in the Revolution, and William +Johnston, a native of Scotland, the leading merchant of +Hillsborough. + +Meeting in Hillsborough on August 27, 1774, these men organized +the new company under the name of the Louisa Company. In the +articles then drawn up they agreed to "rent or purchase" a tract +of land from the Indian owners of the soil for the express +purpose of "settling the country." Each partner obligated himself +to "furnish his Quota of Expenses necessary towards procuring the +grant." In full anticipation of the grave dangers to be +encountered, they solemnly bound themselves, as "equal sharers in +the property," to "support each other with our lives and +fortunes." Negotiations with the Indians were begun at once. +Accompanied by Colonel Nathaniel Hart and guided by the +experienced Indian-trader, Thomas Price, Judge Henderson visited +the Cherokee chieftains at the Otari towns. After elaborate +consultations, the latter deputed the old chieftain, +Atta-kulla-kulla, a young buck, and a squaw, "to attend the said +Henderson and Hart to North Carolina, and there examine the Goods +and Merchandize which had been by them offered as the +Consideration of the purchase." The goods purchased at Cross +Creek (now Fayetteville, North Carolina), in which the Louisa +Company "had embarked a large amount," met the entire approval of +the Indians--the squaw in particular shrewdly examining the goods +in the interest of the women of the tribe. + +On January 6, 1775, the company was again enlarged, and given the +name of the Transylvania Company-the three new partners being +David Hart, brother to Thomas and Nathaniel, Leonard Henley +Bullock, a prominent citizen of Granville, and James Hogg, of +Hillsborough, a native Scotchman and one of the most influential +men in the colony. In the elaborate agreement drawn up reference +is explicitly made to the contingency of "settling and voting as +a proprietor and giving Rules and Regulations for the Inhabitants +etc." Hillsborough was the actual starting-point for the westward +movement, the first emigrants, traveling thence to the Sycamore +Shoals of the Watauga. In speaking of the departure of the +settlers, the first movement of extended and permanent westward +migration, an eye-witness quaintly says: "At this place +[Hillsborough] I saw the first party of emigrant families that +moved to Kentucky under the auspices of Judge Henderson. They +marched out of the town with considerable solemnity, and to many +their destination seemed as remote as if it had been to the South +Sea Islands." Meanwhile, the "Proposals for the encouragement of +settling the lands etc.," issued on Christmas Day, 1774, were +quickly spread broadcast through the colony and along the +border." It was the greatest sensation North Carolina had known +since Alamance; and Archibald Neilson, deputy-auditor and naval +officer of the colony, inquired with quizzical anxiety: "Pray, is +Dick Henderson out of his head?" The most liberal terms, +proffered by one quite in possession of his head, were embodied +in these proposals. Land at twenty shillings per hundred acres +was offered to each emigrant settling within the territory and +raising a crop of corn before September 1, 1775, the emigrant +being permitted to take up as much as five hundred acres for him +self and two hundred and fifty acres for each tithable person +under him. In these "Proposals" there was no indication that the +low terms at which the lands were offered would be maintained +after September 1, 1775. In a letter to Governor Dunmore +(January, 1775), Colonel William Preston, county surveyor of +Fincastle County, Virginia, says "The low price he [Henderson] +proposes to sell at, together with some further encouragement he +offers, will I am apprehensive induce a great many families to +remove from this County (Fincastle) & Carolina and settle there." +Joseph Martin, states his son, "was appointed entry-Taker and +agent for the Powell Valley portion" of the Transylvania Purchase +on January 20, 1775; and "he (Joseph Martin) and others went on +in the early part of the year 1775 and made their stand at the +very spot where he had made corn several years before. In +speaking of the startling design, unmasked by Henderson, of +establishing an independent government, Colonel Preston writes to +George Washington of the contemplated "large Purchase by one Col. +Henderson of North Carolina from the Cherokees.... I hear +that Henderson talks with great Freedom & Indecency of the +Governor of Virginia, sets the Government at Defiance & says if +he once had five hundred good Fellows settled in that Country he +would not Value Virginia." + +Early in 1775 runners were sent off to the Cherokee towns to +summon the Indians to the treaty ground at the Sycamore Shoals of +the Watauga; and Boone, after his return from a hunt in Kentucky +in January, was summoned by Judge Henderson to aid in the +negotiations preliminary to the actual treaty. The dominating +figure in the remarkable assemblage at the treaty ground, +consisting of twelve hundred Indians and several hundred whites, +was Richard Henderson, "comely in person, of a benign and social +disposition," with countenance betokening the man of strenuous +action" noble forehead, prominent nose, projecting chin, firm-set +jaw, with kindness and openness of expression." Gathered about +him, picturesque in garb and striking in appearance, were many of +the buckskin-clad leaders of the border--James Robertson, John +Sevier, Isaac Shelby, William Bailey Smith, and their +compeers--as well as his Carolina friends John Williams, Thomas +and Nathaniel Hart, Nathaniel Henderson, Jesse Benton, and +Valentine Searcy. + +Little was accomplished on the first day of the treaty (March +14th); but on the next day, the Cherokees offered to sell the +section bargained for by Donelson acting as agent for Virginia in +1771. Although the Indians pointed out that Virginia had never +paid the promised compensation of five hundred pounds and had +therefore forfeited her rights, Henderson flatly refused to +entertain the idea of purchasing territory to which Virginia had +the prior claim. Angered by Henderson's refusal, The Dragging +Canoe, leaping into the circle of the seated savages, made an +impassioned speech touched with the romantic imagination peculiar +to the American Indian. With pathetic eloquence he dwelt upon the +insatiable land-greed of the white men, and predicted the +extinction of his race if they committed the insensate folly of +selling their beloved hunting-grounds. Roused to a high pitch of +oratorical fervor, the savage with uplifted arm fiercely exhorted +his people to resist further encroachments at all hazards--and +left the treaty ground. This incident brought the conference to a +startling and abrupt conclusion. On the following day, however, +the savages proved more tractable, agreeing to sell the land as +far as the Cumberland River. In order to secure the additional +territory watered by the tributaries of the Cumberland, Henderson +agreed to pay an additional sum of two thousand pounds. Upon this +day there originated the ominous phrase descriptive of Kentucky +when The Dragging Canoe, dramatically pointing toward the west, +declared that a DARK Cloud hung over that land, which was known +as the BLOODY GROUND. + +On the last day, March 17th, the negotiations were opened with +the signing of the "Great Grant." The area purchased, some twenty +millions of acres, included almost all the present state of +Kentucky, and an immense tract in Tennessee, comprising all the +territory watered by the Cumberland River and all its +tributaries. For "two thousand weight of leather in goods" +Henderson purchased "the lands lying down Holston and between the +Watauga lease, Colonel Donelson's line and Powell's Mountain" as +a pathway to Kentucky--the deed for which was known as the "Path +Deed." By special arrangement, Carter's Valley in this tract went +to Carter and Lucas; two days later, for two thousand pounds, +Charles Robertson on behalf of the Watauga Association purchased +a large tract in the valleys of the Holston, Watauga, and New +Rivers; and eight days later Jacob Brown purchased two large +areas, including the Nolichucky Valley. This historic treaty, +which heralds the opening of the West, was conducted with +absolute justice and fairness by Judge Henderson and his +associates. No liquor was permitted at the treaty ground; and +Thomas Price, the ablest of the Cherokee traders, deposed that +"he at that time understood the Cherokee language, so as to +comprehend everything which was said and to know that what was +observed on either side was fairly and truly translated; that the +Cherokees perfectly understood, what Lands were the subject of +the Treaty...." The amount paid by the Transylvania Company +for the imperial domain was ten thousand pounds sterling, in +money and in goods. + +Although Daniel Boone doubtless assisted in the proceedings prior +to the negotiation of the treaty, his name nowhere appears in the +voluminous records of the conference. Indeed, he was not then +present; for a fortnight before the conclusion of the treaty he +was commissioned by Judge Henderson to form a party of competent +woodmen to blaze a passage through the wilderness. On March 10th +this party of thirty ax-men, under the leadership of Boone, +started from the rendezvous, the Long Island of Holston, to +engage in the arduous labor of cutting out the Transylvania +Trail. + +Henderson, the empire-builder, now faced with courage and +resolution the hazardous task of occupying the purchased +territory and establishing an independent government. No mere +financial promoter of a vast speculative enterprise, he was one +of the heroic figures of the Old Southwest; and it was his +dauntless courage, his unwavering resolve to go forward in the +face of all dangers, which carried through the armed "trek" to a +successful conclusion. At Martin's Station, where Henderson and +his party tarried to build a house in which to store their +wagons, as the road could be cleared no further, they were joined +by another party, of five adventurers from Prince William County, +Virginia." In Henderson's party were some forty men and boys, +with forty packhorses and a small amount of powder, lead, salt, +and garden-seeds. The warning freely given by Joseph Martin of +the perils of the path was soon confirmed, as appears from the +following entry in Henderson's diary: + +"Friday the 7th. [April] About Brake of Day began to snow. About +11 O'Clock received a letter from Mr. Luttrells camp that were +five persons killd on the road to the Cantuckie by Indians. Capt. +[Nathaniel] Hart, uppon the receipt of this News Retreated back +with his Company, & determined to Settle in the Valley to make +Corn for the Cantucky people. The same Day Received a Letter from +Dan. Boone, that his Company was fired uppon by Indians, Kill'd +Two of his men--tho he kept the ground & saved the Baggage &c." + +The following historic letter, which reveals alike the dogged +resolution of Boone and his reliance upon Henderson and his +company in this black hour of disaster, addressed "Colonel +Richard Henderson--these with care," is eloquent in its +simplicity + + +"Dear Colonel: After my compliments to you, I shall acquaint you +of our misfortunes. On March the 25 a party of Indians fired on +my Company about half an hour before day, and killed Mr. Twitty +and his negro, and wounded Mr. Walker very deeply, but I hope he +will recover. + +"On March the 28 as we were hunting for provisions, we found +Samuel Tate's son, who gave us an account that the Indians fired +on their camp on the 27th day. My brother and I went down and +found two men killed and sculped, Thomas McDowell and Jeremiah +McFeters. I have sent a man down to all the lower companies in +order to gather them all at the mouth of Otter Creek. + +"My advice to you, Sir, is to come or send as soon as possible. +Your company is desired greatly, for the people are very uneasy, +but are willing to stay and venture their lives with you, and now +is the time to flusterate their [the Indians'] intentions, and +keep the country, whilst we are in it. If we give way to them +now, it will ever be the case. This day we start from the battle +ground, for the mouth of Otter Creek, where we shall immediately +erect a Fort, which will be done before you can come or send, +then we can send ten men to meet you, if you send for them. + +"I am, Sir, your most obedient + Omble Sarvent +Daniel Boone. + +"N.B. We stood on the ground and guarded our baggage till day, +and lost nothing. We have about fifteen miles to Cantuck +[Kentucky River] at Otter Creek." + + +This dread intelligence caused the hearts of strong men to quail +and induced some to turn back, but Henderson, the jurist-pioneer, +was made of sterner stuff. At once (April 8th) he despatched an +urgent letter in hot haste to the proprietors of Transylvania, +enclosing Boone's letter, informing them of Boone's plight and +urging them to send him immediately a large quantity of powder +and lead, as he had been compelled to abandon his supply of +saltpeter at Martin's Station. "We are all in high spirits," he +assures the proprietors, "and on thorns to fly to Boone's +assistance, and join him in defense of so fine and valuable a +country." + +Laconically eloquent is this simple entry in his diary: "Saturday +the 8th. Started abt. 10 oClock Crossed Cumberland Gap about 4 +miles met about 40 persons Returning from the Cantucky, on Acct. +of the Late Murders by the Indians could prevail on one only to +return. Memo Several Virginians who were with us return'd." + +There is no more crucial moment in early Western history than +this, in which we see the towering form of Henderson, clad in the +picturesque garb of the pioneer, with outstretched arm resolutely +pointing forward to the "dark and bloody ground," and in +impassioned but futile eloquence pleading with the pale and +panic-stricken fugitives to turn about, to join his company, and +to face once more the mortal dangers of pioneer conquest. +Significant indeed are the lines: + + Some to endure, and many to fail, + Some to conquer, and many to quail, + Toiling over the Wilderness Trail. + +The spirit of the pioneer knight-errant inspires Henderson's +words: "In this situation, some few, of genuine courage and +undaunted resolution, served to inspire the rest; by the help of +whose example, assisted by a little pride and some ostentation, +we made a shift to march on with all the appearance of gallantry, +and, cavalier like, treated every insinuation of danger with the +utmost contempt." + +Fearing that Boone, who did not even know that Henderson's +cavalcade was on the road, would be unable to hold out, Henderson +realized the imperative necessity for sending him a message of +encouragement. The bold young Virginian, William Cocke, +volunteered to brave alone the dangers of the murder-haunted +trail to undertake a ride more truly memorable and hazardous than +that of Revere. "This offer, extraordinary as it was, we could by +no means refuse," remarks Henderson, who shed tears of gratitude +as he proffered his sincere thanks and wrung the brave +messenger's hand. Equipped with "a good Queen Anne's musket, +plenty of ammunition, a tomahawk, a large cuttoe knife [French, +couteau], a Dutch blanket, and no small quantity of jerked beef," +Cocke on April 10th rode off "to the Cantuckey to Inform Capt +Boone that we were on the road." The fearful apprehensions felt +for Cocke's safety were later relieved, when along the road were +discovered his letters in forming Henderson of his arrival and of +his having been joined on the way by Page Portwood of Rowan. On +his arrival at Otter Creek, Cocke found Boone and his men, and on +relating his adventures, "came in for his share of applause." +Boone at once despatched the master woodman, Michael Stoner, with +pack-horses to assist Henderson's party, which he met on April +18th at their encampment "in the Eye of the Rich Land." Along +with "Excellent Beef in plenty," Stoner brought the story of +Boone's determined stand and an account of the erection of a rude +little fortification which they had hurriedly thrown up to resist +attack. With laconic significance Henderson pays the following +tribute to Boone which deserves to be perpetuated in national +annals: "It was owing to Boone's confidence in us, and the +people's in him, that a stand was ever attempted in order to wait +for our coming." + +In the course of their journey over the mountains and through the +wilderness, the pioneers forgot the trials of the trail in the +face of the surpassing beauties of the country. The Cumberlands +were covered with rich undergrowth of the red and white +rhododendron, the delicate laurel, the mountain ivy, the +flameazalea, the spicewood, and the cane; while the white stars +of the dogwood and the carmine blossoms of the red-bud, strewn +across the verdant background of the forest, gleamed in the eager +air of spring. "To enter uppon a detail of the Beuty & Goodness +of our Country," writes Nathaniel Henderson, "would be a task too +arduous.... Let it suffice to tell you it far exceeds any +country I ever saw or herd off. I am conscious its out of the +power of any man to make you clearly sensible of the great Beuty +and Richness of Kentucky." Young Felix Walker, endowed with more +vivid powers of description, says with a touch of native +eloquence: + +"Perhaps no Adventurer Since the days of donquicksotte or before +ever felt So Cheerful & Ilated in prospect, every heart abounded +with Joy & excitement ... & exclusive of the Novelties of the +Journey the advantages & accumalations arising on the Settlement +of a new Country was a dazzling object with many of our Company.... +As the Cain ceased, we began to discover the pleasing & +Rapturous appearance of the plains of Kentucky, a New Sky & +Strange Earth to be presented to our view.... So Rich a Soil +we had never Saw before, Covered with Clover in full Bloom. the +Woods alive abounding in wild Game, turkeys so numerous that it +might be said there appeared but one flock Universally Scattered +in the woods ... it appeared that Nature in the profusion of +her Bounties, had Spread a feast for all that lives, both for the +Animal & Rational World, a Sight so delightful to our View and +grateful to our feelings almost Induced us, in Immitation of +Columbus in Transport to Kiss the Soil of Kentucky, as he haild & +Saluted the sand on his first setting his foot on the Shores of +America." + +On the journey Henderson was joined in Powell's Valley by +Benjamin Logan, afterward so famous in Kentucky annals, and a +companion, William Galaspy. At the Crab Orchard they left +Henderson's party; and turning their course westward finally +pitched camp in the present Lincoln County, where Logan +subsequently built a fort. On Sunday, April 16th, on Scaggs's +Creek, Henderson records: "About 12 oClock Met James McAfee with +18 other persons Returning from Cantucky." They advised Henderson +of the "troublesomeness and danger" of the Indians, says Robert +McAfee junior: "but Henderson assured them that he had purchased +the whole country from the Indians, that it belonged to him, and +he had named it Transylvania.... Robt, Samuel, and William +McAfee and 3 others were inclined to return, but James opposed +it, alleging that Henderson had no right to the land, and that +Virginia had previously bought it. The former (6) returned with +Henderson to Boonesborough." Among those who had joined +Henderson's party was Abraham Hanks from Virginia, the maternal +grandfather of Abraham Lincoln; but alarmed by the stories +brought by Stewart and his party of fugitives, Hanks and Drake, +as recorded by William Calk on that day (April 13th), turned +back. + +At last the founder of Kentucky with his little band reached the +destined goal of their arduous journeyings. Henderson's record on +his birthday runs: "Thursday the 20th [April] Arrived at Fort +Boone on the Mouth of Oter Creek Cantuckey River where we were +Saluted by a running fire of about 25 Guns; all that was then at +Fort.... The men appeared in high spirits & much rejoiced in +our arrival." It is a coincidence of historic interest that just +one day after the embattled farmers at Lexington and Concord +"fired the shots heard round the world," the echoing shots of +Boone and his sturdy backwoodsmen rang out to announce the +arrival of the proprietor of Transylvania and the birth of the +American West. + + + +CHAPTER XV. Transylvania--A wilderness Commonwealth + +You are about a work of the utmost importance to the well-being +of this country in general, in which the interest and security of +each and every individual are inseparably connected .... Our +peculiar circumstances in this remote country, surrounded on all +sides with difficulties, and equally subject to one common +danger, which threatens our common overthrow, must, I think, in +their effects, secure to us an union of interests, and, +consequently, that harmony in opinion, so essential to the +forming good, wise and wholesome laws.--Judge Richard Henderson: +Address to the Legislature of Transylvania, May 23, 1775. + + +The independent spirit displayed by the Transylvania Company, and +Henderson's procedure in open defiance of the royal governors of +both North Carolina and Virginia, naturally aroused grave alarm +throughout these colonies and South Carolina. "This in my +Opinion," says Preston in a letter to George Washington (January +31, 1775), "will soon become a serious Affair, & highly deserves +the Attention of the Government. For it is certain that a vast +Number of People are preparing to go out and settle on this +Purchase; and if once they get fixed there, it will be next to +impossible to remove them or reduce them to Obedience; as they +are so far from the Seat of Government. Indeed it may be the +Cherokees will support them." Governor Martin of North Carolina, +already deeply disturbed in anticipation of the coming +revolutionary cataclysm, thundered in what was generally regarded +as a forcible-feeble proclamation (February 19, 1775) against +"Richard Henderson and his Confederates" in their "daring, unjust +and unwarrantable proceedings." In a letter to Dartmouth he +denounces "Henderson the famous invader" and dubs the +Transylvania Company "an infamous Company of land Pyrates." + +Officials who were themselves eager for land naturally opposed +Henderson's plans. Lord Dunmore, who in 1774, as we have seen, +was heavily interested in the Wabash Land Company engineered by +William Murray, took the ground that the Wabash purchase was +valid under the Camden-Yorke decision. This is so stated in the +records of the Illinois Company. Likewise under Murray's control. +But although the "Ouabache Company," of which Dunmore was a +leading member, was initiated as early as May 16, 1774, the +purchase of the territory was not formally effected until October +18, 1775--too late to benefit Dunmore, then deeply embroiled in +the preliminaries to the Revolution. Under the cover of his +agent's name, it is believed, Dunmore, with his "passion for land +and fees," illegally entered tracts aggregating thousands of +acres of land surveyed by the royal surveyors in the summer of +1774 for Dr. John Connolly. Early in this same year, Patrick +Henry, who, as already pointed out, had entered large tracts in +Kentucky in violation of Virginia's treaty obligations with the +Cherokees, united with William Byrd 3d, John Page, Ralph Wormley, +Samuel Overton, and William Christian, in the effort to purchase +from the Cherokees a tract of land west of Donelson's line, being +firmly persuaded of the validity of the Camden-Yorke opinion. +Their agent, William Kenedy, considerably later in the year, went +on a mission to the Cherokee towns, and upon his return reported +that the Indians might be induced to sell. When it became known +that Judge Henderson had organized the Transylvania Company and +anticipated Patrick Henry and his associates, Colonel Arthur +Campbell, as he himself states, applied to several of the +partners of the Transylvania Company on behalf of Patrick Henry, +requesting that Henry be taken in as a partner. It was afterward +stated, as commonly understood among the Transylvania +proprietors, that both Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson desired +to become members of the company; but that Colonel Richard +Henderson was instrumental in preventing their admission "lest +they should supplant the Colonel [Henderson] as the guiding +spirit of the company." + +Fully informed by Preston's elaborate communication on the +gravity of the situation, Dunmore acted energetically, though +tardily, to prevent the execution of Henderson's designs. On +March 21st Dunmore sent flying through the back country a +proclamation, demanding the immediate relinquishment of the +territory by "one Richard Henderson and other disorderly persons, +his associates," and "in case of refusal, and of violently +detaining such possession, that he or they be immediately fined +and imprisoned. This proclamation, says a peppery old chronicler, +may well rank with the one excepting those arch traitors and +rebels, Samuel Adams and John Hancock, from the mercy of the +British monarch. In view of Dunmore's confidence in the validity +of the Camden-Yorke decision, it is noteworthy that no mention of +the royal proclamation of 1763 occurs in his broadside; and that +he bases his objection to the Transylvania purchase upon the +king's instructions that all vacant lands "within this colony" be +laid off in tracts, from one hundred to one thousand acres in +extent, and sold at public auction. This proclamation which was +enclosed, oddly enough, in a letter of official instructions to +Preston warning him not to survey any lands "beyond the line run +by Colonel Donaldson," proved utterly ineffective. At the same +time, Dunmore despatched a pointed letter to Oconostota, +Atta-kulla-kulla, Judge's Friend, and other Cherokee chieftains, +notifying them that the sale of the great tract of land below the +Kentucky was illegal and threatening them with the king's +displeasure if they did not repudiate the sale. + +News of the plans which Henderson had already matured for +establishing an independent colony in the trans-Alleghany +wilderness, now ran like wild-fire through Virginia. In a letter +to George Washington (April 9, 1775), Preston ruefully says: +"Henderson I hear has made the Purchase & got a Conveyance of the +great and Valluable Country below the Kentucky from the +Cherokees. He and about 300 adventurers are gone out to take +Possession, who it is said intends to set up an independent +Government & form a Code of Laws for themselves. How this may be +I cant say, but I am affraid the steps taken by the Government +have been too late. Before the Purchase was made had the Governor +interfered it is believed the Indians would not have sold." + +Meanwhile Judge Henderson, with strenuous energy, had begun to +erect a large stockaded fort according to plans of his own. +Captain James Harrod with forty-two men was stationed at the +settlement he had made the preceding year, having arrived there +before the McAfees started back to Virginia; and there were small +groups of settlers at Boiling Spring, six miles southeast of +Harrods settlement, and at St. Asaph's, a mile west of the +present Stanford. A representative government for Transylvania +was then planned. When the frank and gallant Floyd arrived at the +Transylvania Fort on May 3d, he "expressed great satisfaction," +says Judge Henderson, "on being informed of the plan we proposed +for Legislation & sayd he must most heartily concur in that & +every other measure we should adopt for the well Govern'g or good +of the Community in Gen'l." In reference to a conversation with +Captain James Harrod and Colonel Thomas Slaughter of Virginia, +Henderson notes in his diary (May 8th): "Our plan of Legislation, +the evils pointed out--the remedies to be applyed &c &c &c were +Acceeded to without Hesitation. The plann was plain & Simple--'twas +nothing novel in its essence a thousand years ago it was +in use, and found by every year's experience since to be +unexceptionable. We were in four distinct settlem'ts. Members or +delegates from every place by free choice of Individuals they +first having entered into writings solemnly binding themselves to +obey and carry into Execution Such Laws as representatives should +from time to time make, Concurred with, by A Majority of the +Proprietors present in the Country." + +In reply to inquiries of the settlers, Judge Henderson gave as +his reason for this assembling of a Transylvania Legislature that +"all power was derived from the people." Six days before the +prophetic arrival of the news of the Battle of Lexington and +eight days before the revolutionary committee of Mecklenburg +County, North Carolina, promulgated their memorable Resolves +establishing laws for independent government, the pioneers +assembled on the green beneath the mighty plane-tree at the +Transylvania Fort. In his wise and statesmanlike address to this +picturesque convention of free Americans (May 23, 1775), an +address which Felix Walker described as being "considered equal +to any of like kind ever delivered to any deliberate body in that +day and time," Judge Henderson used these memorable words: + +"You, perhaps, are fixing the palladium, or placing the first +corner stone of an edifice, the height and magnificence of whose +superstructure ... can only become great in proportion to the +excellence of its foundation.... If any doubt remain amongst +you with respect to the force or efficiency of whatever laws you +now, or hereafter make, be pleased to consider that ALL POWER IS +ORIGINALLY IN THE PEOPLE; MAKE AND THEIR INTEREST, THEREFORE, BY +IMPARTIAL AND BENEFICENT LAWS, AND YOU MAY BE SURE OF THEIR +INCLINATION TO SEE THEM ENFORCED." + +An early writer, in speaking of the full blooded democracy of +these "advanced" sentiments, quaintly comments: "If Jeremy +Bentham had been in existence of manhood, he would have sent his +compliments to the President of Transylvania." This, the first +representative body of American freemen which ever convened west +of the Alleghanies, is surely the most unique colonial government +ever set up on this continent. The proceedings of this backwoods +legislature--the democratic leader ship of the principal +proprietor; the prudence exhibited in the laws for protecting +game, breeding horses, etc.; the tolerance shown in the granting +of full religious liberty--all display the acumen and practical +wisdom of these pioneer law-givers. As the result of Henderson's +tactfulness, the proprietary form of government, thoroughly +democratized in tone, was complacently accepted by the backwoods +men. From one who, though still under royal rule, vehemently +asserted that the source of all political power was the people, +and that "laws derive force and efficiency from our mutual +consent," Western democracy thus born in the wilderness was +"taking its first political lesson." In their answer to +Henderson's assertion of freedom from alien authority the +pioneers unhesitatingly declared: "That we have an absolute +right, as a political body, without giving umbrage to Great +Britain, or any of the colonies, to form rules for the government +of our little society, cannot be doubted by any sensible mind and +being without the jurisdiction of, and not answerable to any of +his Majesty's courts, the constituting tribunals of justice shall +be a matter of our first contemplation...." In the +establishment of a constitution for the new colony, Henderson +with paternalistic wisdom induced the people to adopt a legal +code based on the laws of England. Out of a sense of +self-protection he reserved for the proprietors only one +prerogative not granted them by the people, the right of veto. He +clearly realized that if this power were given up, the delegates +to any convention that might be held after the first would be +able to assume the claims and rights of the proprietors. + +A land-office was formally opened, deeds were issued, and a store +was established which supplied the colonists with powder, lead, +salt, osnaburgs, blankets, and other chief necessities of pioneer +existence. Writing to his brother Jonathan from Leestown, the +bold young George Rogers Clark, soon to plot the downfall of +Transylvania, enthusiastically says (July 6, 1775): "A richer and +more Beautifull Cuntry than this I believe has never been seen in +America yet. Col. Henderson is hear and Claims all ye Country +below Kentucke. If his Claim Should be good, land may be got +Reasonable Enough and as good as any in ye World." Those who +settled on the south side of Kentucky River acknowledged the +validity of the Transylvania purchase; and Clark in his Memoir +says: "the Proprietors at first took great pains to Ingratiate +themselves in the fav'r of the people." + +In regard to the designs of Lord Dunmore, who, as noted above, +had illegally entered the Connolly grant on the Ohio and sought +to outlaw Henderson, and of Colonel William Byrd 3d, who, after +being balked in Patrick Henry's plan to anticipate the +Transylvania Company in effecting a purchase from the Cherokees, +was supposed to have tried to persuade the Cherokees to repudiate +the "Great Treaty," Henderson defiantly says: "Whether Lord +Dunmore and Colonel Byrd have interfered with the Indians or not, +Richard Henderson is equally ignorant and indifferent. The utmost +result of their efforts can only serve to convince them of the +futility of their schemes and possibly frighten some few +faint-hearted persons, naturally prone to reverence great names +and fancy everything must shrink at the magic of a splendid +title." + +Prompted by Henderson's desire to petition the Continental +Congress then in session for recognition as the fourteenth +colony, the Transylvania legislature met again on the first +Thursday in September and elected Richard Henderson and John +Williams, among others, as delegates to the gathering at +Philadelphia. Shortly afterward the Proprietors of Transylvania +held a meeting at Oxford, North Carolina (September 25, 1775), +elected Williams as the agent of the colony, and directed him to +proceed to Boonesborough there to reside until April, 1776. James +Hogg, of Hillsborough, chosen as Delegate to represent the Colony +in the Continental Congress, was despatched to Philadelphia, +bearing with him an elaborate memorial prepared by the President, +Judge Henderson, petitioning the Congress "to take the infant +Colony of Transylvania into their protection." + +Almost immediately upon his arrival in Philadelphia, James Hogg +was presented to "the famous Samuel and John Adams." The latter +warned Hogg, in view of the efforts then making toward +reconciliation between the colonies and the king, that "the +taking under our protection a body of people who have acted in +defiance of the King's proclamation, will be looked on as a +confirmation of that independent spirit with which we are daily +reproached." Jefferson said that if his advice were followed, all +the use the Virginians should make of their charter would be "to +prevent any arbitrary or oppressive government to be established +within the boundaries of it"; and that it was his wish "to see a +free government established at the back of theirs [Virginia's] +properly united with them." He would not consent, however, that +Congress should acknowledge the colony of Transylvania, until it +had the approbation of the Virginia Convention. The quit-rents +imposed by the company were denounced in Congress as a mark of +vassalage; and many advised a law against the employment of +negroes in the colony. "They even threatened us with their +opposition," says Hogg, with precise veracity, "if we do not act +upon liberal principles when we have it so much in our power to +render ourselves immortal." + + + +CHAPTER XVI. The Repulse of the Red Men + +To this short war may be properly attributed all the kind +feelings and fidelity to treaty stipulations manifested by the +Cherokees ever afterwards. General Rutherford instilled into the +Indians so great a fear of the whites, that never afterwards were +they disposed to engage in any cruelty, or destroy any of the +property of our frontier men.--David L. Swain: The Indian War of +1776. + + +During the summer of 1775 the proprietors of Transylvania were +confronted with two stupendous tasks--that of winning the favor +and support of the frontiersmen and that of rallying the rapidly +dwindling forces in Kentucky in defense of the settlements. +Recognizing the difficulty of including Martin's Station, because +of its remoteness, with the government provided for Transylvania, +Judge Henderson prepared a plan of government for the group of +settlers located in Powell's Valley. In a letter to Martin (July +30th), in regard to the recent energetic defense of the settlers +at that point against the Indians, Henderson says: "Your spirited +conduct gives me much pleasure.... Keep your men in heart if +possible, NOW IS OUR TIME, THE INDIANS MUST NOT DRIVE US." The +gloom which had been occasioned by the almost complete desertion +of the stations at Harrodsburg, the Boiling Spring, and the +Transylvania Fort or Boonesborough was dispelled with the return +of Boone, accompanied by some thirty persons, on September 8th, +and of Richard Callaway with a considerable party on September +26th. The crisis was now passed; and the colony began for the +first time really to flourish. The people on the south side of +the Kentucky River universally accepted proprietary rule for the +time being. But the seeds of dissension were soon to be sown +among those who settled north of the river, as well as among men +of the stamp of James Harrod, who, having preceded Henderson in +the establishment of a settlement in Kentucky, naturally resented +holding lands under the Transylvania Company. + +The great liberality of this organization toward incoming +settlers had resulted in immense quantities of land being taken +up through their land-office. The ranging, hunting, and +road-building were paid for by the company; and the entire +settlement was furnished with powder, lead, and supplies, wholly +on credit, for this and the succeeding year. "Five hundred and +sixty thousand acres of land are now entered," reports Floyd on +December 1st, "and most of the people waiting to have it run +out." After Dunmore, having lost his hold upon the situation, +escaped to the protection of a British vessel, the Fowey, Colonel +Preston continued to prevent surveys for officers' grants within +the Transylvania territory; and his original hostility to Judge +Henderson gave place to friendship and support. On December 1st, +Colonel John Williams, resident agent of the Transylvania +Company, announced at Boonesborough the long-contemplated and +widely advertised advance in price of the lands, from twenty to +fifty shillings per hundred acres, with surveying fees of four +dollars for tracts not exceeding six hundred and forty acres. At +a meeting of the Transylvania legislature, convened on December +21st, John Floyd was chosen surveyor general of the colony, +Nathaniel Henderson was placed in charge of the Entering Office, +and Richard Harrison given the post of secretary. At this meeting +of the legislature, the first open expression of discontent was +voiced in the "Harrodsburg Remonstrance," questioning the +validity of the proprietors' title, and protesting against any +increase in the price of lands, as well as the taking up by the +proprietors and a few other gentlemen of the best lands at the +Falls of the Ohio. Every effort was made to accommodate the +remonstrants, who were led by Abraham Hite. Office fees were +abolished, and the payment of quit-rents was deferred until +January 1, 1780. Despite these efforts at accommodation, grave +doubts were implanted by this Harrodsburg Remonstrance in the +minds of the people; and much discussion and discontent ensued. + +By midsummer, 1775, George Rogers Clark, a remarkably +enterprising and independent young pioneer, was "engrossing all +the land he could" in Kentucky. Upon his return to Virginia, as +he relates, he "found there was various oppinions Respecting +Henderson claim. many thought it good, others douted whether or +not Virginia coud with propriety have any pretentions to the +cuntrey." Jefferson displayed a liberal attitude toward the +claims of the Transylvania proprietors; and Patrick Henry openly +stated that, in his opinion, "their claim would stand good." But +many others, of the stamp of George Mason and George Washington, +vigorously asserted Virginia's charter rights over the Western +territory." This sharp difference of opinion excited in Clark's +mind the bold conception of seizing the leadership of the country +and making terms with Virginia under threat of secession. With +the design of effecting some final disposition in regard to the +title of the Transylvania proprietors, Judge Henderson and +Colonel Williams set off from Boonesborough about May 1st, +intending first to appeal to the Virginia Convention and +ultimately to lay their claims before the Continental Congress. +"Since they have gone," reports Floyd to Preston, "I am told most +of the men about Harrodsburg have re-assumed their former +resolution of not complying with any of the office rules +whatever. Jack Jones, it is said, is at the head of the party & +flourishes away prodigiously." John Gabriel Jones was the mere +figurehead in the revolt. The real leader, the brains of the +conspiracy, was the unscrupulous George Rogers Clark. At Clark's +instance, an eight-day election was held at Harrodsburg (June +7-15), at which time a petition to the Virginia Convention was +drawn up; and Clark and Jones were elected delegates. Clark's +plan, the scheme of a bold revolutionist, was to treat with +Virginia for terms; and if they were not satisfactory, to revolt +and, as he says, "Establish an Independent Government" ... +"giving away great part of the Lands and disposing of the +Remainder." In a second petition, prepared by the self-styled +"Committee of West Fincastle" (June 20th), it was alleged that +"if these pretended Proprietors have leave to continue to act in +their arbitrary manner out the controul of this colony [Virginia] +the end must be evident to every well wisher to American +Liberty." + +The contest which now ensued between Richard Henderson and George +Rogers Clark, waged upon the floor of the convention and behind +the scenes, resulted in a conclusion that was inevitable at a +moment in American history marked by the signing of the +Declaration of Independence. Virginia, under the leader ship of +her new governor, Patrick Henry, put an end to the proprietary +rule of the Transylvania Company. On December 7th such part of +Transylvania as lay within the chartered limits of Virginia was +erected by the legislature of that colony into the County of +Kentucky. The proprietary form of government with its "marks of +vassalage," although liberalized with the spirit of democracy, +was unendurable to the independent and lawless pioneers, already +intoxicated with the spirit of freedom swept in on the first +fresh breezes of the Revolution. Yet it is not to be doubted that +the Transylvania Company, through the courage and moral influence +of its leaders, made a permanent contribution to the colonization +of the West, which, in providential timeliness and effective +execution, is without parallel in our early annals. + +While events were thus shaping themselves in Kentucky--events +which made possible Clark's spectacular and meteoric campaign in +the Northwest and ultimately resulted in the establishment of the +Mississippi instead of the Alleghanies as the western boundary of +the Confederation--the pioneers of Watauga were sagaciously +laying strong the foundations of permanent occupation. In +September, 1775, North Carolina, through her Provincial Congress, +provided for the appointment in each district of a Committee of +Safety, to consist of a president and twelve other members. +Following the lead thus set, the Watauga settlers assumed for +their country the name of "Washington District"; and proceeded by +unanimous vote of the people to choose a committee of thirteen, +which included James Robertson and John Sevier. This district was +organized "shortly after October, 1775, according to Felix +Walker; and the first step taken after the election of the +committee was the organization of a court, consisting of five +members. Felix Walker was elected clerk of the court thus +organized, and held the position for about four years. James +Robertson and John Sevier, it is believed, were also members of +this court. To James Robertson who, with the assistance of his +colleagues, devised this primitive type of frontier rule--a true +commission form of government, on the "Watauga Plan"--is justly +due distinctive recognition for this notable inauguration of the +independent democracy of the Old Southwest. The Watauga +settlement was animated by a spirit of deepest loyalty to the +American cause. In a memorable petition these hardy settlers +requested the Provincial Council of North Carolina not to regard +them as a "lawless mob," but to "annex" them to North Carolina +without delay. "This committee (willing to become a party in the +present unhappy contest)", states the petition, which must have +been drafted about July 15, 1776, "resolved (which is now on our +records), to adhere strictly to the rules and orders of the +Continental Congress, and in open committee acknowledged +themselves indebted to the united colonies their full proportion +of the Continental expense." + +While these disputes as to the government of the new communities +were in progress an additional danger threatened the pioneers. +For a whole year the British had been plying the various Indian +tribes from the lakes to the gulf with presents, supplies, and +ammunition. In the Northwest bounties had actually been offered +for American scalps. During the spring of 1776 plans were +concerted, chiefly through Stuart and Cameron, British agents +among the Southern Indians, for uniting the Loyalists and the +Indians in a crushing attack upon the Tennessee settlements and +the back country of North Carolina. Already the frontier of South +Carolina had passed through the horrors of Indian uprising; and +warning of the approaching invasion had been mercifully sent the +Holston settlers by Atta-kulla-kulla's niece, Nancy Ward, the +"Pocahontas of the West"--doubtless through the influence of her +daughter, who loved Joseph Martin. The settlers, flocking for +refuge into their small stockaded forts, waited in readiness for +the dreaded Indian attacks, which were made by two forces +totaling some seven hundred warriors. + +On July 20th, warned in advance of the approach of the Indians, +the borderers, one hundred and seventy in all, marched in two +columns from the rude breastwork, hastily thrown up at Eaton's +Station, to meet the Indians, double their own number, led by The +Dragging Canoe. The scouts surprised one party of Indians, +hastily poured in a deadly fire, and rushed upon them with such +impetuous fury that they fled precipitately. Withdrawing now +toward their breastwork, in anticipation of encountering there a +larger force, the backwoodsmen suddenly found themselves attacked +in their rear and in grave danger of being surrounded. Extending +their own line under the direction of Captain James Shelby, the +frontiersmen steadily met the bold attack of the Indians, who, +mistaking the rapid extension of the line for a movement to +retreat, incautiously made a headlong onslaught upon the whites, +giving the war-whoop and shouting: "The Unakas are running!" In +the ensuing hot conflict at close quarters, in some places hand +to hand, the Indians were utterly routed--The Dragging Canoe +being shot down, many warriors wounded, and thirteen left dead +upon the field. + +On the day after Thompson, Cocke, Shelby, Campbell, Madison, and +their men were thus winning the battle of the Long Island +"flats," Robertson, Sevier, and their little band of forty-two +men were engaged in repelling an attack, begun at sunrise, upon +the Watauga fort near the Sycamore Shoals. This attack, which was +led by Old Abraham, proved abortive; but as the result of the +loose investment of the log fortress, maintained by the Indians +for several weeks, a few rash venturers from the fort were killed +or captured, notably a young boy who was carried to one of the +Indian towns and burned at the stake, and the wife of the pioneer +settler, William Been, who was rescued from a like fate by the +intercession of the humane and noble Nancy Ward. It was during +this siege, according to constant tradition, that a frontier +lass, active and graceful as a young doe, was pursued to the very +stockade by the fleet-footed savages. Seeing her plight, an +athletic young officer mounted the stockade at a single leap, +shot down the foremost of the pursuers, and leaning over, seized +the maiden by the hands and lifted her over the stockade. The +maiden who sank breathless into the arms of the young officer, +John Sevier, was "Bonnie Kate Sherrill"--who, after the fashion +of true romance, afterward became the wife of her gallant +rescuer. + +While the Tennessee settlements were undergoing the trials of +siege and attack, the settlers on the frontiers of Rowan were +falling beneath the tomahawk of the merciless savage. In the +first and second weeks of July large forces of Indians penetrated +to the outlying settlements; and in two days thirty-seven persons +were killed along the Catawba River. On July 13th, the bluff old +soldier of Rowan, General Griffith Rutherford, reported to the +council of North Carolina that "three of our Captains are killed +and one wounded"; and that he was setting out that day with what +men he could muster to relieve Colonel McDowell, ten men, and one +hundred and twenty women and children, who were "besieged in some +kind of a fort." Aroused to extraordinary exertions by these +daring and deadly blows, the governments of North Carolina, South +Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia instituted a joint campaign +against the Cherokees. It was believed that, by delivering a +series of crushing blows to the Indians and so conclusively +demonstrating the overwhelming superiority of the whites, the +state governments in the Old Southwest would convince the savages +of the futility, of any attempt ever again to oppose them +seriously. + +Within less than a week after sending his despatches to the +council Rutherford set forth at the head of twenty-five hundred +men to protect the frontiers of North Carolina and to overwhelm +the foe. Leading the South Carolina army of more than eighteen +hundred men, Colonel Andrew Williamson directed his attack +against the lower Cherokee towns; while Colonel Samuel Jack led +two hundred Georgians against the Indian towns at the heads of +the Chattahoochee and Tugaloo Rivers. Assembling a force of some +sixteen hundred Virginians, Colonel William Christian +rendezvoused in August at the Long Island of Holston, where his +force was strengthened by between three and four hundred North +Carolinians under Colonels Joseph Williams and Love, and Major +Winston. The various expeditions met with little effective +opposition on the whole, succeeding everywhere in their design of +utterly laying waste the towns of the Cherokees. One serious +engagement occurred when the Indians resolutely challenged +Rutherford's advance at the gap of the Nantahala Mountains. +Indian women--heroic Amazons disguised in war-paint and armed +with the weapons of warriors and the courage of despair--fought +side by side with the Indian braves in the effort to arrest +Rutherford's progress and compass his defeat. More than forty +frontiersmen fell beneath the deadly shots of this truly Spartan +band before the final repulse of the savages. + +The most picturesque figures in this overwhelmingly successful +campaign were the bluff old Indian-fighter, Griffith Rutherford, +wearing "a tow hunting shirt, dyed black, and trimmed with white +fringe" as a uniform; Captain Benjamin Cleveland, a rude paladin +of gigantic size, strength, and courage; Lieutenant William +Lenoir (Le Noir), the gallant and recklessly brave French +Huguenot, later to win a general's rank in the Revolution; and +that militant man of God, the Reverend James Hall, graduate of +Nassau Hall, stalwart and manly, who carried a rifle on his +shoulder and, in the intervals between the slaughter of the +savages, preached the gospel to the vindictive and bloodthirsty +backwoodsmen. Such preaching was sorely needed on that campaign--when +the whites, maddened beyond the bounds of self-control by +the recent ghastly murders, gladly availed themselves of the +South Carolina bounty offered for fresh Indian scalps. At times +they exultantly displayed the reeking patches of hair above the +gates of their stockades; at others, with many a bloody oath, +they compelled their commanders either to sell the Indian +captives into slavery or else see them scalped on the spot. +Twenty years afterward Benjamin Hawkins relates that among Indian +refugees in extreme western Georgia the children had been so +terrorized by their parents' recitals of the atrocities of the +enraged borderers in the campaign of 1776, that they ran +screaming from the face of a white man. + + + +CHAPTER XVII. The Colonization of the Cumberland + +March 31, 1760. Set out this day, and after running some +distance, met with Col. Richard Henderson, who was running the +line between Virginia and North Carolina. At this meeting we were +much rejoiced. He gave us every information we wished, and +further informed 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 without bread, and are +compelled to hunt the buffalo to preserve life.--John Donelson: +Journal of a Voyage, intended by God's permission, in the good +boat Adventure, from Fort Patrick Henry, on Holston River, to the +French Salt Springs on Cumberland River. + + +To the settlements in Tennessee and Kentucky, which they had +seized and occupied, the pioneers held on with a tenacious grip +which never relaxed. From these strongholds, won through sullen +and desperate strokes, they pushed deeper into the wilderness, +once again to meet with undimmed courage the bitter onslaughts of +their resentful foes. The crushing of the Cherokees in 1776 +relieved the pressure upon the Tennessee settlers, enabling them +to strengthen their hold and prepare effectively for future +eventualities; the possession of the gateway to Kentucky kept +free the passage for Western settlement; Watauga and its +defenders continued to offer a formidable barrier to British +invasion of the East from Kentucky and the Northwest during the +Revolution; while these Tennessee frontiersmen were destined soon +to set forth again to invade a new wilderness and at frightful +cost to colonize the Cumberland. + +The little chain of stockades along the farflung frontier of +Kentucky was tenaciously held by the bravest of the race, grimly +resolved that this chain must not break. The Revolution +precipitated against this chain wave after wave of formidable +Indian foes from the Northwest under British leadership. At the +very time when Grifth Rutherford set out for the relief of +McDowell's Fort, a marauding Indian band captured by stealth near +the Transylvania Fort, known as Boone's Fort (Boonesborough), +Elizabeth and Frances Callaway, and Jemima Boone, the daughters +of Richard Callaway and Daniel Boone, and rapidly marched them +away toward the Shawanoe towns on the Ohio. A relief party, in +two divisions, headed respectively by the young girls' fathers, +and composed among others of the lovers of the three girls, +Samuel Henderson, John Holder, and Flanders Callaway, pursued +them with almost incredible swiftness. Guided by broken twigs and +bits of cloth surreptitiously dropped by Elizabeth Callaway, they +finally overtook the unsuspecting savages, killed two of them, +and rescued the three maidens unharmed. This romantic +episode--which gave Fenimore Cooper the theme for the most +memorable scene in one of his Leatherstocking Tales had an even +more romantic sequel in the subsequent marriage of the three +pairs of lovers. + +This bold foray, so shrewdly executed and even more sagaciously +foiled, was a true precursor of the dread happenings of the +coming neighborhood of the stations; and relief was felt when the +Transylvania Fort, the great stockade planned by Judge Henderson, +was completed by the pioneers (July, 1776). Glad tidings arrived +only a few days later when the Declaration of Independence, read +aloud from the Virginia Gazette, was greeted with wild huzzas by +the patriotic backwoodsmen. During the ensuing months occasional +invasions were made by savage bands; but it was not until April +24, 1777, that Henderson's "big fort" received its first attack, +being invested by a company of some seventy-five savages. The +twenty-two riflemen in the fort drove off the painted warriors, +but not before Michael Stoner, Daniel Boone, and several others +were severely wounded. As he lay helpless upon the ground, his +ankle shattered by a bullet, Boone was lifted by Simon Kenton and +borne away upon his shoulders to the haven of the stockade amid a +veritable shower of balls. The stoical and taciturn Boone clasped +Kenton's hand and gave him the accolade of the wilderness in the +brief but heartfelt utterance; "You are a fine fellow." On July +4th of this same year the fort was again subjected to siege, when +two hundred gaudily painted savages surrounded it for two days. +But owing to the vigilance and superb markmanship of the +defenders, as well as to the lack of cannon by the besieging +force, the Indians reluctantly abandoned the siege, after leaving +a number dead upon the field. Soon afterward the arrival of two +strong bodies of prime riflemen, who had been hastily summoned +from the frontiers of North Carolina and Virginia, once again +made firm the bulwark of white supremacy in the West. + +Kentucky's terrible year, 1778, opened with a severe disaster to +the white settlers--when Boone with thirty men, while engaged in +making salt at the "Lower Salt Spring," was captured in February +by more than a hundred Indians, sent by Governor Hamilton of +Detroit to drive the white settlers from "Kentucke." Boone +remained in captivity until early summer, when, learning that his +Indian captors were planning an attack in force upon the +Transylvania Fort, he succeeded in effecting his escape. After a +break-neck journey of one hundred and sixty miles, during which +he ate but one meal, Boone finally arrived at the big fort on +June 20th. The settlers were thus given ample time for +preparation, as the long siege did not begin until September 7th. +The fort was invested by a powerful force flying the English +flag--four hundred and forty-four savages gaudy in the vermilion +and ochre of their war-paint, and eleven Frenchmen, the whole +being commanded by the French-Canadian, Captain Dagniaux de +Quindre, and the great Indian Chief, Black-fish who had adopted +Boone as a son. In the effort to gain his end de Quindre resorted +to a dishonorable stratagem, by which he hoped to outwit the +settlers and capture the fort with but slight loss. "They formed +a scheme to deceive us," says Boone, "declaring it was their +orders, from Governor Hamilton, to take us captives, and not to +destroy us; but if nine of us would come out and treat with them, +they would immediately withdraw their forces from our walls, and +return home peacably." Transparent as the stratagem was, Boone +incautiously agreed to a conference with the enemy; Callaway +alone took the precaution to guard against Indian duplicity. +After a long talk, the Indians proposed to Boone, Callaway, and +the seven or eight pioneers who accompanied them that they shake +hands in token of peace and friendship. As picturesquely +described by Daniel Trabue: + +"The Indians sayed two Indians must shake hands with one white +man to make a Double or sure peace at this time the Indians had +hold of the white men's hands and held them. Col. Calloway +objected to this but the other Indians laid hold or tryed to lay +hold of the other hand but Colonel Calloway was the first that +jerked away from them but the Indians seized the men two Indians +holt of one man or it was mostly the case and did their best to +hold them but while the man and Indians was a scuffling the men +from the Fort agreeable to Col. Calloway's order fired on them +they had a dreadful skuffel but our men all got in the fort safe +and the fire continued on both sides." + +During the siege Callaway, the leader of the pioneers, made a +wooden cannon wrapped with wagon tires, which on being fired at a +group of Indians "made them scamper perdidiously." The secret +effort of the Indians to tunnel a way underground into the fort, +being discovered by the defenders, was frustrated by a +countermine. Unable to outwit, outfight, or outmaneuver the +resourceful Callaway, de Quindre finally withdrew on September +16th, closing the longest and severest attack that any of the +fortified stations of Kentucky had ever been called upon to +withstand. + +The successful defense of the Transylvania Fort, made by these +indomitable backwoodsmen who were lost sight of by the +Continental Congress and left to fight alone their battles in the +forests, was of national significance in its results. Had the +Transylvania Fort fallen, the northern Indians in overwhelming +numbers, directed by Hamilton and led by British officers, might +well have swept Kentucky free of defenders and fallen with +devastating force upon the exposed settlements along the western +frontiers of North Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, This +defense of Boonesborough, therefore, is deserving of +commemoration in the annals of the Revolution, along with +Lexington and Bunker's Hill. Coupled with Clark's meteoric +campaign in the Northwest and the subsequent struggles in the +defense of Kentucky, it may be regarded as an event basically +responsible for the retention of the trans-Alleghany region by +the United States. The bitter struggles, desperate sieges, and +bloody reprisals of these dark years came to a close with the +expeditions of Clark and Logan in November, 1782, which +appropriately concluded the Revolution in the West by putting a +definite end to all prospect of formidable invasion of Kentucky. + +In November, 1777, "Washington District," the delegates of which +had been received in the preceding year by the Provincial +Congress of North Carolina, was formed by the North Carolina +General Assembly into Washington County; and to it were assigned +the boundaries of the whole of the present state of Tennessee. +While this immense territory was thus being definitely included +within the bounds of North Carolina, Judge Henderson on behalf of +the Transylvania Company was making a vigorous effort to secure +the reestablishment of its rights from the Virginia Assembly. By +order of the Virginia legislature, an exhaustive investigation of +the claims of the Transylvania Company was therefore made, +hearings being held at various points in the back country. On +July 18, 1777, Judge Henderson presented to the peace +commissioners for North Carolina and Virginia at the Long Island +treaty ground an elaborate memorial in behalf of the Transylvania +Company, which the commissioners unanimously refused to consider, +as not coming under their jurisdiction. Finally, after a full and +impartial discussion before the Virginia House of Delegates, that +body declared the Transylvania purchase void. But in +consideration of "the very great expense [incurred by the +company] in making the said purchase, and in settling the said +lands, by which the commonwealth is likely to receive great +advantage, by increasing its inhabitants, and establishing a +barrier against the Indians," the House of Delegates granted +Richard Henderson and Company two hundred thousand acres of land +situated between the Ohio and Green rivers, where the town of +Henderson, Kentucky, now stands. With this bursting of the +Transylvania bubble and the vanishing of the golden dreams of +Henderson and his associates for establishing the fourteenth +American colony in the heart of the trans-Alleghany, a first +romantic chapter in the history of Westward expansion comes to a +close. + +But another and more feasible project immediately succeeded. +Undiscouraged by Virginia's confiscation of Transylvania, and +disregarding North Carolina's action in extending her boundaries +over the trans-Alleghany region lying within her chartered +limits, Henderson, in whom the genius of the colonizer and the +ambition of the speculative capitalist were found in striking +conjunction, was now inspired to repeat, along broader and more +solidly practical lines, the revolutionary experiment of +Transylvania. It was not his purpose, however, to found an +independent colony; for he believed that millions of acres in the +Transylvania purchase lay within the bounds of North Carolina, +and he wished to open for colonization, settlement, and the sale +of lands, the vast wilderness of the valley of the Cumberland +supposed to lie within those confines. But so universal was the +prevailing uncertainty in regard to boundaries that it was +necessary to prolong the North Carolina-Virginia line in order to +determine whether or not the Great French Lick, the ideal +location for settlement, lay within the chartered limits of North +Carolina. + +Judge Henderson's comprehensive plans for the promotion of an +extensive colonization of the Cumberland region soon began to +take form in vigorous action. Just as in his Transylvania project +Henderson had chosen Daniel Boone, the ablest of the North +Carolina pioneers, to spy out the land and select sites for +future location, so now he chose as leader of the new colonizing +party the ablest of the Tennessee pioneers, James Robertson. +Although he was the acknowledged leader of the Watauga settlement +and held the responsible position of Indian agent for North +Carolina, Robertson was induced by Henderson's liberal offers to +leave his comparatively peaceful home and to venture his life in +this desperate hazard of new fortunes. The advance party of eight +white men and one negro, under Robertson's leadership, set forth +from the Holston settlement on February 6, 1779, to make a +preliminary exploration and to plant corn "that bread might be +prepared for the main body of emigrants in the fall." After +erecting a few cabins for dwellings and posts of defense, +Robertson plunged alone into the wilderness and made the long +journey to Post St. Vincent in the Illinois, in order to consult +with George Rogers Clark, who had entered for himself in the +Virginia Land Office several thousand acres of land at the French +Lick. After perfecting arrangements with Clark for securing +"cabin rights" should the land prove to lie in Virginia, +Robertson returned to Watauga to take command of the migration. + +Toward the end of the year two parties set out, one by land, the +other by water, for the wonderful new country on the Cumberland +of which Boone and Scaggs and Mansker had brought back such +glowing descriptions. During the autumn Judge Henderson and other +commissioners from North Carolina, in conjunction with +commissioners from Virginia, had been running out the boundary +line between the two states. On the very day--Christmas, +1779--that Judge Henderson reached the site of the Transylvania +Fort, now called Boonesborough, the swarm of colonists from the +parent hive at Watauga, under Robertson's leadership, reached the +French Lick and on New Year's Day, 1780, crossed the river on the +ice to the present site of Nashville. + +The journal of the other party, which, as has been aptly said, +reads like a chapter from one of Captain Mayne Reid's fascinating +novels of adventure, was written by Colonel John Donelson, the +father-in-law of Andrew Jackson. Setting out from Fort Patrick +Henry on Holston River, December 22, 1779, with a flotilla +consisting of about thirty flatboats, dugouts, and canoes, they +encountered few difficulties until they began to run the gauntlet +of the Chickamauga towns on the Tennessee. Here they were +furiously attacked by the Indians, terrible in their red and +black war-paint; and a well-filled boat lagging in the rear, with +smallpox on board, was driven to shore by the Indians. The +occupants were massacred; but the Indians at once contracted the +disease and died by the hundreds. This luckless sacrifice of +"poor Stuart, his family and friends," while a ghastly price to +pay, undoubtedly procured for the Cumberland settlements +comparative immunity from Indian forays until the new-comers had +firmly established themselves in their wilderness stronghold. +Eloquent of the granite endurance and courageous spirit of the +typical American pioneer in its thankfulness for sanctuary, for +reunion of families and friends, and for the humble shelter of a +log cabin, is the last entry in Donelson's diary (April 24, +1780): + +"This day we arrived at our journey's end at the Big Salt Lick, +where we have the pleasure of finding Capt. 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 +intrusted to our care, and who, some time since, perhaps, +despaired of ever meeting again. Though our prospects at present +are dreary, we have found a few log cabins which have been built +on a cedar bluff above the Lick by Capt. Robertson and his +company." + +In the midst of the famine during this terrible period of the +"hard winter," Judge Henderson was sorely concerned for the fate +of the new colony which he had projected, and immediately +proceeded to purchase at huge cost a large stock of corn. On +March 5, 1780, this corn, which had been raised by Captain +Nathaniel Hart, was "sent from Boonesborough in perogues +[pettiaugers or flatboats] under the command of William Bailey +Smith.... This corn was taken down the Kentucky River, and +over the Falls of Ohio, to the mouth of the Cumberland, and +thence up that river to the fort at the French Lick. It is +believed have been the only bread which the settlers had until it +was raised there in 1781." There is genuine impressiveness in +this heroic triumphing over the obstacles of obdurate nature and +this paternalistic provision for the exposed Cumberland +settlement--the purchase by Judge Henderson, the shipment by +Captain Hart, and the transportation by Colonel Smith, in an +awful winter of bitter cold and obstructed navigation, of this +indispensable quantity of corn purchased for sixty thousand +dollars in depreciated currency. + +Upon his arrival at the French Lick, shortly after the middle of +April, Judge Henderson at once proceeded to organize a government +for the little community. On May 1st articles of association were +drawn up; and important additions thereto were made on May 13th, +when the settlers signed the complete series. The original +document, still preserved, was drafted by Judge Henderson, being +written throughout in his own handwriting; and his name heads the +list of two hundred and fifty and more signatures. The +"Cumberland Compact," as this paper is called, is fundamentally a +mutual contract between the copartners of the Transylvania +Company and the settlers upon the lands claimed by the company. +It represents the collective will of the community; and on +account of the careful provisions safeguarding the rights of each +party to the contract it may be called a bill of rights. The +organization of this pure democracy was sound and +admirable--another notable early example of the commission form +of government. The most remarkable feature of this backwoods +constitution marks Judge Henderson as a pioneer in the use of the +political device so prominent to-day, one hundred and forty years +later--the "recall of judges." In the following striking clause +this innovation in government was recognized thus early in +American history as the most effective means of securing and +safeguarding justice in a democracy: + +"As often as the people in general are dissatisfied with the +doings of the Judges or Triers so to be chosen, they may call a +new selection in any of the said stations, and elect bothers in +their stead, having due respect to the number now agreed to be +elected at each station, which persons so to be chosen shall have +the same power with those in whose room or place they shall or +may be chosen to act." + +A land-office was now opened, the entry-taker being appointed by +Judge Henderson, in accordance with the compact; and the lands, +for costs of entry, etc., were registered for the nominal fee of +ten dollars per thousand acres. But as the Transylvania Company +was never able to secure a "satisfactory and indisputable title," +the clause resulted in perpetual nonpayment. In 1783, following +the lead of Virginia in the case of Transylvania, North Carolina +declared the Transylvania Company's purchase void, but granted +the company in compensation a tract of one hundred and ninety +thousand acres in Powell's Valley. As compensation, the grants of +North Carolina and Virginia were quite inadequate, considering +the value of the service in behalf of permanent western +colonization rendered by the Transylvania company. + +James Robertson was chosen as presiding officer of the court of +twelve commissioners, and was also elected commander-in-chief of +the military forces of the eight little associated settlements on +the Cumberland. Here for the next two years the self-reliant +settlers under Robertson's wise and able leadership successfully +repelled the Indians in their guerrilla warfare, firmly +entrenched themselves in their forest-girt stronghold, and +vindicated their claim to the territory by right of occupation +and conquest. Here sprang up in later times a great and populous +city--named, strangely enough, neither for Henderson, the +founder, nor for Robertson and Donelson, the leaders of the two +colonizing parties, but for one having no association with its +history or origins, the gallant North Carolinian, General Francis +Nash, who was killed at the Battle of Germantown. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. King's Mountain + +With the utmost satisfaction I can acquaint you with the sudden +and favorable turn of our public affairs. A few days ago +destruction hung over our heads. Cornwallis with at least 1500 +British and Tories waited at Charlotte for the reinforcement of +1000 from Broad River, which reinforcement has been entirely cut +off, 130 killed and the remainder captured. Cornwallis +immediately retreated, and is now on his way toward Charleston, +with part of our army in his rear....--Elizabeth Maxwell +Steel: Salisbury, October 25, 1780. + + +So thoroughly had the Cherokees been subdued by the devastations +of the campaign of 1776 that for several years thereafter they +were unable to organize for a new campaign against the +backwoodsmen along the frontiers of North Carolina and Tennessee. +During these years the Holston settlers principally busied +themselves in making their position secure, as well as in setting +their house in order by severely punishing the lawless Tory +element among them. In 1779 the Chickamaugas, with whom The +Dragging Canoe and his irreconcilable followers among the +Cherokees had joined hands after the campaign of 1776, grew so +bold in their bloody forays upon small exposed settlements that +North Carolina and Virginia in conjunction despatched a strong +expedition against them. Embarking on April 10th at the mouth of +Big Creek near the present Rogersville, Tennessee, three hundred +and fifty men led by Colonel Evan Shelby descended the Tennessee +to the fastnesses of the Chickamaugas. Meeting with no resistance +from the astonished Indians, who fled to the shelter of the +densely wooded hills, they laid waste the Indian towns and +destroyed the immense stores of goods collected by the British +agents for distribution among the red men. The Chickamaugas were +completely quelled; and during the period of great stress through +which the Tennessee frontiersmen were soon to pass, the Cherokees +were restrained through the wise diplomacy of Joseph Martin, +Superintendent of Indian affairs for Virginia. + +The great British offensive against the Southern colonies, which +were regarded as the vulnerable point in the American +Confederacy, was fully launched upon the fall of Charleston in +May, 1780. Cornwallis established his headquarters at Camden; and +one of his lieutenants, the persuasive and brilliant Ferguson, +soon rallied thousands of Loyalists in South Carolina to the +British standard. When Cornwallis inaugurated his campaign for +cutting Washington wholly off from the Southern colonies by +invading North Carolina, the men upon the western waters realized +that the time had come to rise, in defense of their state and in +protection of their homes. Two hundred Tennessee riflemen from +Sullivan County, under Colonel Isaac Shelby, were engaged in +minor operations in South Carolina conducted by Colonel Charles +McDowell; and conspicuous among these engagements was the affair +at Musgrove's Mill on August 18th when three hundred horsemen led +by Colonel James Williams, a native of Granville County, North +Carolina, Colonel Isaac Shelby, and Lieutenant-Colonel Clark of +Georgia repulsed with heavy loss a British force of between four +and five hundred. + +These minor successes availed nothing in face of the disastrous +defeat of Gates by Cornwallis at Camden on August 16th and the +humiliating blow to Sumter at Rocky Mount on the following day. +Ferguson hotly pursued the frontiersmen, who then retreated over +the mountains; and from his camp at Gilbert Town he despatched a +threatening message to the Western leaders, declaring that if +they did not desist from their opposition to the British arms and +take protection under his standard, he would march his army over +the mountains and lay their country waste with fire and sword. +Stung to action, Shelby hastily rode off to consult with Sevier +at his log castle near Jonesboro; and together they matured a +plan to arouse the mountain men and attack Ferguson by surprise. +In the event of failure, these wilderness free-lances planned to +leave the country and find a home with the Spaniards in +Louisiana. + +At the original place of rendezvous, the Sycamore Shoals of the +Watauga, the overmountain men gathered on September 25th. There +an eloquent sermon was preached to them by that fiery man of God, +the Reverend Samuel Doak, who concluded his discourse with a +stirring invocation to the sword of the Lord and of Gideon--a +sentiment greeted with the loud applause of the militant +frontiersmen. Here and at various places along the march they +were joined by detachments of border fighters summoned to join +the expedition--Colonel William Campbell, who with some +reluctance had abandoned his own plans in response to Shelby's +urgent and repeated message, in command of four hundred hardy +frontiersmen from Washington County, Virginia; Colonel Benjamin +Cleveland, with the wild fighters of Wilkes known as "Cleveland's +Bulldogs"; Colonel Andrew Hampton, with the stalwart riflemen of +Rutherford; Major Joseph Winston, the cousin of Patrick Henry, +with the flower of the citizenry of Surry; the McDowells, Charles +and Joseph, with the bold borderers of Burke; Colonels Lacy and +Hill, with well-trained soldiers of South Carolina; and +Brigadier-General James Williams, leading the intrepid Rowan +volunteers. + +Before breaking camp at Quaker Meadows, the leading officers in +conference chose Colonel William Campbell as temporary officer of +the day, until they could secure a general officer from +headquarters as commander-in-chief. The object of the +mountaineers and big-game hunters was, in their own terms, to +pursue Ferguson, to run him down, and to capture him. In +pursuance of this plan, the leaders on arriving at the ford of +Green River chose out a force of six hundred men, with the best +mounts and equipment; and at daybreak on October 6th this force +of picked mounted riflemen, followed by some fifty "foot-cavalry" +eager to join in the pursuit, pushed rapidly on to the Cowpens. +Here a second selection took place; and Colonel Campbell, was +again elected commander of the detachment, now numbering some +nine hundred and ten horsemen and eighty odd footmen, which +dashed rapidly on in pursuit of Ferguson. + +The British commander had been apprised of the coming of the +over-mountain men. Scorning to make a forced march and attempt to +effect a junction with Cornwallis at Charlotte, Ferguson chose to +make a stand and dispose once for all of the barbarian horde whom +he denounced as mongrels and the dregs of mankind. After +despatching to Cornwallis a message asking for aid, Ferguson took +up his camp on King's Mountain, just south of the North Carolina +border line, in the present York County, South Carolina. Here, +after his pickets had been captured in silence, he was surprised +by his opponents. At three o'clock in the afternoon of October +7th the mountain hunters treed their game upon the heights. + +The battle which ensued presents an extraordinary contrast in the +character of the combatants and the nature of the strategy and +tactics. Each party ran true to form--Ferguson repeating +Braddock's suicidal policy of opposing bayonet charges to the +deadly fusillade of riflemen, who in Indian fashion were +carefully posted behind trees and every shelter afforded by the +natural inequalities of the ground. In the army of the Carolina +and Virginia frontiersmen, composed of independent detachments +recruited from many sources and solicitous for their own +individual credit, each command was directed in the battle by its +own leader. Campbell--like Cleveland, Winston, Williams, Lacey, +Shelby, McDowell, Sevier, and Hambright--personally led his own +division; but the nature of the fighting and the peculiarity of +the terrain made it impossible for him, though the chosen +commander of the expedition, actually to play that role in the +battle. The plan agreed upon in advance by the frontier leaders +was simple enough--to surround and capture Ferguson's camp on the +high plateau. The more experienced Indian fighters, Sevier and +Shelby, unquestionably suggested the general scheme which in any +case would doubtless have been employed by the frontiersmen; it +was to give the British "Indian play"--namely to take cover +everywhere and to fire from natural shelter. Cleveland, a +Hercules in strength and courage who had fought the Indians and +recognized the wisdom of Indian tactics, ordered his men, as did +some of the other leaders, to give way before a bayonet charge, +but to return to the attack after the charge had spent its force. + +"My brave fellows," said Cleveland, "every man must consider +himself an officer, and act from his own judgment. Fire as quick +as you can, and stand your ground as long as you can. When you +can do no better, get behind trees, or retreat; but I beg you not +to run quite off. If we are repulsed, let us make a point of +returning and renewing the fight; perhaps we may have better luck +in the second attempt than in the first." + +The plateau upon which Ferguson was encamped was the top of an +eminence some six hundred yards long and about two hundred and +fifty yards from one base across to the other; and its shape was +that of an Indian paddle, varying from one hundred and twenty +yards at the blade to sixty yards at the handle in width. +Outcropping boulders upon the outer edge of the plateau afforded +some slight shelter for Ferguson's force; but, unsuspicious of +attack, Ferguson had made no abatis to protect his camp from the +assault to which it was so vulnerable because of the protection +of the timber surrounding it on all sides. As to the disposition +of the attacking force, the center to the northeast was occupied +by Cleveland with his "Bulldogs," Hambright with his South Fork +Boys from the Catawba (now Lincoln County, North Carolina), and +Winston with his Surry riflemen; to the south were the divisions +of Joseph McDowell, Sevier, and Campbell; while Lacey's South +Carolinians, the Rowan levies under Williams, and the Watauga +borderers under Shelby were stationed upon the north side. +Ferguson's forces consisted of Provincial Rangers, one hundred +and fifty strong, and other well-drilled Loyalists, between eight +and nine hundred in number; but his strength was seriously +weakened by the absence of a foraging party of between one and +two hundred who had gone off on the morning the battle occurred. +Shelby's men, before getting into position, received a hot fire, +the opening shots of the engagement. This inspired Campbell, who +now threw off his coat, to shout encouraging orders to his men +posted on the side of the mountain opposite to Shelby's force. +When Campbell's Virginians uttered a series of piercing shouts, +the British officer, De Peyster, second in command, remarked to +his chief: "These things are ominous--these are the damned +yelling boys." + +The battle, which lasted some minutes short of an hour, was waged +with terrific ferocity. The Loyalist militia, whenever possible, +fired from the shelter of the rocks; while the Provincial Corps, +with fixed bayonets, steadily charged the frontiersmen, who fired +at close range and then rapidly withdrew to the very base of the +mountain. After each bayonet charge the Provincials coolly +withdrew to the summit, under the accumulating fire of the +returning mountaineers, who quickly gathered in their rear. Owing +to their elevated location, the British, although using the +rapid-fire breech-loading rifle invented by Ferguson himself, +found their vision deflected, and continually fired high, thus +suffering from nature's handicap, refraction. The militia, using +sharpened butcher-knives which Ferguson had taught them to +utilize as bayonets, charged against the mountaineers; but their +fire, in answer to the deadly fusillade of the expert squirrel-shooters, +was belated, owing to the fact that they could not fire +while the crudely improvised bayonets remained inserted in their +pieces. The Americans, continually firing upward, found ready +marks for their aim in the clearly delineated outlines of their +adversaries, and felt the fierce exultation which animates the +hunter who has tracked to its lair and surrounded wild game at +bay. + +The leaders of the various divisions of the mountaineers bore +themselves with impetuous bravery, recklessly rushing between the +lines of fire and with native eloquence, interspersed with +profanity, rallying their individual commands again and again to +the attack. The valiant Campbell scaled the rugged heights, +loudly encouraging his men to the ascent. Cleveland, resolutely +facing the foe, urged on is Bulldogs with the inspiriting words: +"Come, boys; let's try 'em again. We'll have better luck next +time." No sooner did Shelby's men reach the bottom of the hill, +in retreating before a charge, than their commander, fiery and +strenuous, ardently shouted: "Now boys, quickly reload your +rifles, and let's advance upon them, and give them another hell +of a fire." The most deadly charge, led by De Peyster himself, +fell upon Hambright's South Fork boys; and one of their gallant +officers, Major Chronicle, waving his military hat, was mortally +wounded, the command, "Face to the hill!", dying on his lips. +These veteran soldiers, unlike the mountaineers, firmly met the +shock of the charge, and a number of their men were shot down or +transfixed; but the remainder, reserving their fire until the +charging column was only a few feet away, poured in a deadly +volley before retiring. The gallant William Lenoir, whose +reckless bravery made him a conspicuous target for the enemy, +received several wounds and emerged from the battle with his hair +and clothes torn by balls. The ranking American officer, +Brigadier General James Williams, was mortally wounded while "on +the very top of the mountain, in the thickest of the fight"; and +as he momentarily revived, his first words were: "For God's sake, +boys, don't give up the hill." Hambright, sorely wounded, his +boot overflowing with blood and his hat riddled with three bullet +holes, declined to dismount, but pressed gallantly forward, +exclaiming in his "Pennsylvania Dutch": "Huzza, my prave poys, +fight on a few minutes more, and the pattle will be over!" On the +British side, Ferguson was supremely valorous, rapidly dashing +from one point to another, rallying his men, oblivious to all +danger. Wherever the shrill note of his silver whistle sounded, +there the fighting was hottest and the British resistance the +most stubborn. His officers fought with the characteristic +steadiness of the British soldier; and again and again his men +charged headlong against the wavering and fiery circle of the +frontiersmen. + +Ferguson's boast that "he was on King's Mountain, that he was +king of the Mountain, and God Almighty could not drive him from +it" was doubtless prompted, less by a belief in the +impregnability of his position, than by a desperate desire to +inspire confidence in his men. His location was admirably chosen +for defense against attack by troops employing regulation +tactics; but, never dreaming of the possibility of sudden +investment, Ferguson had erected no fortifications for his +encampment. His frenzied efforts on the battlefield seem like a +mad rush against fate; for the place was indefensible against the +peculiar tactics of the frontiersmen. While the mountain flamed +like a volcano and resounded with the thunder of the guns, a +steady stricture was in progress. The lines were drawn tighter +and tighter around the trapped and frantically struggling army; +and at last the fall of their commander, riddled with bullets, +proved the tragic futility of further resistance. The game was +caught and bagged to a man. When Winston, with his fox-hunters of +Surry, dashed recklessly through the woods, says a chronicler of +the battle, and the last to come into position, + +Flow'd in, and settling, circled all the lists, + +then + +From all the circle of the hills death sleeted in upon the +doomed. + +The battle was decisive in its effect--shattering the plans of +Cornwallis, which till then appeared certain of success. The +victory put a full stop to the invasion of North Carolina, which +was then well under way. Cornwallis abandoned his carefully +prepared campaign and immediately left the state. After +ruthlessly hanging nine prisoners, an action which had an +effectively deterrent effect upon future Tory murders and +depredations, the patriot force quietly disbanded. The brilliant +initiative of the buckskin-clad borderers, the strenuous energy +of their pursuit, the perfection of their surprise--all +reinforced by the employment of ideal tactics for meeting the +given situation--were the controlling factors in this +overwhelming victory of the Revolution. The pioneers of the Old +Southwest--the independent and aggressive yeomanry of North +Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina--had risen in their might. +Without the aid or authority of blundering state governments, +they had created an army of frontiersmen, Indian-fighters, and +big-game hunters which had found no parallel or equal on the +continent since the Battle of the Great Kanawha. + + + +CHAPTER XIX. The State of Franklin + +Designs of a more dangerous nature and deeper die seem to glare +in the western revolt .... I have thought proper to issue this +manifesto, hereby warning all persons concerned in the said +revolt ... that the honour of this State has been particularly +wounded, by seizing that by violence which, in time, no doubt, +would have been obtained by consent, when the terms of separation +would have been explained or stipulated, to the mutual +satisfaction of the mother and new State.... Let your +proposals be consistent with the honour of the State to accede +to, which by your allegiance as good citizens, you cannot violate +and I make no doubt but her generosity, in time, will meet your +wishes.--Governor Alexander Martin: Manifesto against the State +of Franklin, April 25, 1785. + + +To the shrewd diplomacy of Joseph Martin, who held the Cherokees +in check during the period of the King's Mountain campaign, the +settlers in the valleys of the Watauga and the Holston owed their +temporary immunity from Indian attack. But no sooner did Sevier +and his over-mountain men return from the battle-field of King's +Mountain than they were called upon to join in an expedition +against the Cherokees, who had again gone on the war-path at the +instigation of the British. After Sevier with his command had +defeated a small party of Indians at Boyd's Creek in December, +the entire force of seven hundred riflemen, under the command of +Colonel Arthur Campbell, with Major Joseph Martin as subordinate, +penetrated to the heart of the Indian country, burned Echota, +Chilhowee, Settiquo, Hiawassee, and seven other principal +villages, and destroyed an immense amount of property and +supplies. In March, suspecting that the arch-conspirators against +the white settlers were the Cherokees at the head waters of the +Little Tennessee, Sevier led one hundred and fifty horsemen +through the devious mountain defiles and struck the Indians a +swift and unexpected blow at Tuckasegee, near the present +Webster, North Carolina. In this extraordinarily daring raid, one +of his most brilliant feats of arms, Sevier lost only one man +killed and one wounded; while upon the enemy he inflicted the +loss of thirty killed, took many more prisoners, burned six +Indian towns, and captured many horses and supplies. Once his +deadly work was done, Sevier with his bold cavaliers silently +plunged again into the forest whence he had so suddenly emerged, +and returned in triumph to the settlements. + +Disheartened though the Indians were to see the smoke of their +burning towns, they sullenly remained averse to peace; and they +did not keep the treaty made at Long Island in July, 1781. The +Indians suffered from very real grievances at the hands of the +lawless white settlers who persisted in encroaching upon the +Indian lands. When the Indian ravages were resumed, Sevier and +Anderson, the latter from Sullivan County, led a punitive +expedition of two hundred riflemen against the Creeks and the +Chickamaugas; and employing the customary tactics of laying waste +the Indian towns, administered stern and salutary chastisement to +the copper-colored marauders. + +During this same period the settlers on the Cumberland were +displaying a grim fortitude and stoical endurance in the face of +Indian attack forever memorable in the history of the Old +Southwest. On the night of January 15, 1781, the settlers at +Freeland's Station, after a desperate resistance, succeeded in +beating off the savages who attacked in force. At Nashborough on +April 2d, twenty of the settlers were lured from the stockade by +the artful wiles of the savages; and it was only after serious +loss that they finally won their way back to the protection of +the fort. Indeed, their return was due to the fierce dogs of the +settlers, which were released at the most critical moment, and +attacked the astounded Indians with such ferocity that the +diversion thus created enabled the settlers to escape from the +deadly trap. During the next two years the history of the +Cumberland settlements is but the gruesome recital of murder +after murder of the whites, a few at a time, by the lurking +Indian foe. Robertson's dominant influence alone prevented the +abandonment of the sorely harassed little stations. The arrival +of the North Carolina commissioners for the purpose of laying off +bounty lands and settlers' preemptions, and the treaty of peace +concluded at the French Lick on November 5 and 6, 1783, gave +permanence and stability to the Cumberland settlements. The +lasting friendship of the Chickasaws was won; but the Creeks for +some time continued to harass the Tennessee pioneers. The +frontiersmen's most formidable foe, the Cherokees, stoically, +heroically fighting the whites in the field, and smallpox, +syphilis, and drunkenness at home, at last abandoned the unequal +battle. The treaty at Hopewell on November 28, 1785, marks the +end of an era--the Spartan yet hopeless resistance of the +intrepid red men to the relentless and frequently unwarranted +expropriation by the whites of the ancient and immemorial domain +of the savage. + +The skill in self-government of the isolated people beyond the +mountains, and the ability they had already demonstrated in the +organization of "associations," received a strong stimulus on +June 2, 1784, when the legislature of North Carolina ceded to the +Congress of the United States the title which that state +possessed to the land west of the Alleghanies. Among the terms of +the Cession Act were these conditions: that the ceded territory +should be formed into a separate state or states; and that if +Congress should not accept the lands thus ceded and give due +notice within two years, the act should be of no force and the +lands should revert to North Carolina. No sooner did this news +reach the Western settlers than they began to mature plans for +the organization of a government during the intervening twelve +months. Their exposed condition on the frontiers, still harassed +by the Indians, and North Carolina's delay in sending goods +promised the Indians by a former treaty, both promoted Indian +hostility; and these facts, combined with their remote location +beyond the mountains, rendering them almost inaccessible to +communication with North Carolina--all rendered the decision of +the settlers almost inevitable. Moreover, the allurements of high +office and the dazzling dreams of ambition were additional +motives sufficiently human in themselves to give driving power to +the movement toward independence. + +At a convention assembled at Jonesborough on August 23, 1784, +delegates from the counties of Washington, Sullivan, and Greene +characteristically decided to organize an "Association." They +solemnly declared by resolution: "We have a just and undeniable +right to petition to Congress to accept the session made by North +Carolina, and for that body to countenance us for forming +ourselves into a separate government, and to frame either a +permanent or temporary constitution, agreeably to a resolve of +Congress...." Meanwhile, Governor Martin, largely as the +result of the prudent advice of North Carolina's representative +in Congress, Dr. Hugh Williamson, was brought to the conclusion +that North Carolina, in the passage of the cession act, had acted +precipitately. This important step had been taken without the +full consideration of the people of the state. Among the various +arguments advanced by Williamson was the impressive contention +that, in accordance with the procedure in the case of other +states, the whole expense of the huge Indian expeditions in 1776 +and the heavy militia aids to South Carolina and Georgia should +be credited to North Carolina as partial fulfilment of her +continental obligations before the cession should be irrevocably +made to the Federal government. Williamson's arguments proved +convincing; and it was thus primarily for economic reasons of far +reaching national importance that the assembly of North Carolina +(October 22 to November 25, 1784) repealed the cession act made +the preceding spring. + +Before the news of the repeal of the cession act could reach the +western waters, a second convention met at Jonesborough on +December 17th. Sentiment at this time was much divided, for a +number of the people, expecting the repeal of the cession act, +genuinely desired a continued allegiance to North Carolina. Of +these may well have been John Sevier, who afterward declared to +Joseph Martin that he had been "Draged into the Franklin measures +by a large number of the people of this country." The principal +act of this convention was the adoption of a temporary +constitution for six months and the provision for a convention to +be held within one year, at the expiration of which time this +constitution should be altered, or adopted as the permanent +constitution of the new state. The scholars on the western +waters, desiring to commemorate their aspirations for freedom, +chose as the name of the projected new state: "Frankland"--the +Land of the Free. The name finally chosen, however, perhaps for +reasons of policy, was "Franklin," in honor of Benjamin Franklin. +Meanwhile, in order to meet the pressing needs for a stable +government along the Tennessee frontier, the North Carolina +assembly, which repealed the cession act, created out of the four +western counties the District of Washington, with John Haywood as +presiding judge and David Campbell as associate, and conferred +upon John Sevier the rank of brigadier general of the new +district. The first week in December Governor Martin sent to +Sevier his military commission; and replying to Joseph Martin's +query (December 31, 1784, prompted by Governor Martin) as to +whether, in view of the repeal of the cession act, he intended to +persist in revolt or await developments, Sevier gave it out +broadcast that "we shall pursue no further measures as to a new +State." + +Owing to the remoteness of the Tennessee settlements and the +difficulty of appreciating through correspondence the atmosphere +of sentiment in Franklin, Governor Martin realized the necessity +of sending a personal representative to discover the true state +of affairs in the disaffected region beyond the mountains. For +the post of ambassador to the new government, Governor Martin +selected a man distinguished for mentality and diplomatic skill, +a pioneer of Tennessee and Kentucky, Judge Richard Henderson's +brother, Colonel Samuel Henderson. Despite Sevier's disavowal of +any further intention to establish a new state, the governor gave +Colonel Henderson elaborate written instructions, the purport of +which was to learn all that he could about the political +complexion of the Tennessee frontiersmen, the sense of the +people, and the agitation for a separate commonwealth. Moreover, +in the hope of placating the leading chieftains of the Cherokees, +who had bitterly protested against the continued aggressions and +encroachments upon their lands by the lawless borderers, he +instructed Colonel Henderson also to learn the temper and +dispositions of the Indians, and to investigate the case of +Colonel James Hubbardt who was charged with the murder of Untoola +of Settiquo, a chief of the Cherokees. + +When Colonel Henderson arrived at Jonesborough, he found the +third Franklin legislature in session, and to this body he +presented Governor Martin's letter of February 27, 1785. In +response to the governor's request for an "account of the late +proceedings of the people in the western country," an extended +reply was drafted by the new legislature; and this letter, +conveyed to Governor Martin by Colonel Henderson, in setting +forth in detail the reasons for the secession, made the following +significant statement: "We humbly thank North Carolina for every +sentiment of regard she has for us, but are sorry to observe, +that as it is founded upon principles of interest, as is aparent +from the tenor of your letter, we are doubtful, when the cause +ceases which is the basis of that affection, we shall lose your +esteem." At the same time (March 22nd), Sevier, who had just been +chosen Governor of the State of Franklin, transmitted to Governor +Martin by Colonel Henderson a long letter, not hitherto published +in any history of the period, in which he outspokenly says: + +"It gives me great pain to think there should arise any Disputes +between us and North Carolina, & I flatter myself when North +Carolina states the matter in a fair light she will be fully +convinced that necessity and self preservation have Compelled Us +to the measures we Have taken, and could the people have +discovered that No. Carolina would Have protected and Govern'd +them, They would have remained where they were; but they +perceived a neglect and Coolness, and the Language of Many of +your most leading members Convinced them they were Altogether +Disregarded." + +Following the issuance of vigorous manifestos by Martin (April +25th) and Sevier (May 15th), the burden of the problem fell upon +Richard Caswell, who in June succeeded Martin as Governor of +North Carolina. + +Meantime the legislature of the over-mountain men had given the +name of Franklin to the new state, although for some time it +continued to be called by many Frankland, and its adherents +Franks. The legislature had also established an academy named +after Governor Martin, and had appointed (March 12th) William +Cocke as a delegate to the Continental Congress, urging its +acceptance of the cession. In the Memorial from the Franklin +legislature to the Continental Congress, dealing in some detail +with North Carolina's failure to send the Cherokees some goods +promised them for lands acquired by treaty, it is alleged: + +"She [North Carolina] immediately stoped the goods she had +promised to give the Indians for the said land which so +exasperated them that they begun to commit hostalities on our +frontiers in this situation we were induced to a declaration of +Independence not doubting we should be excused by Congress ... as +North Carolina seemed quite regardless of our interest and the +Indians daily murdering our friends and relations without +distinction of age or sex." + +Sympathizing with the precarious situation of the settlers, as +well as desiring the cession, Congress urged North Carolina to +amend the repealing act and execute a conveyance of the western +territory to the Union. + +Among the noteworthy features of the Franklin movement was the +constitution prepared by a committee, headed by the Reverend +Samuel Houston of Washington County, and presented at the meeting +of the Franklin legislature, Greeneville, November 14, 1785. This +eccentric constitution was based in considerable part upon the +North Carolina model; but it was "rejected in the lump" and the +constitution of North Carolina, almost unchanged, was adopted. +Under this Houston constitution, the name "Frankland" was chosen +for the new state. The legislature was to consist of but a single +house. In a section excluding from the legislature "ministers of +the gospel, attorneys at law, and doctors of physics," those were +declared ineligible for office who were of immoral character or +guilty of "such flagrant enormities as drunkenness, gaming, +profane swearing, lewdness, Sabbath-breaking and such like," or +who should deny the existence of God, of heaven, and of hell, the +inspiration of the Scriptures, or the existence of the Trinity. +Full religious liberty and the rights of conscience were +assured--but strict orthodoxy was a condition for eligibility to +office. No one should be chosen to office who was "not a scholar +to do the business." This remarkable document, which provided for +many other curious innovations in government, was the work of +pioneer doctrinaires--Houston, Campbell, Cocke, and Tipton--and +deserves study as a bizarre reflection of the spirit and genius +of the western frontiersmen. + +The liberal policy of Martin, followed by the no less +conciliatory attitude of his successor, Caswell, for the time +proved wholly abortive. However, Martin's appointment of Evan +Shelby in Sevier's place as brigadier, and of Jonathan Tipton as +colonel of his county, produced disaffection among the Franks; +and the influence of Joseph Martin against the new government was +a powerful obstacle to its success. At first the two sets of +military, civil, and judicial officers were able to work amicably +together; and a working-basis drawn up by Shelby and Sevier, +although afterward repudiated by the Franklin legislature, +smoothed over some of the rapidly accumulating difficulties. The +persistent and quiet assertion of authority by North Carolina, +without any overt act of violence against the officers of +Franklin state, revealed great diplomatic skill in Governors +Martin and Caswell. It was doubtless the considerate policy of +the latter, coupled with the defection from Sevier's cause of men +of the stamp of Houston and Tipton, after the blundering and +cavalier rejection of their singular constitution, which +undermined the foundations of Franklin. Sevier himself later +wrote with considerable bitterness: "I have been faithfull, and +my own breast acquits myself that I have acted no part but what +has been Consistent with honor and justice, tempered with +Clemency and mercy. How far our pretended patriots have supported +me as their pretended chiefe magistrate, I leave the world at +large to Judge." Arthur Campbell's plans for the formation of a +greater Franklin, through the union of the people on the western +waters of Virginia with those of North Carolina, came to nought +when Virginia in the autumn of 1785 with stern decisiveness +passed an act making it high treason to erect an independent +government within her limits unless authorized by the assembly. +Sevier, however, became more fixed in his determination to +establish a free state, writing to Governor Caswell: "We shall +continue to act independent and would rather suffer death, in all +its various and frightful shapes, than conform to anything that +is disgraceful." North Carolina, now proceeding with vigor +(November, 1786), fully reassumed its sovereignty and +jurisdiction over the mountain counties, but passed an act of +pardon and oblivion, and in many ways adopted moderate and +conciliatory measures. + +Driven to extremities, Cocke and Sevier in turn appealed for aid +and advice to Benjamin Franklin, in whose honor the new state had +been named. In response to Cocke, Franklin wrote (August 12, +1786): "I think you are perfectly right in resolving to submit +them [the Points in Dispute] to the Decision of Congress and to +abide by their Determination." Franklin's views change in the +interim; for when, almost a year later, Sevier asks him for +counsel, Franklin has come to the conclusion that the wisest move +for Sevier was not to appeal to Congress, but to endeavor to +effect some satisfactory compromise with North Carolina (June 30, +1787): + +"There are only two Things that Humanity induces me to wish you +may succeed in: The Accomodating your Misunderstanding with the +Government of North Carolina, by amicable Means; and the Avoiding +an Indian war, by preventing Encroaching on their Lands.... +The Inconvenience to your People attending so remote a Seat of +Government, and the difficulty to that Government in ruling well +so remote a People, would I think be powerful Inducements with +it, to accede to any fair & reasonable Proposition it may receive +from you towards an Accommodation." + +Despite Sevier's frenzied efforts to achieve independence--his +treaty with the Indians, his sensational plan to incorporate the +Cherokees into the new state, his constancy to an ideal of revolt +against others in face of the reality of revolt against himself, +his struggle, equivocal and half-hearted, with the North Carolina +authorities under Tipton--despite all these heroic efforts, the +star of Franklin swiftly declined. The vigorous measures pursued +by General Joseph Martin, and his effective influence focussed +upon a movement already honey-combed with disaffection, finally +turned the scale. To the Franklin leaders he sent the urgent +message: "Nothing will do but a submission to the laws of North +Carolina." Early in April, 1788, Martin wrote to Governor +Randolph of Virginia: "I returned last evening from Green Co. +Washington destrict, North Carolina, after a tower through that +Co'ntry, and am happy to inform your Excellency that the late +unhappy dispute between the State of North Carolina, and the +pretended State of Franklin is subsided." Ever brave, constant, +and loyal to the interest of the pioneers, Sevier had originally +been drawn into the movement against his best judgment. Caught in +the unique trap, created by the passage of the cession act and +the sudden volte-face of its repeal, he struggled desperately to +extricate himself. Alone of all the leaders, the governor of +ill-starred Franklin remained recalcitrant. + + + +CHAPTER XX. The Lure of Spain--The Haven of Statehood + +The people of this region have come to realize truly upon what +part of the world and upon which nation their future happiness +and security depend, and they immediately infer that their +interest and prosperity depend entirely upon the protection and +liberality of your government.--John Sevier to Don Diego de +Gardoqui, September 12, 1788. + +From the early settlements in the eastern parts of this Continent +to the late & more recent settlements on the Kentucky in the Rest +the same difficulties have constantly occurred which now oppress +you, but by a series of patient sufferings, manly and spirited +exertions and unconquerable perseverance, they have been +altogether or in great measure subdued.--Governor Samuel Johnston +to James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe, January 29, 1788. + + +A strange sham-battle, staged like some scene from opera bouffe, +in the bleak snow-storm of February, 1788, is really the prelude +to a remarkable drama of revolt in which Sevier, Robertson, +Bledsoe, and the Cumberland stalwarts play the leading roles. On +February 27th, incensed beyond measure by the action of Colonel +John Tipton in harboring some of his slaves seized by the sheriff +under an execution issued by one of the North Carolina courts, +Sevier with one hundred and fifty adherents besieged Tipton with +a few of his friends in his home on Sinking Creek. The siege was +raised at daybreak on February 29th by the arrival of +reinforcements under Colonel Maxwell from Sullivan County; and +Sevier, who was unwilling to precipitate a conflict, withdrew his +forces after some desultory firing, in which two men were killed +and several wounded. Soon afterward Sevier sent word to Tipton +that on condition his life be spared he would submit to North +Carolina. On this note of tragi-comedy the State of Franklin +appeared quietly to expire. The usually sanguine Sevier, now +thoroughly chastened, sought shelter in the distant settlements--deeply +despondent over the humiliating failure of his plans and +the even more depressing defection of his erstwhile friends and +supporters The revolutionary designs and separatist tendencies +which he still harbored were soon to involve him in a secret +conspiracy to give over the State of Franklin into the protection +of a foreign power. + +The fame of Sevier's martial exploits and of his bold stroke for +independence had long since gone abroad, astounding even so +famous an advocate of liberty as Patrick Henry and winning the +sympathy of the Continental Congress. One of the most interested +observers of the progress of affairs in the State of Franklin was +Don Diego de Gardoqui, who had come to America in the spring of +1785, bearing a commission to the American Congress as Spanish +charge d'affaires (Encargados de Negocios) to the United States. +In the course of his negotiations with Jay concerning the right +of navigation of the Mississippi River, which Spain denied to the +Americans, Gardoqui was not long in discovering the violent +resentment of the Western frontiersmen, provoked by Jay's crass +blunder in proposing that the American republic, in return for +reciprocal foreign advantages offered by Spain, should waive for +twenty-five years her right to navigate the Mississippi. The +Cumberland traders had already felt the heavy hand of Spain in +the confiscation of their goods at Natchez; but thus far the +leaders of the Tennessee frontiersmen had prudently restrained +the more turbulent agitators against the Spanish policy, fearing +lest the spirit of retaliation, once aroused, might know no +bounds. Throughout the entire region of the trans-Alleghany, a +feeling of discontent and unrest prevailed--quite as much the +result of dissatisfaction with the central government which +permitted the wholesale restraint of trade, as of resentment +against the domination of Spain. + +No sooner had the shrewd and watchful Gardoqui, who was eager to +utilize the separatist sentiment of the western settlements in +the interest of his country, learned of Sevier's armed +insurrection against the authority of North Carolina than he +despatched an emissary to sound the leading men of Franklin and +the Cumberland settlements in regard to an alliance. This secret +emissary was Dr. James White, who had been appointed by the +United States Government as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for +the Southern Department on November 29, 1786. Reporting as +instructed to Don Estevan Miro, governor of Louisiana, White, the +corrupt tool of Spain, stated concerning his confidential mission +that the leaders of "Frankland" and "Cumberland district" had +"eagerly accepted the conditions" laid down by Gardoqui: to take +the oath of allegiance to Spain, and to renounce all submission +or allegiance whatever to any other sovereign or power. Satisfied +by the secret advices received, the Spanish minister reported to +the home authorities his confident belief that the Tennessee +backwoodsmen, if diplomatically handled, would readily throw in +their lot with Spain. + +After the fiasco of his siege of Tipton's home, Sevier had seized +upon the renewal of hostilities by the Cherokees as a means of +regaining his popularity. This he counted upon doing by rallying +his old comrades-in-arms under his standard and making one of his +meteoric, whirlwind onslaughts upon their ancient Indian foe. The +victory of this erstwhile popular hero, the beloved "Nolichucky +Jack of the Border," over the Indians at a town on the Hiwassee +"so raised him in the esteem of the people on the frontier," +reports Colonel Maxwell, "that the people began [once more] to +flock to his standard." Inspirited by this good turn in his +fortunes, Sevier readily responded to Dr. White's overtures. + +Alarmed early in the year over the unprovoked depredations and +murders by the Indians in several Tennessee counties and on the +Kentucky road, Sevier, Robertson, and Anthony Bledsoe had +persuaded Governor Samuel Johnston of North Carolina to address +Gardoqui and request him to exert his influence to prevent +further acts of savage barbarity. In letters to Governor +Johnston, to Robertson, and to Sevier, all of date April 18th, +Gardoqui expressed himself in general as being "extremely +surprised to know that there is a suspicion that the good +government of Spain is encouraging these acts of barbarity." The +letters to Robertson and Sevier, read between the lines as +suggestive reinforcements of Spain's secret proposals, possess +real significance. The letter to Sevier contains this dexterously +expressed sentiment: "His Majesty is very favorably inclined to +give the inhabitants of that region all the protection that they +ask for and, on my part, I shall take very great pleasure in +contributing to it on this occasion and other occasions." + +This letter, coupled with the confidential proposals of Dr. +White, furnished a convenient opening for correspondence with the +Spaniards; and in July Sevier wrote to Gardoqui indicating his +readiness to accede to their proposals. After secret conferences +with men who had supported him throughout the vicissitudes of his +ill-starred state, Sevier carefully matured his plans. The +remarkable letter of great length which he wrote to Gardoqui on +September 12, 1788, reveals the conspiracy in all its details and +presents in vivid colors the strong separatist sentiment of the +day. Sevier urgently petitions Gardoqui for the loan of a few +thousand pounds, to enable him to "make the most expedient and +necessary preparations for defense"; and offers to repay the loan +within a short time "by sending the products of this region to +the lower ports." Upon the vital matter of "delivering" the State +of Franklin to Spain, he forthrightly says: + +"Since my last of the 18th of July, upon consulting with the +principal men of this country, I have been particularly happy to +find that they are equally disposed and ready as I am to accept +your propositions and guarantees. You may be sure that the +pleasing hopes and ideas which the people of this country hold +with regard to the probability of an alliance with, and +commercial concessions from, you are very ardent, and that we are +unanimously determined on that score. The people of this region +have come to realize truly upon what part of the world and upon +which nation their future happiness and security depend, and they +immediately infer that their interest and prosperity depend +entirely upon the protection and liberality of your government.... +Being the first from this side of the Appalachian Mountains +to resort in this way to your protection and liberality, we feel +encouraged to entertain the greatest hope that we shall be +granted all reasonable aid by him who is so amply able to do it, +and to give the protection and help that is asked of him in this +petition. You know our delicate situation and the difficulties in +which we are in respect to our mother State which is making use +of every strategem to impede the development and prosperity of +this country.... Before I conclude, it may be necessary to +remind you that there will be no more favorable occasion than the +present one to put this plan into execution. North Carolina has +rejected the Constitution and moreover it seems to me that a +considerable time will elapse before she becomes a member of the +Union, if that event ever happens." + +Through Miro, Gardoqui was simultaneously conducting a similar +correspondence with General James Wilkinson. The object of the +Spanish conspiracy, matured as the result of this correspondence, +was to seduce Kentucky from her allegiance to the United States. +Despite the superficial similarity between the situation of +Franklin and Kentucky, it would be doing Sevier and his adherents +a capital injustice to place them in the category of the corrupt +Wilkinson and the malodorous Sebastian. Moreover, the +secessionists of Franklin, as indicated in the above letter, had +the excuse of being left virtually without a country. On the +preceding August 1st, North Carolina had rejected the +Constitution of the United States; and the leaders of Franklin, +who were sorely aggrieved by what they regarded as her +indifference and neglect, now felt themselves more than ever out +of the Union and wholly repudiated by the mother state. Again, +Sevier had the embittered feeling resultant from outlawry. +Because of his course in opposing the laws and government of +North Carolina and in the killing of several good citizens, +including the sheriff of Washington County, by his forces at +Sinking Creek, Sevier, through the action of Governor Johnston of +North Carolina, had been attainted of high treason. Under the +heavy burden of this grave charge, he felt his hold upon Franklin +relax. Further, an atrocity committed in the recent campaign +under Sevier's leadership--Kirk's brutal murder of Corn Tassel, a +noble old Indian, and other chieftains, while under the +protection of a flag of truce--had placed a bar sinister across +the fair fame of this stalwart of the border. Utter desperation +thus prompted Sevier's acceptance of Gardoqui's offer of the +protection of Spain. + +John Sevier's son, James, bore the letter of September 12th to +Gardoqui. By a strangely ironic coincidence, on the very day +(October 10, 1788) that Gardoqui wrote to Miro, recommending to +the attention of Spain Dr. White and James Sevier, the emissaries +of Franklin, with their plans and proposals, John Sevier was +arrested by Colonel Tipton at the Widow Brown's in Washington +County, on the charge of high treason. He was handcuffed and +borne off, first to Jonesborough and later to Morganton. But his +old friends and former comrades-in-arms, Charles and Joseph +McDowell, gave bond for his appearance at court; and Morrison, +the sheriff, who also had fought at King's Mountain, knocked the +irons from his wrists and released him on parole. Soon afterward +a number of Sevier's devoted friends, indignant over his arrest, +rode across the mountains to Morganton and silently bore him +away, never to be arrested again. In November an act of pardon +and oblivion with respect to Franklin was passed by the North +Carolina Assembly. Although Sevier was forbidden to hold office +under the state, the passage of this act automatically operated +to clear him of the alleged offense of high treason. With affairs +in Franklin taking this turn, it is little wonder that Gardoqui +and Miro paid no further heed to Sevier's proposal to accept the +protection of Spain. Sevier's continued agitation in behalf of +the independence of Franklin inspired Governor Johnston with the +fear that he would have to be "proceeded against to the last +extremity." But Sevier's opposition finally subsiding, he was +pardoned, given a seat in the North Carolina assembly, and with +extraordinary consideration honored with his former rank of +brigadier-general. + +When Dr. White reported to Miro that the leaders of "Frankland" +had eagerly accepted Gardoqui's conditions for an alliance with +Spain, he categorically added: "With regard to Cumberland +district, what I have said of Frankland applies to it with equal +force and truth." James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe had but +recently availed themselves of the good offices of Governor +Johnston of North Carolina in the effort to influence Gardoqui to +quiet the Creek Indians. The sagacious and unscrupulous half +breed Alexander McGillivray had placed the Creeks under the +protection of Spain in 1784; and shortly afterward they began to +be regularly supplied with ammunition by the Spanish authorities. +At first Spain pursued the policy of secretly encouraging these +Indians to resist the encroachments of the Americans, while she +remained on outwardly friendly terms with the United States. +During the period of the Spanish conspiracy, however, there is +reason to believe that Miro endeavored to keep the Indians at +peace with the borderers, as a friendly service, intended to pave +the way for the establishment of intimate relations between Spain +and the dwellers in the trans-Alleghany. Yet his efforts cannot +have been very effective; for the Cumberland settlements +continued to suffer from the ravages and depredations of the +Creeks, who remained "totally averse to peace, notwithstanding +they have had no cause of offence"; and Robertson and Bledsoe +reported to Governor Caswell (June 12, 1787): "It is certain, the +Chickasaws inform us, that Spanish traders offer a reward for +scalps of the Americans." The Indian atrocities became so +frequent that Robertson later in the summer headed a party on the +famous Coldwater Expedition, in which he severely chastised the +marauding Indians. Aroused by the loss of a number of chiefs and +warriors at the hands of Robertson's men, and instigated, as was +generally believed, by the Spaniards, the Creeks then prosecuted +their attacks with renewed violence against the Cumberland +settlements. + +Unprotected either by the mother state or by the national +government, unable to secure free passage to the Gulf for their +products, and sorely pressed to defend their homes, now seriously +endangered by the incessant attacks of the Creeks, the Cumberland +leaders decided to make secret overtures to McGillivray, as well +as to communicate to Miro, through Dr. White, their favorable +inclination toward the proposals of the one country which +promised them protection. In a letter which McGillivray wrote to +Miro (transmitted to Madrid, June 15, 1788) in regard to the +visit of Messrs. Hackett and Ewing, two trusty messengers sent by +Robertson and Bledsoe, he reports that the two delegates from the +district of Cumberland had not only submitted to him proposals of +peace but "had added that they would throw themselves into the +arms of His Majesty as subjects, and that Kentucky and Cumberland +are determined to free themselves from their dependence on +Congress, because that body can not protect either their +property, or favor their commerce, and they therefore believe +that they no longer owe obedience to a power which is incapable +of protecting them." Commenting upon McGillivray's communication, +Miro said in his report to Madrid (June 15, 1788): "I consider as +extremely interesting the intelligence conveyed to McGillivray by +the deputies on the fermentation existing in Kentucky, with +regard to a separation from the Union. Concerning the proposition +made to McGillivray by the inhabitants of Cumberland to become +the vassals of His Majesty, I have refrained from returning any +precise answer." + +In his long letter of reply to Robertson and Bledsoe, McGillivray +agreed to make peace between his nation, the Creeks, and the +Cumberland settlers. This letter was most favorably received and +given wide circulation throughout the West. In a most +ingratiating reply, offering McGillivray a fine gun and a lot in +Nashville, Robertson throws out the following broad suggestion, +which he obviously wishes McGillivray to convey to Miro: "In all +probability we cannot long remain in our present state, and if +the British or any commercial nation who may be in possession of +the mouth of the Mississippi would furnish us with trade, and +receive our produce there cannot be a doubt but the people on the +west side of the Appalachian mountains will open their eyes to +their real interest." Robertson actually had the district erected +out of the counties of Davidson, Sumner, and Tennessee given the +name of "Miro" by the Assembly of North Carolina in November, +1788--a significant symbol of the desires of the Cumberland +leaders. In a letter (April 23, 1789), Miro, who had just +received letters from Robertson (January 29th) and Daniel Smith +(March 4th) postmarked "District of Miro," observes: "The bearer, +Fagot, a confidential agent of Gen. Smith, informed me that the +inhabitants of Cumberland, or Miro, would ask North Carolina for +an act of separation the following fall, and that as soon as this +should be obtained other delegates would be sent from Cumberland +to New Orleans, with the object of placing that territory under +the domination of His Majesty. I replied to both in general +terms." + +Robertson, Bledsoe, and Smith were successful in keeping secret +their correspondence with McGillivray and Miro; and few were in +the secret of Sevier's effort to deliver the State of Franklin to +Spain. Joseph Martin was less successful in his negotiations; and +a great sensation was created throughout the Southern colonies +when a private letter from Joseph Martin to McGillivray (November +8, 1788) was intercepted. In this letter Martin said: "I must beg +that you write me by the first opportunity in answer to what I am +now going to say to you.... I hope to do honor to any part of +the world I settle in, and am determined to leave the United +States, for reasons that I can assign to you when we meet, but +durst not trust it to paper." The general assembly of Georgia +referred the question of the intercepted letter to the governor +of North Carolina (January 24, 1789); and the result was a +legislative investigation into Martin's conduct. Eleven months +later, the North Carolina assembly exonerated him. From the +correspondence of Joseph Martin and Patrick Henry, it would +appear that Martin, on Henry's advice, had acted as a spy upon +the Spaniards, in order to discover the views of McGillivray, to +protect the exposed white settlements from the Indians, and to +fathom the designs of the Spaniards against the United States. + +The sensational disclosures of Martin's intercepted letter had no +deterrent effect upon James Robertson in the attempted execution +of his plan for detaching the Cumberland settlements from North +Carolina. History has taken no account of the fact that Robertson +and the inhabitants now deliberately endeavored to secure an act +of separation from North Carolina. In the event of success, the +next move planned by the Cumberland leaders, as we have already +seen, was to send delegates to New Orleans for the purpose of +placing the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain. + +A hitherto unknown letter, from Robertson to (Miro), dated +Nashville, September 2, 1789, proves that a convention of the +people was actually held--the first overt step looking to an +alliance with Spain. In this letter Robertson says: + +"I must beg your Excellency's permission to take this early +opportunity of thanking you for the honor you did me in writing +by Mr. White. + +"I still hope that your Government, and these Settlements, are +destined to be mutually friendly and usefull, the people here are +impressed with the necessity of it. + +"We have just held a Convention; which has agreed that our +members shall insist on being Seperated from North Carolina. + +"Unprotected, we are to be obedient to the new Congress of the +United States; but we cannot but wish for a more interesting +Connection. + +"The United States afford us no protection. The district of Miro +is daily plundered and the inhabitants murdered by the Creeks, +and Cherokees, unprovoked. + +"For my own part, I conceive highly of the advantages of your +Government." + +A serious obstacle to the execution of the plans of Robertson and +the other leaders of the Cumberland settlements was the prompt +action of North Carolina. In actual conformity with the wishes of +the Western people, as set forth in the petition of Robertson and +Hayes, their representatives, made two years earlier, the +legislature of North Carolina in December passed the second act +of cession, by which the Western territory of North Carolina was +ceded to the United States. Instead of securing an act of +separation from North Carolina as the preparatory step to forming +what Robertson calls "a more interesting connection" with Spain, +Robertson and his associates now found themselves and the +transmontane region which they represented flung bodily into the +arms of the United States. Despite the unequivocal offer of the +calculating and desperate Sevier to "deliver" Franklin to Spain, +and the ingenious efforts of Robertson and his associates to +place the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain, the +Spanish court by its temporizing policy of evasion and indecision +definitely relinquished the ready opportunities thereby afforded, +of utilizing the powerful separatist tendencies of Tennessee for +the purpose of adding the empire upon the Western waters to the +Spanish domain in America. + +The year 1790 marks the end of an era the heroic age of the +pioneers of the Old Southwest. Following the acceptance of North +Carolina's deed of cession of her Western lands to the Union +(April 2, 1790) the Southwest Territory was erected on May 26th; +and William Blount, a North Carolina gentleman of eminence and +distinction, was appointed on June 8th to the post of governor of +the territory. Two years later (June 1, 1792) Kentucky was +admitted into the Union. + +It is a remarkable and inspiring circumstance, in testimony of +the martial instincts and unwavering loyalty of the transmontane +people, that the two men to whom the Western country in great +measure owed its preservation, the inciting and flaming spirits +of the King's Mountain campaign, were the unopposed first choice +of the people as leaders in the trying experiment of +Statehood--John Sevier of Tennessee and Isaac Shelby of Kentucky. +Had Franklin possessed the patient will of Kentucky, she might +well have preceded that region into the Union. It was not, +however, until June 1, 1796, that Tennessee, after a romantic and +arduous struggle, finally passed through the wide-flung portals +into the domain of national statehood. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Conquest of the Old Southwest, by +Archibald Henderson + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST *** + +***** This file should be named 2390.txt or 2390.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/9/2390/ + +Produced by Dianne Bean. HTML version by Al Haines. + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.net/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.net), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.net + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/old/20090327-2390.zip b/old/20090327-2390.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..3d056f1 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/20090327-2390.zip diff --git a/old/cnqsw10.txt b/old/cnqsw10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d4113b6 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cnqsw10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6694 @@ +Project Gutenberg's etext, The Conquest of the Old Southwest: The +Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers into Virginia, The Carolinas, +Tennessee, and Kentucky 1740-1790, by Archibald Henderson + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. We need your donations. + + +The Conquest of the Old Southwest: The Romantic Story of the Early +Pioneers into Virginia, The Carolinas, Tennessee, and Kentucky +1740-1790 + +by Archibald Henderson + +November, 2000 [Etext #2390] + + +Project Gutenberg Etext, The Conquest of the Old Southwest: The +Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers into Virginia, The Carolinas, +Tennessee, and Kentucky 1740-1790, by Archibald Henderson +******This file should be named cnqsw10.txt or cnqsw10.zip****** + +Corrected EDITIONS of our etexts get a new NUMBER, cnqsw11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, cnqsw10a.txt + + +Project Gutenberg Etexts are usually created from multiple editions, +all of which are in the Public Domain in the United States, unless a +copyright notice is included. Therefore, we usually do NOT keep any +of these books in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Etext scanned by Dianne Bean, Prescott Valley, Arizona. + +We are now trying to release all our books one month in advance +of the official release dates, leaving time for better editing. + +Please note: neither this list nor its contents are final till +midnight of the last day of the month of any such announcement. +The official release date of all Project Gutenberg Etexts is at +Midnight, Central Time, of the last day of the stated month. A +preliminary version may often be posted for suggestion, comment +and editing by those who wish to do so. To be sure you have an +up to date first edition [xxxxx10x.xxx] please check file sizes +in the first week of the next month. Since our ftp program has +a bug in it that scrambles the date [tried to fix and failed] a +look at the file size will have to do, but we will try to see a +new copy has at least one byte more or less. + + +Information about Project Gutenberg (one page) + +We produce about two million dollars for each hour we work. The +time it takes us, a rather conservative estimate, is fifty hours +to get any etext selected, entered, proofread, edited, copyright +searched and analyzed, the copyright letters written, etc. This +projected audience is one hundred million readers. If our value +per text is nominally estimated at one dollar then we produce $2 +million dollars per hour this year as we release thirty-six text +files per month, or 432 more Etexts in 1999 for a total of 2000+ +If these reach just 10% of the computerized population, then the +total should reach over 200 billion Etexts given away this year. + +The Goal of Project Gutenberg is to Give Away One Trillion Etext +Files by December 31, 2001. [10,000 x 100,000,000 = 1 Trillion] +This is ten thousand titles each to one hundred million readers, +which is only ~5% of the present number of computer users. + +At our revised rates of production, we will reach only one-third +of that goal by the end of 2001, or about 3,333 Etexts unless we +manage to get some real funding; currently our funding is mostly +from Michael Hart's salary at Carnegie-Mellon University, and an +assortment of sporadic gifts; this salary is only good for a few +more years, so we are looking for something to replace it, as we +don't want Project Gutenberg to be so dependent on one person. + +We need your donations more than ever! + + +All donations should be made to "Project Gutenberg/CMU": and are +tax deductible to the extent allowable by law. (CMU = Carnegie- +Mellon University). + +For these and other matters, please mail to: + +Project Gutenberg +P. O. Box 2782 +Champaign, IL 61825 + +When all other email fails. . .try our Executive Director: +Michael S. Hart <hart@pobox.com> +hart@pobox.com forwards to hart@prairienet.org and archive.org +if your mail bounces from archive.org, I will still see it, if +it bounces from prairienet.org, better resend later on. . . . + +We would prefer to send you this information by email. + +****** + +To access Project Gutenberg etexts, use any Web browser +to view http://promo.net/pg. This site lists Etexts by +author and by title, and includes information about how +to get involved with Project Gutenberg. You could also +download our past Newsletters, or subscribe here. This +is one of our major sites, please email hart@pobox.com, +for a more complete list of our various sites. + +To go directly to the etext collections, use FTP or any +Web browser to visit a Project Gutenberg mirror (mirror +sites are available on 7 continents; mirrors are listed +at http://promo.net/pg). + +Example FTP session: + +ftp metalab.unc.edu +login: anonymous +password: your@login +cd pub/docs/books/gutenberg +cd etext90 through etext99 or etext00 +dir [to see files] +get or mget [to get files. . .set bin for zip files] +GET GUTINDEX.?? [to get a year's listing of books, e.g., GUTINDEX.99] +GET GUTINDEX.ALL [to get a listing of ALL books] + +**Information prepared by the Project Gutenberg legal advisor** + +(Three Pages) + + +***START**THE SMALL PRINT!**FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS**START*** +Why is this "Small Print!" statement here? You know: lawyers. +They tell us you might sue us if there is something wrong with +your copy of this etext, even if you got it for free from +someone other than us, and even if what's wrong is not our +fault. So, among other things, this "Small Print!" statement +disclaims most of our liability to you. It also tells you how +you can distribute copies of this etext if you want to. + +*BEFORE!* YOU USE OR READ THIS ETEXT +By using or reading any part of this PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +etext, you indicate that you understand, agree to and accept +this "Small Print!" statement. If you do not, you can receive +a refund of the money (if any) you paid for this etext by +sending a request within 30 days of receiving it to the person +you got it from. If you received this etext on a physical +medium (such as a disk), you must return it with your request. + +ABOUT PROJECT GUTENBERG-TM ETEXTS +This PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext, like most PROJECT GUTENBERG- +tm etexts, is a "public domain" work distributed by Professor +Michael S. Hart through the Project Gutenberg Association at +Carnegie-Mellon University (the "Project"). Among other +things, this means that no one owns a United States copyright +on or for this work, so the Project (and you!) can copy and +distribute it in the United States without permission and +without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth +below, apply if you wish to copy and distribute this etext +under the Project's "PROJECT GUTENBERG" trademark. + +To create these etexts, the Project expends considerable +efforts to identify, transcribe and proofread public domain +works. Despite these efforts, the Project's etexts and any +medium they may be on may contain "Defects". Among other +things, Defects may take the form of incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other +intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged +disk or other etext medium, a computer virus, or computer +codes that damage or cannot be read by your equipment. + +LIMITED WARRANTY; DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES +But for the "Right of Replacement or Refund" described below, +[1] the Project (and any other party you may receive this +etext from as a PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm etext) disclaims all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including +legal fees, and [2] YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE OR +UNDER STRICT LIABILITY, OR FOR BREACH OF WARRANTY OR CONTRACT, +INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE +OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE +POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. + +If you discover a Defect in this etext within 90 days of +receiving it, you can receive a refund of the money (if any) +you paid for it by sending an explanatory note within that +time to the person you received it from. If you received it +on a physical medium, you must return it with your note, and +such person may choose to alternatively give you a replacement +copy. If you received it electronically, such person may +choose to alternatively give you a second opportunity to +receive it electronically. + +THIS ETEXT IS OTHERWISE PROVIDED TO YOU "AS-IS". NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, ARE MADE TO YOU AS +TO THE ETEXT OR ANY MEDIUM IT MAY BE ON, INCLUDING BUT NOT +LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A +PARTICULAR PURPOSE. + +Some states do not allow disclaimers of implied warranties or +the exclusion or limitation of consequential damages, so the +above disclaimers and exclusions may not apply to you, and you +may have other legal rights. + +INDEMNITY +You will indemnify and hold the Project, its directors, +officers, members and agents harmless from all liability, cost +and expense, including legal fees, that arise directly or +indirectly from any of the following that you do or cause: +[1] distribution of this etext, [2] alteration, modification, +or addition to the etext, or [3] any Defect. + +DISTRIBUTION UNDER "PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm" +You may distribute copies of this etext electronically, or by +disk, book or any other medium if you either delete this +"Small Print!" and all other references to Project Gutenberg, +or: + +[1] Only give exact copies of it. Among other things, this + requires that you do not remove, alter or modify the + etext or this "small print!" statement. You may however, + if you wish, distribute this etext in machine readable + binary, compressed, mark-up, or proprietary form, + including any form resulting from conversion by word pro- + cessing or hypertext software, but only so long as + *EITHER*: + + [*] The etext, when displayed, is clearly readable, and + does *not* contain characters other than those + intended by the author of the work, although tilde + (~), asterisk (*) and underline (_) characters may + be used to convey punctuation intended by the + author, and additional characters may be used to + indicate hypertext links; OR + + [*] The etext may be readily converted by the reader at + no expense into plain ASCII, EBCDIC or equivalent + form by the program that displays the etext (as is + the case, for instance, with most word processors); + OR + + [*] You provide, or agree to also provide on request at + no additional cost, fee or expense, a copy of the + etext in its original plain ASCII form (or in EBCDIC + or other equivalent proprietary form). + +[2] Honor the etext refund and replacement provisions of this + "Small Print!" statement. + +[3] Pay a trademark license fee to the Project of 20% of the + net profits you derive calculated using the method you + already use to calculate your applicable taxes. If you + don't derive profits, no royalty is due. Royalties are + payable to "Project Gutenberg Association/Carnegie-Mellon + University" within the 60 days following each + date you prepare (or were legally required to prepare) + your annual (or equivalent periodic) tax return. + +WHAT IF YOU *WANT* TO SEND MONEY EVEN IF YOU DON'T HAVE TO? +The Project gratefully accepts contributions in money, time, +scanning machines, OCR software, public domain etexts, royalty +free copyright licenses, and every other sort of contribution +you can think of. Money should be paid to "Project Gutenberg +Association / Carnegie-Mellon University". + +*END*THE SMALL PRINT! FOR PUBLIC DOMAIN ETEXTS*Ver.04.29.93*END* + + + + +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST: THE ROMANTIC STORY OF THE +EARLY PIONEERS INTO VIRGINIA, THE CAROLINAS, TENNESSEE, AND +KENTUCKY 1740-1790 + +BY ARCHIBALD HENDERSON, Ph.D., D.C.L. + +Some to endure and many to fail, +Some to conquer and many to quail +Toiling over the Wilderness Trail. + +NEW YORK +THE CENTURY CO. +1920 + +TO THE HISTORIAN OF +OLD WEST AND NEW WEST +FREDERICK JACKSON TURNER +WITH ADMIRATION AND REGARD + +The country might invite a prince from his palace, merely for the +pleasure of contemplating its beauty and excellence; but only add +the rapturous idea of property, and what allurements can the +world offer for the loss of so glorious a prospect?--Richard +Henderson. + +The established Authority of any government in America, and the +policy of Government at home, are both insufficient to restrain +the Americans . . . . They acquire no attachment to Place: But +wandering about Seems engrafted in their Nature; and it is a +weakness incident to it, that they Should for ever imagine the +Lands further off, are Still better than those upon which they +are already settled.--Lord Dunmore, to the Earl of Dartmouth. + + +INTRODUCTION + +The romantic and thrilling story of the southward and westward +migration of successive waves of transplanted European peoples +throughout the entire course of the eighteenth century is the +history of the growth and evolution of American democracy. Upon +the American continent was wrought out, through almost superhuman +daring, incredible hardship, and surpassing endurance, the +formation of a new society. The European rudely confronted with +the pitiless conditions of the wilderness soon discovered that +his maintenance, indeed his existence, was conditioned upon his +individual efficiency and his resourcefulness in adapting himself +to his environment. The very history of the human race, from the +age of primitive man to the modern era of enlightened +civilization, is traversed in the Old Southwest throughout the +course of half a century. + +A series of dissolving views thrown upon the screen, picturing +the successive episodes in the history of a single family as it +wended its way southward along the eastern valleys, resolutely +repulsed the sudden attack of the Indians, toiled painfully up +the granite slopes of the Appalachians, and pitched down into the +transmontane wilderness upon the western waters, would give to +the spectator a vivid conception, in miniature, of the westward +movement. But certain basic elements in the grand procession, +revealed to the sociologist and the economist, would perhaps +escape his scrutiny. Back of the individual, back of the family, +even, lurk the creative and formative impulses of colonization, +expansion, and government. In the recognition of these social and +economic tendencies the individual merges into the group; the +group into the community; the community into a new society. In +this clear perspective of historic development the spectacular +hero at first sight seems to diminish; but the mass, the +movement, the social force which he epitomizes and interprets, +gain in impressiveness and dignity. + +As the irresistible tide of migratory peoples swept ever +southward and westward, seeking room for expansion and economic +independence, a series of frontiers was gradually thrust out +toward the wilderness in successive waves of irregular +indentation. The true leader in this westward advance, to whom +less than his deserts has been accorded by the historian, is the +drab and mercenary trader with the Indians. The story of his +enterprise and of his adventures begins with the planting of +European civilization upon American soil. In the mind of the +aborigines he created the passion for the fruits, both good and +evil, of the white man's civilization, and he was welcomed by the +Indian because he also brought the means for repelling the +further advance of that civilization. The trader was of +incalculable service to the pioneer in first spying out the land +and charting the trackless wilderness. The trail rudely marked by +the buffalo became in time the Indian path and the trader's +"trace"; and the pioneers upon the westward march, following the +line of least resistance, cut out their, roads along these very +routes. It is not too much to say that had it not been for the +trader--brave, hardy, and adventurous however often crafty, +unscrupulous, and immoral--the expansionist movement upon the +American continent would have been greatly retarded. + +So scattered and ramified were the enterprises and expeditions of +the traders with the Indians that the frontier which they +established was at best both shifting and unstable. Following far +in the wake of these advance agents of the civilization which +they so often disgraced, came the cattle-herder or rancher, who +took advantage of the extensive pastures and ranges along the +uplands and foot-hills to raise immense herds of cattle. Thus was +formed what might be called a rancher's frontier, thrust out in +advance of the ordinary farming settlements and serving as the +first serious barrier against the Indian invasion. The westward +movement of population is in this respect a direct advance from +the coast. Years before the influx into the Old Southwest of the +tides of settlement from the northeast, the more adventurous +struck straight westward in the wake of the fur-trader, and here +and there erected the cattle-ranges beyond the farming frontier +of the piedmont region. The wild horses and cattle which roamed +at will through the upland barrens and pea-vine pastures were +herded in and driven for sale to the city markets of the East. + +The farming frontier of the piedmont plateau constituted the real +backbone of western settlement. The pioneering farmers, with the +adventurous instincts of the hunter and the explorer, plunged +deeper and ever deeper into the wilderness, lured on by the +prospect of free and still richer lands in the dim interior. +Settlements quickly sprang up in the neighborhood of military +posts or rude forts established to serve as safeguards against +hostile attack; and trade soon flourished between these +settlements and the eastern centers, following the trails of the +trader and the more beaten paths of emigration. The bolder +settlers who ventured farthest to the westward were held in +communication with the East through their dependence upon salt +and other necessities of life; and the search for salt-springs in +the virgin wilderness was an inevitable consequence of the desire +of the pioneer to shake off his dependence upon the coast. + +The prime determinative principle of the progressive American +civilization of the eighteenth century was the passion for the +acquisition of land. The struggle for economic independence +developed the germ of American liberty and became the +differentiating principle of American character. Here was a vast +unappropriated region in the interior of the continent to be had +for the seeking, which served as lure and inspiration to the man +daring enough to risk his all in its acquisition. It was in +accordance with human nature and the principles of political +economy that this unknown extent of uninhabited transmontane +land, widely renowned for beauty, richness, and fertility, should +excite grandiose dreams in the minds of English and Colonials +alike. England was said to be "New Land mad and everybody there +has his eye fixed on this country." Groups of wealthy or +well-to-do individuals organized themselves into land companies +for the colonization and exploitation of the West. The pioneer +promoter was a powerful creative force in westward expansion; and +the activities of the early land companies were decisive factors +in the colonization of the wilderness. Whether acting under the +authority of a crown grant or proceeding on their own authority, +the land companies tended to give stability and permanence to +settlements otherwise hazardous and insecure. + +The second determinative impulse of the pioneer civilization was +wanderlust--the passionately inquisitive instinct of the hunter, +the traveler, and the explorer. This restless class of nomadic +wanderers was responsible in part for the royal proclamation of +1763, a secondary object of which, according to Edmund Burke, was +the limitation of the colonies on the West, as "the charters of +many of our old colonies give them, with few exceptions, no +bounds to the westward but the South Sea." The Long Hunters, +taking their lives in their hands, fared boldly forth to a fabled +hunter's paradise in the far-away wilderness, because they were +driven by the irresistible desire of a Ponce de Leon or a De Soto +to find out the truth about the unknown lands beyond. + +But the hunter was not only thrilled with the passion of the +chase and of discovery; he was intent also upon collecting the +furs and skins of wild animals for lucrative barter and sale in +the centers of trade. He was quick to make "tomahawk claims" and +to assert "corn rights" as he spied out the rich virgin land for +future location and cultivation. Free land and no taxes appealed +to the backwoodsman, tired of paying quit-rents to the agents of +wealthy lords across the sea. Thus the settler speedily followed +in the hunter's wake. In his wake also went many rude and lawless +characters of the border, horse thieves and criminals of +different sorts, who sought to hide their delinquencies in the +merciful liberality of the wilderness. For the most part, +however, it was the salutary instinct of the homebuilder--the man +with the ax, who made a little clearing in the forest and built +there a rude cabin that he bravely defended at all risks against +continued assaults--which, in defiance of every restraint, +irresistibly thrust westward the thin and jagged line of the +frontier. The ax and the surveyor's chain, along with the rifle +and the hunting-knife, constituted the armorial bearings of the +pioneer. With individual as with corporation, with explorer as +with landlord, land-hunger was the master impulse of the era. + +The various desires which stimulated and promoted westward +expansion were, to be sure, often found in complete conjunction. +The trader sought to exploit the Indian for his own advantage, +selling him whisky, trinkets, and firearms in return for rich +furs and costly peltries; yet he was often a hunter himself and +collected great stores of peltries as the result of his solitary +and protracted hunting-expeditions. The rancher and the herder +sought to exploit the natural vegetation of marsh and upland, the +cane-brakes and pea-vines; yet the constantly recurring need for +fresh pasturage made him a pioneer also, drove him ever nearer to +the mountains, and furnished the economic motive for his westward +advance. The small farmer needed the virgin soil of the new +region, the alluvial river-bottoms, and the open prairies, for +the cultivation of his crops and the grazing of his cattle; yet +in the intervals between the tasks of farm life he scoured the +wilderness in search of game "and spied out new lands for future +settlement". + +This restless and nomadic race, says the keenly observant Francis +Baily, "delight much to live on the frontiers, where they can +enjoy undisturbed, and free from the control of any laws, the +blessings which nature has bestowed upon them." Independence of +spirit, impatience of restraint, the inquisitive nature, and the +nomadic temperament--these are the strains in the American +character of the eighteenth century which ultimately blended to +create a typical democracy. The rolling of wave after wave of +settlement westward across the American continent, with a +reversion to primitive conditions along the line of the farthest +frontier, and a marked rise in the scale of civilization at each +successive stage of settlement, from the western limit to the +eastern coast, exemplifies from one aspect the history of the +American people during two centuries. This era, constituting the +first stage in our national existence, and productive of a +buoyant national character shaped in democracy upon a free soil, +closed only yesterday with the exhaustion of cultivable free +land, the disappearance of the last frontier, and the recent +death of "Buffalo Bill". The splendid inauguration of the period, +in the region of the Carolinas, Virginia, Tennessee, and +Kentucky, during the second half of the eighteenth century, is +the theme of this story of the pioneers of the Old Southwest. + + +CONTENTS + +INTRODUCTION + +I THE MIGRATION OF THE PEOPLES + +II THE CRADLE OF WESTWARD EXPANSION + +III THE BACK COUNTRY AND THE BORDER + +IV THE INDIAN WAR + +V IN DEFENSE OF CIVILIZATION + +VI CRUSHING THE CHEROKEES + +VII THE LAND COMPANIES + +VIII THE LONG HUNTERS IN THE TWILIGHT ZONE + +IX DANIEL BOONE AND WILDERNESS EXPLORATION + +X DANIEL BOONE IN KENTUCKY + +XI THE REGULATORS + +XII WATAUGA--HAVEN OF LIBERTY + +XIII OPENING THE GATEWAY--DUNMORE'S WAR + +XIV RICHARD HENDERSON AND THE TRANSYLVANIA COMPANY + +XV TRANSYLVANIA--A WILDERNESS COMMONWEALTH + +XVI THE REPULSE OF THE RED MEN + +XVII THE COLONIZATION OF THE CUMBERLAND + +XVIII KING'S MOUNTAIN + +XIX THE STATE OF FRANKLIN + +XX THE LURE OF SPAIN--THE HAVEN OF STATEHOOD + + + +THE CONQUEST OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST + +Chapter I. The Migration of the Peoples + +Inhabitants flock in here daily, mostly from Pensilvania and +other parts of America, who are over-stocked with people and Mike +directly from Europe, they commonly seat themselves towards the +West, and have got near the mountains.--Gabriel Johnston, +Governor of North Carolina, to the Secretary of the Board of +Trade, February 15, 1751. + + +At the opening of the eighteenth century the tide of population +had swept inland to the "fall line", the westward boundary of the +established settlements. The actual frontier had been advanced by +the more aggressive pioneers to within fifty miles of the Blue +Ridge. So rapid was the settlement in North Carolina that in the +interval 1717-32 the population quadrupled in numbers. A map of +the colonial settlements in 1725 reveals a narrow strip of +populated land along the Atlantic coast, of irregular +indentation, with occasional isolated nuclei of settlements +further in the interior. The civilization thus established +continued to maintain a close and unbroken communication with +England and the Continent. As long as the settlers, for economic +reasons, clung to the coast, they reacted but slowly to the +transforming influences of the frontier.. Within a triangle of +continental altitude with its apex in New England, bounded on the +east by the Atlantic, and on the west by the Appalachian range, +lay the settlements, divided into two zones--tidewater and +piedmont. As no break occurred in the great mountain system south +of the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, the difficulties of cutting a +passage through the towering wall of living green long proved an +effective obstacle to the crossing of the grim mountain barrier. + +In the beginning the settlements gradually extended westward from +the coast in irregular outline, the indentations taking form +around such natural centers of attraction as areas of fertile +soil, frontier posts, mines, salt-springs, and stretches of +upland favorable for grazing. After a time a second advance of +settlement was begun in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, +running in a southwesterly direction along the broad terraces to +the east of the Appalachian Range, which in North Carolina lies +as far as two hundred and fifty miles from the sea. The Blue +Ridge in Virginia and a belt of pine barrens in North Carolina +were hindrances to this advance, but did not entirely check it. +This second streaming of the population thrust into the long, +narrow wedge of the piedmont zone a class of people differing in +spirit and in tendency from their more aristocratic and +complacent neighbors to the east. + +These settlers of the Valley of Virginia and the North Carolina +piedmont region--English, Scotch-Irish, Germans, Scotch, Irish, +Welsh, and a few French--were the first pioneers of the Old +Southwest. From the joint efforts of two strata of population, +geographically, socially, and economically distinct--tidewater +and piedmont, Old South and New South--originated and flowered +the third and greatest movement of westward expansion, opening +with the surmounting of the mountain barrier and ending in the +occupation and assumption of the vast medial valley of the +continent. + +Synchronous with the founding of Jamestown in Virginia, +significantly enough, was the first planting of Ulster with the +English and Scotch. Emigrants from the Scotch Lowlands, sometimes +as many as four thousand a year (1625), continued throughout the +century to pour into Ulster. "Those of the North of Ireland . . +.," as pungently described in 1679 by the Secretary of State, +Leoline Jenkins, to the Duke of Ormond, "are most Scotch and +Scotch breed and are the Northern Presbyterians and phanatiques, +lusty, able bodied, hardy and stout men, where one may see three +or four hundred at every meeting-house on Sunday, and all the +North of Ireland is inhabited by these, which is the popular +place of all Ireland by far. They are very numerous and greedy +after land." During the quarter of a century after the English +Revolution of 1688 and the Jacobite uprising in Ireland, which +ended in 1691 with the complete submission of Ireland to William +and Mary, not less than fifty thousand Scotch, according to +Archbishop Synge, settled in Ulster. Until the beginning of the +eighteenth century there was no considerable emigration to +America; and it was first set up as a consequence of English +interference with trade and religion. Repressive measures passed +by the English parliament (1665 1699), prohibiting the +exportation from Ire land to England and Scotland of cattle, +beef, pork, dairy products, etc., and to any country whatever of +manufactured wool, had aroused deep resentment among the +Scotch-Irish, who had built up a great commerce. This discontent +was greatly aggravated by the imposition of religious +disabilities upon the Presbyterians, who, in addition to having +to pay tithes for the support of the established church, were +excluded from all civil and military office (1704), while their +ministers were made liable to penalties for celebrating +marriages. + +This pressure upon a high-spirited people resulted inevitably in +an exodus to the New World. The principal ports by which the +Ulsterites entered America were Lewes and Newcastle (Delaware), +Philadelphia and Boston. The streams of immigration steadily +flowed up the Delaware Valley; and by 1720 the Scotch-Irish began +to arrive in Bucks County. So rapid was the rate of increase in +immigration that the number of arrivals soon mounted from a few +hundred to upward of six thousand, in a single year (1729); and +within a few years this number was doubled. According to the +meticulous Franklin, the proportion increased from a very small +element of the population of Pennsylvania in 1700 to one fourth +of the whole in 1749, and to one third of the whole (350,000) in +1774. Writing to the Penns in 1724, James Logan, Secretary of the +Province, caustically refers to the Ulster settlers on the +disputed Maryland line as "these bold and indigent strangers, +saying as their excuse when challenged for titles, that we had +solicited for colonists and they had come accordingly." The +spirit of these defiant squatters is succinctly expressed in +their statement to Logan that it "was against the laws of God and +nature that so much land should be idle while so many Christians +wanted it to work on and to raise their bread." + +The rising scale of prices for Pennsylvania lands, changing from +ten pounds and two shillings quit-rents per hundred acres in 1719 +to fifteen pounds ten shillings per hundred acres with a +quit-rent of a halfpenny per acre in 1732, soon turned the eyes +of the thrifty Scotch-Irish settlers southward and southwestward. +In Maryland in 1738 lands were offered at five pounds sterling +per hundred acres. Simultaneously, in the Valley of Virginia free +grants of a thousand acres per family were being made. In the +North Carolina piedmont region the proprietary, Lord Granville, +through his agents was disposing of the most desirable lands to +settlers at the rate of three shillings proclamation money for +six hundred and forty acres, the unit of land-division; and was +also making large free grants on the condition of seating a +certain proportion of settlers. "Lord Carteret's land in +Carolina," says North Carolina's first American historian, "where +the soil was cheap, presented a tempting residence to people of +every denomination. Emigrants from the north of Ireland, by the +way of Pennsylvania, flocked to that country; and a considerable +part of North Carolina . . . is inhabited by those people or +their descendants." From 1740 onward, attracted by the rich lure +of cheap and even free lands in Virginia and North Carolina, a +tide of immigration swept ceaselessly into the valleys of the +Shenandoah, the Yadkin, and the Catawba. The immensity of this +mobile, drifting mass, which sometimes brought "more than 400 +families with horse waggons and cattle" into North Carolina in a +single year (1752-3), is attested by the fact that from 1732 to +1754, mainly as the result of the Scotch-Irish inundation, the +population of North Carolina more than doubled. + +The second important racial stream of population in the +settlement of the same region was composed of Germans, attracted +to this country from the Palatinate. Lured on by the highly +colored stories of the commercial agents for promoting +immigration--the "newlanders," who were thoroughly unscrupulous +in their methods and extravagant in their representations--a +migration from Germany began in the second decade of the +eighteenth century and quickly assumed alarming proportions. +Although certain of the emigrants were well-to-do, a very great +number were "redemptioners" (indentured servants), who in order +to pay for their transportation were compelled to pledge +themselves to several years of servitude. This economic condition +caused the German immigrant, wherever he went, to become a +settler of the back country, necessity compelling him to pass by +the more expensive lands near the coast. + +For well-nigh sixty years the influx of German immigrants of +various sects was very great, averaging something like fifteen +hundred a year into Pennsylvania alone from 1727 to 1775. Indeed, +Pennsylvania, one third of whose population at the beginning of +the Revolution was German, early became the great distributing +center for the Germans as well as for the Scotch-Irish. Certainly +by 1727 Adam Miller and his fellow Germans had established the +first permanent white settlement in the Valley of Virginia. By +1732 Jost Heydt, accompanied by sixteen families, came from York, +Pennsylvania, and settled on the Opeckon River, in the +neighborhood of the present Winchester. There is no longer any +doubt that "the portion of the Shenandoah Valley sloping to the +north was almost entirely settled by Germans." + +It was about the middle of the century that these pioneers of the +Old Southwest, the shrewd, industrious, and thrifty Pennsylvania +Germans (who came to be generally called "Pennsylvania Dutch" +from the incorrect translation of Pennsylvanische Deutsche), +began to pour into the piedmont region of North Carolina. In the +autumn, after the harvest was in, these ambitious Pennsylvania +pioneers would pack up their belongings in wagons and on beasts +of burden and head for the southwest, trekking down in the manner +of the Boers of South Africa. This movement into the fertile +valley lands of the Yadkin and the Catawba continued unabated +throughout the entire third quarter of the century. Owing to +their unfamiliarity with the English language and the solidarity +of their instincts, the German settlers at first had little share +in government. But they devotedly played their part in the +defense of the exposed settlements and often bore the brunt of +Indian attack. + +The bravery and hardihood displayed by the itinerant missionaries +sent out by the Pennsylvania Synod under the direction of Count +Zinzendorf (1742-8), and by the Moravian Church (1748-53), are +mirrored in the numerous diaries, written in German, happily +preserved to posterity in religious archives of Pennsylvania and +North Carolina. These simple, earnest crusaders, animated by pure +and unselfish motives, would visit on a single tour of a thousand +miles the principal German settlements in Maryland and Virginia +(including the present West Virginia). Sometimes they would make +an extended circuit through North Carolina, South Carolina, and +even Georgia, everywhere bearing witness to the truth of the +gospel and seeking to carry the most elemental forms of the +Christian religion, preaching and prayer, to the primitive +frontiersmen marooned along the outer fringe of white +settlements. These arduous journeys in the cause of piety place +this type of pioneer of the Old Southwest in alleviating contrast +to the often relentless and bloodthirsty figure of the rude +borderer. + +Noteworthy among these pious pilgrimages is the Virginia journey +of Brothers Leonhard Schnell and John Brandmuller (October 12 to +December 12, 1749). At the last outpost of civilization, the +scattered settlements in Bath and Alleghany counties, these +courageous missionaries--feasting the while solely on bear meat, +for there was no bread--encountered conditions of almost +primitive savagery, of which they give this graphic picture: +"Then we came to a house, where we had to lie on bear skins +around the fire like the rest . . . . The clothes of the people +consist of deer skins, their food of Johnny cakes, deer and bear +meat. A kind of white people are found here, who live like +savages. Hunting is their chief occupation." Into the valley of +the Yadkin in December, 1752, came Bishop Spangenberg and a party +of Moravians, accompanied by a surveyor and two guides, for the +purpose of locating the one hundred thousand acres of land which +had been offered them on easy terms the preceding year by Lord +Granville. This journey was remarkable as an illustration of +sacrifices willingly made and extreme hardships uncomplainingly +endured for the sake of the Moravian brotherhood. In the back +country of North Carolina near the Mulberry Fields they found the +whole woods full of Cherokee Indians engaged in hunting. A +beautiful site for the projected settlement met their delighted +gaze at this place; but they soon learned to their regret that it +had already been "taken up" by Daniel Boone's future +father-in-law, Morgan Bryan. + +On October 8, 1753, a party of twelve single men headed by the +Rev. Bernhard Adam Grube, set out from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, +to trek down to the new-found haven in the Carolina +hinterland--"a corner which the Lord has reserved for the +Brethren"--in Anson County. Following for the most part the great +highway extending from Philadelphia to the Yadkin, over which +passed the great throng sweeping into the back country of North +Carolina--through the Valley of Virginia and past Robert Luhny's +mill on the James River--they encountered many hardships along +the way. Because of their "long wagon," they had much difficulty +in crossing one steep mountain; and of this experience Brother +Grube, with a touch of modest pride, observes: "People had told +us that this hill was most dangerous, and that we would scarcely +be able to cross it, for Morgan Bryan, the first to travel this +way, had to take the wheels off his wagon and carry it piecemeal +to the top, and had been three months on the journey from the +Shanidore [Shenandoah] to the Etkin [Yadkin]." + +These men were the highest type of the pioneers of the Old +Southwest, inspired with the instinct of homemakers in a land +where, if idle rumor were to be credited, "the people lived like +wild men never hearing of God or His Word." In one hand they bore +the implement of agriculture, in the other the book of the gospel +of Jesus Christ. True faith shines forth in the simply eloquent +words: "We thanked our Saviour that he had so graciously led us +hither, and had helped us through all the hard places, for no +matter how dangerous it looked, nor how little we saw how we +could win through, everything always went better than seemed +possible." The promise of a new day--the dawn of the heroic +age--rings out in the pious carol of camaraderie at their +journey's end: + +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. + + + +Chapter II. The Cradle of Westward Expansion + +In the year 1746 I was up in the country that is now Anson, +Orange and Rowan Counties, there was not then above one hundred +fighting men there is now at least three thousand for the most +part Irish Protestants and Germans and dailey increasing.-- +Matthew Rowan, President of the North Carolina Council, to the +Board of Trade, June 28, 1753. + + +The conquest of the West is usually attributed to the ready +initiative, the stern self-reliance, and the libertarian instinct +of the expert backwoodsmen. These bold, nomadic spirits were +animated by an unquenchable desire to plunge into the wilderness +in search of an El Dorado at the outer verge of civilization, +free of taxation, quit-rents, and the law's restraint. They +longed to build homes for themselves and their descendants in a +limitless, free domain; or else to fare deeper and deeper into +the trackless forests in search of adventure. Yet one must not +overlook the fact that behind Boone and pioneers of his stamp +were men of conspicuous civil and military genius, constructive +in purpose and creative in imagination, who devoted their best +gifts to actual conquest and colonization. These men of large +intellectual mold-themselves surveyors, hunters, and +pioneers--were inspired with the larger vision of the +expansionist. Whether colonizers, soldiers, or speculators on the +grand scale, they sought to open at one great stroke the vast +trans-Alleghany regions as a peaceful abode for mankind. + +Two distinct classes of society were gradually drawing apart from +each other in North Carolina and later in Virginia--the pioneer +democracy of the back country and the upland, and the planter +aristocracy of the lowland and the tide-water region. From the +frontier came the pioneer explorers whose individual enterprise +and initiative were such potent factors in the exploitation of +the wilderness. From the border counties still in contact with +the East came a number of leaders. Thus in the heart of the Old +Southwest the two determinative principles already referred to, +the inquisitive and the acquisitive instincts, found a fortunate +conjunction. The exploratory passion of the pioneer, directed in +the interest of commercial enterprise, prepared the way for the +great westward migration. The warlike disposition of the hardy +backwoodsman, controlled by the exercise of military strategy, +accomplished the conquest of the trans-Alleghany country. + +Fleeing from the traditional bonds of caste and aristocracy in +England and Europe, from economic boycott and civil oppression, +from religious persecution and favoritism, many worthy members of +society in the first quarter of the eighteenth century sought a +haven of refuge in the "Quackerthal" of William Penn, with its +trustworthy guarantees of free tolerance in religious faith and +the benefits of representative self-government. From East +Devonshire in England came George Boone, the grandfather of the +great pioneer, and from Wales came Edward Morgan, whose daughter +Sarah became the wife of Squire Boone, Daniel's father. These +were conspicuous representatives of the Society of Friends, drawn +thither by the roseate representations of the great Quaker, +William Penn, and by his advanced views on popular government and +religious toleration. Hither, too, from Ireland, whither he had +gone from Denmark, came Morgan Bryan, settling in Chester County, +prior to 1719; and his children, William, Joseph, James, and +Morgan, who more than half a century later gave the name to +Bryan's Station in Kentucky, were destined to play important +roles in the drama of westward migration. In September, 1734, +Michael Finley from County Armagh, Ireland, presumably +accompanied by his brother Archibald Finley, settled in Bucks +County, Pennsylvania. According to the best authorities, +Archibald Finley was the father of John Finley, or Findlay as he +signed himself, Boone's guide and companion in his exploration of +Kentucky in 1769-71. To Pennsylvania also came Mordecai Lincoln, +great grandson of Samuel Lincoln, who had emigrated from England +to Hingham, Massachusetts, as early as 1637. This Mordecai +Lincoln, who in 1720 settled in Chester County, Pennsylvania, the +great-great-grandfather of President Lincoln, was the father of +Sarah Lincoln, who was wedded to William Boone, and of Abraham +Lincoln, who married Anne Boone, William's first cousin. Early +settlers in Pennsylvania were members of the Hanks family, one of +whom was the maternal grandfather of President Lincoln. + +No one race or breed of men can lay claim to exclusive credit for +leadership in the hinterland movement and the conquest of the +West. Yet one particular stock of people, the Ulster Scots, +exhibited with most completeness and picturesqueness a group of +conspicuous qualities and attitudes which we now recognize to be +typical of the American character as molded by the conditions of +frontier life. Cautious, wary, and reserved, these Scots +concealed beneath a cool and calculating manner a relentlessness +in reasoning power and an intensity of conviction which glowed +and burned with almost fanatical ardor. Strict in religious +observance and deep in spiritual fervor, they never lost sight of +the main chance, combining a shrewd practicality with a wealth of +devotion. It has been happily said of them that they kept the +Sabbath and everything else they could lay their hands on. In the +polity of these men religion and education went hand in hand; and +they habitually settled together in communities in order that +they might have teachers and preachers of their own choice and +persuasion. + +In little-known letters and diaries of travelers and itinerant +ministers may be found many quaint descriptions and faithful +characterizations of the frontier settlers in their habits of +life and of the scenes amidst which they labored. In a letter to +Edmund Fanning, the cultured Robin Jones, agent of Lord Granville +and Attorney-General of North Carolina, summons to view a piquant +image of the western border and borderers: "The inhabitants are +hospitable in their way, live in plenty and dirt, are stout, of +great prowess in manly athletics; and, in private conversation, +bold, impertinent, and vain. In the art of war (after the Indian +manner) they are well-skilled, are enterprising and fruitful of +strategies; and, when in action, are as bold and intrepid as the +ancient Romans. The Shawnese acknowledge them their superiors +even in their own way of fighting . . . . [The land] may be truly +called the land of the mountains, for they are so numerous that +when you have reached the summit of one of them, you may see +thousands of every shape that the imagination can suggest, +seeming to vie with each other which should raise his lofty head +to touch the clouds . . . . It seems to me that nature has been +wanton in bestowing her blessings on that country." + +An excellent pen-picture of educational and cultural conditions +in the backwoods of North Carolina, by one of the early settlers +in the middle of the century, exhibits in all their barren +cheerlessness the hardships and limitations of life in the +wilderness. The father of William Few, the narrator, had trekked +down from Maryland and settled in Orange County, some miles east +of the little hamlet of Hillsborough. "In that country at that +time there were no schools, no churches or parsons, or doctors or +lawyers; no stores, groceries or taverns, nor do I recollect +during the first two years any officer, ecclesiastical, civil or +military, except a justice of the peace, a constable and two or +three itinerant preachers . . . . These people had few wants, and +fewer temptations to vice than those who lived in more refined +society, though ignorant. They were more virtuous and more happy +. . . . A schoolmaster appeared and offered his services to teach +the children of the neighborhood for twenty shillings each per +year . . . . In that simple state of society money was but little +known; the schoolmaster was the welcome guest of his pupil, fed +at the bountiful table and clothed from the domestic loom . . . . +In that country at that time there was great scarcity of books." + +The journals of itinerant ministers through the Valley of +Virginia and the Carolina piedmont zone yield precious mementoes +of the people, their longing after the things of the spirit, and +their pitiful isolation from the regular preaching of the gospel. +These missionaries were true pioneers in this Old Southwest, +ardent, dauntless, and heroic--carrying the word into remote +places and preaching the gospel beneath the trees of the forest. +In his journal (1755-6), the Rev. Hugh McAden, born in +Pennsylvania of Scotch-Irish parentage, a graduate of Nassau Hall +(1753), makes the unconsciously humorous observation that +wherever he found Presbyterians he found people who "seemed +highly pleased, and very desirous to hear the word"; whilst +elsewhere he found either dissension and defection to Baptist +principles, or "no appearance of the life of religion." In the +Scotch-Irish Presbyterian settlements in what is now Mecklenburg +County, the cradle of American liberty, he found "pretty serious, +judicious people" of the stamp of Moses, William, and James +Alexander. While traveling in the upper country of South +Carolina, he relates with gusto the story of "an old gentleman +who said to the Governor of South Carolina, when he was in those +parts, in treaty with the Cherokee Indians that 'he had never +seen a shirt, been in a fair, heard a sermon, or seen a minister +in all his life.' Upon which the governor promised to send him up +a minister, that he might hear one sermon before he died." The +minister came and preached; and this was all the preaching that +had been heard in the upper part of South Carolina before Mr. +McAden's visit. + +Such, then, were the rude and simple people in the back country +of the Old Southwest--the deliberate and self-controlled English, +the aggressive, landmongering Scotch-Irish, the buoyant Welsh, +the thrifty Germans, the debonair French, the impetuous Irish, +and the calculating Scotch. The lives they led were marked by +independence of spirit, democratic instincts, and a forthright +simplicity. In describing the condition of the English settlers +in the backwoods of Virginia, one of their number, Doddridge, +says: "Most of the articles were of domestic manufacture. There +might have been incidentally a few things brought to the country +for sale in a primitive way, but there was no store for general +supply. The table furniture usually consisted of wooden vessels, +either turned or coopered. Iron forks, tin cups, etc., were +articles of rare and delicate luxury. The food was of the most +wholesome and primitive kind. The richest meat, the finest +butter, and best meal that ever delighted man's palate were here +eaten with a relish which health and labor only know. The +hospitality of the people was profuse and proverbial." + +The circumstances of their lives compelled the pioneers to become +self-sustaining. Every immigrant was an adept at many trades. He +built his own house, forged his own tools, and made his own +clothes. At a very early date rifles were manufactured at the +High Shoals of the Yadkin; Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, was an +expert gunsmith. The difficulty of securing food for the +settlements forced every man to become a hunter and to scour the +forest for wild game. Thus the pioneer, through force of sheer +necessity, became a dead shot--which stood him in good stead in +the days of Indian incursions and bloody retaliatory raids. +Primitive in their games, recreations, and amusements, which not +infrequently degenerated into contests of savage brutality, the +pioneers always set the highest premium upon personal bravery, +physical prowess, and skill in manly sports. At all public +gatherings, general musters, "vendues" or auctions, and even +funerals, whisky flowed with extraordinary freedom. It is worthy +of record that among the effects of the Rev. Alexander Craighead, +the famous teacher and organizer of Presbyterianism in +Mecklenburg and the adjoining region prior to the Revolution, +were found a punch bowl and glasses. + +The frontier life, with its purifying and hardening influence, +bred in these pioneers intellectual traits which constitute the +basis of the American character. The single-handed and successful +struggle with nature in the tense solitude of the forest +developed a spirit of individualism, restive under control. On +the other hand, the sense of sharing with others the arduous +tasks and dangers of conquering the wilderness gave birth to a +strong sense of solidarity arid of human sympathy. With the lure +of free lands ever before them, the pioneers developed a +restlessness and a nervous energy, blended with a buoyancy of +spirit, which are fundamentally American. Yet this same +untrammeled freedom occasioned a disregard for law and a defiance +of established government which have exhibited themselves +throughout the entire course of our history. Initiative, +self-reliance, boldness in conception, fertility in resource, +readiness in execution, acquisitiveness, inventive genius, +appreciation of material advantages--these, shot through with a +certain fine idealism, genial human sympathy, and a high romantic +strain--are the traits of the American national type as it +emerged from the Old Southwest. + + + +CHAPTER III. The Back Country and the Border + +Far from the bustle of the world, they live in the most +delightful climate, and richest soil imaginable; they are +everywhere surrounded with beautiful prospects and sylvan scenes; +lofty mountains, transparent streams, falls of water, rich +valleys, and majestic woods; the whole interspersed with an +infinite variety of flowering shrubs, constitute the landscape +surrounding them; they are subject to few diseases; are generally +robust; and live in perfect liberty; they are ignorant of want +and acquainted with but few vices. Their inexperience of the +elegancies of life precludes any regret that they possess not the +means of enjoying them, but they possess what many princes would +give half their dominion for, health, content, and tranquillity +of mind.--Andrew Burnaby: Travels Through North America. + + +The two streams of Ulstermen, the greater through Philadelphia, +the lesser through Charleston, which poured into the Carolinas +toward the middle of the century, quickly flooded the back +country. The former occupied the Yadkin Valley and tile region to +the westward, the latter the Waxhaws and the Anson County region +to the northwest. The first settlers were known as the +"Pennsylvania Irish," because they had first settled in +Pennsylvania after migrating from the north of Ireland; while +those who came by way of Charleston were known as the +"Scotch-Irish." The former, who had resided in Pennsylvania long +enough to be good judges of land, shrewdly made their settlements +along the rivers and creeks. The latter, new arrivals and less +experienced, settled on thinner land toward the heads of creeks +and water courses. + +Shortly prior to 1735, Morgan Bryan, his wife Martha, and eight +children, together with other families of Quakers from +Pennsylvania, settled upon a large tract of land on the northwest +side of the Opeckon River near Winchester. A few years later they +removed up the Virginia Valley to the Big Lick in the present +Roanoke County, intent upon pushing westward to the very +outskirts of civilization. In the autumn of 1748, leaving behind +his brother William, who had followed him to Roanoke County, +Morgan Bryan removed with his family to the Forks of the Yadkin +River. The Morgans, with the exception of Richard, who emigrated +to Virginia, remained in Pennsylvania, spreading over +Philadelphia and Bucks counties; while the Hanks and Lincoln +families found homes in Virginia--Mordecai Lincoln's son, John, +the great-grandfather of President Lincoln, removing from Berks +to the Shenandoah Valley in 1765. On May 1, 1750, Squire Boone, +his wife Sarah (Morgan), and their eleven children--a veritable +caravan, traveling like the patriarchs of old--started south; and +tarried for a space, according to reliable tradition, on Linville +Creek in the Virginia Valley. In 1752 they removed to the Forks +of the Yadkin, and the following year received from Lord +Granville three tracts of land, all situated in Rowan County. +About the hamlet of Salisbury, which in 1755 consisted of seven +or eight log houses and the court house, there now rapidly +gathered a settlement of people marked by strong individuality, +sturdy independence, and virile self-reliance. The Boones and the +Bryans quickly accommodated themselves to frontier conditions and +immediately began to take an active part in the local affairs of +the county. Upon the organization of the county court Squire +Boone was chosen justice of the peace; and Morgan Bryan was soon +appearing as foreman of juries and director in road improvements. + +The Great Trading Path, leading from Virginia to the towns of the +Catawbas and other Southern Indians, crossed the Yadkin at the +Trading Ford and passed a mile southeast of Salisbury. Above +Sapona Town near the Trading Ford was Swearing Creek, which, +according to constant and picturesque tradition, was the spot +where the traders stopped to take a solemn oath never to reveal +any unlawful proceedings that might occur during their sojourn +among the Indians. In his divertingly satirical "History of the +Dividing Line" William Byrd in 1728 thus speaks of this locality: +"The Soil is exceedingly rich on both sides the Yadkin, abounding +in rank Grass and prodigiously large Trees; and for plenty of +Fish, Fowl and Venison, is inferior to No Part of the Northern +Continent. There the Traders commonly lie Still for some days, to +recruit their Horses' Flesh as well as to recover their own +spirits." In this beautiful country happily chosen for settlement +by Squire Boone --who erected his cabin on the east side of the +Yadkin about a mile and a quarter from Alleman's, now Boone's, +Ford--wild game abounded. Buffaloes were encountered in eastern +North Carolina by Byrd while running the dividing line; and in +the upper country of South Carolina three or four men with their +dogs could kill fourteen to twenty buffaloes in a single day." +Deer and bears fell an easy prey to the hunter; wild turkeys +filled every thicket; the watercourses teemed with beaver, otter, +and muskrat, as well as with shad and other delicious fish. +Panthers, wildcats, and wolves overran the country; and the +veracious Brother Joseph, while near the present Wilkesboro, +amusingly records: "The wolves wh. are not like those in Germany, +Poland and Lifland (because they fear men and don't easily come +near) give us such music of six different cornets the like of wh. +I have never heard in my life." So plentiful was the game that +the wild deer mingled with the cattle grazing over the wide +stretches of luxuriant grass. + +In the midst of this sylvan paradise grew up Squire Boone's son, +Daniel Boone, a Pennsylvania youth of English stock, Quaker +persuasion, and Baptist proclivities. Seen through a glorifying +halo after the lapse of a century and three quarters, he rises +before us a romantic figure, poised and resolute, simple, +benign--as naive and shy as some wild thing of the primeval +forest--five feet eight inches in height, with broad chest and +shoulders, dark locks, genial blue eyes arched with fair +eyebrows, thin lips and wide mouth, nose of slightly Roman cast, +and fair, ruddy countenance. Farming was irksome to this +restless, nomadic spirit, who on the slightest excuse would +exchange the plow and the grubbing hoe for the long rifle and +keen-edged hunting knife. In a single day during the autumn +season he would kill four or five deer; or as many bears as would +snake from two to three thousand pounds weight of bear-bacon. +Fascinated with the forest, he soon found profit as well as +pleasure in the pursuit of game; and at excellent fixed prices he +sold his peltries, most often at Salisbury, some thirteen miles +away, sometimes at the store of the old "Dutchman," George +Hartman, on the Yadkin, and occasionally at Bethabara, the +Moravian town sixty odd miles distant. Skins were in such demand +that they soon came to replace hard money, which was incredibly +scarce in the back country, as a medium of exchange. Upon one +occasion a caravan from Bethabara hauled three thousand pounds, +upon another four thousand pounds, of dressed deerskins to +Charleston. So immense was this trade that the year after Boone's +arrival at the Forks of Yadkin thirty thousand deerskins were +exported from the province of North Carolina. We like to think +that the young Daniel Boone was one of that band of whom Brother +Joseph, while in camp on the Catawba River (November 12, 1752) +wrote: "There are many hunters about here, who live like Indians, +they kill many deer selling their hides, and thus live without +much work." + +In this very class of professional hunters, living like Indians, +was thus bred the spirit of individual initiative and strenuous +leadership in the great westward expansionist movement of the +coming decade. An English traveler gives the following minute +picture of the dress and accoutrement of the Carolina +backwoodsman. + +"Their whole dress is very singular, and not very materially +different from that of the Indians; being a hunting shirt, +somewhat resembling a waggoner's frock, ornamented with a great +many fringes, tied round the middle with a broad belt, much +decorated also, in which is fastened a tomahawk, an instrument +that serves every purpose of defence and convenience; being a +hammer at one side and a sharp hatchet at the other; the shot bag +and powderhorn, carved with a variety of whimsical figures and +devices, hang from their necks over one shoulder; and on their +heads a flapped hat, of a reddish hue, proceeding from the +intensely hot beams of the sun. + +Sometimes they wear leather breeches, made of Indian dressed elk, +or deer skins, but more frequently thin trowsers. + +On their legs they have Indian boots, or leggings, made of coarse +woollen cloth, that either are wrapped round loosely and tied +with garters, or laced upon the outside, and always come better +than half-way up the thigh. + +On their feet they sometimes wear pumps of their own manufacture, +but generally Indian moccossons, of their own construction also, +which are made of strong elk's, or buck's skin, dressed soft as +for gloves or breeches, drawn together in regular plaits over the +toe, and lacing from thence round to the fore part of the middle +of the ancle, without a seam in them, yet fitting close to the +feet, and are indeed perfectly easy and pliant. + +Their hunting, or rifle shirts, they have also died in a variety +of colours, some yellow, others red, some brown, and many wear +them quite white." + +No less unique and bizarre, though less picturesque, was the +dress of the women of the region--in particular of Surry County, +North Carolina, as described by General William Lenoir: + +"The women wore linses [flax] petticoats and 'bedgowns' [like a +dressing-sack], and often went without shoes in the summer. Some +had bonnets and bedgowns made of calico, but generally of linsey; +and some of them wore men's hats. Their hair was commonly +clubbed. Once, at a large meeting, I noticed there but two women +that had on long gowns. One of these was laced genteelly, and the +body of the other was open, and the tail thereof drawn up and +tucked in her apron or coat-string." + +While Daniel Boone was quietly engaged in the pleasant pursuits +of the chase, a vast world-struggle of which he little dreamed +was rapidly approaching a crisis. For three quarters of a century +this titanic contest between France and England for the interior +of the continent had been waged with slowly accumulating force. +The irrepressible conflict had been formally inaugurated at Sault +Ste. Marie in 1671, when Daumont de Saint Lusson, swinging aloft +his sword, proclaimed the sovereignty of France over "all +countries, rivers, lakes, and streams . . . both those which have +been discovered and those which may be discovered hereafter, in +all their length and breadth, bounded on the one side by the seas +of the North and of the West, and on the other by the South Sea." +Just three months later, three hardy pioneers of Virginia, +despatched upon their arduous mission by Colonel Abraham Wood in +behalf of the English crown, had crossed the Appalachian divide; +and upon the banks of a stream whose waters slipped into the Ohio +to join the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico, had carved the +royal insignia upon the blazed trunk of a giant of the forest, +the while crying: "Long live Charles the Second, by the grace of +God, King of England, Scotland, France, Ireland and Virginia and +of the territories thereunto belonging." + +La Salle's dream of a New France in the heart of America was +blotted out in his tragic death upon the banks of the River +Trinity (1687). Yet his mantle was to fall in turn upon the +square shoulders of Le Moyne d'Iberville and of his brother--the +good, the constant Bienville, who after countless and arduous +struggles laid firm the foundations of New Orleans. In the +precious treasury of Margry we learn that on reaching Rochelle +after his first voyage in 1699 Iberville in these prophetic words +voices his faith: "If France does not immediately seize this part +of America which is the most beautiful, and establish a colony +which is strong enough to resist any which England may have, the +English colonies (already considerable in Carolina) will so +thrive that in less than a hundred years they will be strong +enough to seize all America." But the world-weary Louis Quatorze, +nearing his end, quickly tired of that remote and unproductive +colony upon the shores of the gulf, so industriously described in +Paris as a "terrestrial paradise"; and the "paternal providence +of Versailles" willingly yielded place to the monumental +speculation of the great financier Antoine Crozat. In this Paris +of prolific promotion and amazed credulity, ripe for the colossal +scheme of Law, soon to blow to bursting-point the bubble of the +Mississippi, the very songs in the street echoed flamboyant, +half-satiric panegyrics upon the new Utopia, this Mississippi +Land of Cockayne: + +It's to-day no contribution +To discuss the Constitution +And the Spanish war's forgot +For a new Utopian spot; +And the very latest phase +Is the Mississippi craze. + +Interest in the new colony led to a great development of +southwesterly trade from New France. Already the French coureurs +de bois were following the water route from the Illinois to South +Carolina. Jean Couture, a deserter from the service in New +France, journeyed over the Ohio and Tennessee rivers to that +colony, and was known as "the greatest Trader and Traveller +amongst the Indians for more than Twenty years." In 1714 young +Charles Charleville accompanied an old trader from Crozat's +colony on the gulf to the great salt-springs on the Cumberland, +where a post for trading with the Shawanoes had already been +established by the French. But the British were preparing to +capture this trade as early as 1694, when Tonti warned Villermont +that Carolinians were already established on a branch of the +Ohio. Four years later, Nicholson, Governor of Maryland, was +urging trade with the Indians of the interior in the effort to +displace the French. At an early date the coast colonies began to +trade with the Indian tribes of the back country: the Catawbas of +the Yadkin Valley; the Cherokees, whose towns were scattered +through Tennessee; the Chickasaws, to the westward in northern +Mississippi; and the Choctaws farther to the southward. Even +before the beginning of the eighteenth century, when the South +Carolina settlements extended scarcely twenty miles from the +coast, English traders had established posts among the Indian +tribes four hundred miles to the west of Charleston. Following +the sporadic trading of individuals from Virginia with the inland +Indians, the heavily laden caravans of William Byrd were soon +regularly passing along the Great Trading Path from Virginia to +the towns of the Catawbas and other interior tribes of the +Carolinas, delighting the easily captivated fancy and provoking +the cupidity of the red men with "Guns, Powder, Shot, Hatchets +(which the Indians call Tomahawks), Kettles, red and blue Planes, +Duffields, Stroudwater blankets, and some Cutlary Wares, Brass +Rings and other Trinkets." In Pennsylvania, George Croghan, the +guileful diplomat, who was emissary from the Council to the Ohio +Indians (1748), had induced "all-most all the Ingans in the +Woods" to declare against the French; and was described by +Christopher Gist as a "meer idol among his countrymen, the Irish +traders." + +Against these advances of British trade and civilization, the +French for four decades had artfully struggled, projecting tours +of exploration into the vast medial valley of the continent and +constructing a chain of forts and trading-posts designed to +establish their claims to the country and to hold in check the +threatened English thrust from the east. Soon the wilderness +ambassador of empire, Celoron de Bienville, was despatched by the +far-visioned Galissoniere at Quebec to sow broadcast with +ceremonial pomp in the heart of America the seeds of empire, +grandiosely graven plates of lasting lead, in defiant yet futile +symbol of the asserted sovereignty of France. Thus threatened in +the vindication of the rights of their colonial sea-to-sea +charters, the English threw off the lethargy with which they had +failed to protect their traders, and in grants to the Ohio and +Loyal land companies began resolutely to form plans looking to +the occupation of the interior. But the French seized the English +trading-house at Venango which they converted into a fort; and +Virginia's protest, conveyed by a calm and judicious young man, a +surveyor, George Washington, availed not to prevent the French +from seizing Captain Trent's hastily erected military post at the +forks of the Ohio and constructing there a formidable work, named +Fort Duquesne. Washington, with his expeditionary force sent to +garrison Captain Trent's fort, defeated Jumonville and his small +force near Great Meadows (May, 1754); but soon after he was +forced to surrender Fort Necessity to Coulon de Villiers. + +The titanic struggle, fittingly precipitated in the backwoods of +the Old Southwest, was now on--a struggle in which the resolute +pioneers of these backwoods first seriously measured their +strength with the French and their copper-hued allies, and +learned to surpass the latter in their own mode of warfare. The +portentous conflict, destined to assure the eastern half of the +continent to Great Britain, is a grim, prophetic harbinger of the +mighty movement of the next quarter of a century into the +twilight zone of the trans-Alleghany territory: + + + +CHAPTER IV. The Indian War + +All met in companies with their wives and children, and set about +building little fortifications, to defend themselves from such +barbarian and inhuman enemies, whom they concluded would be let +loose upon them at pleasure.--The Reverend Hugh McAden--Diary, +July, 1755. + + +Long before the actual outbreak of hostilities powerful forces +were gradually converging to produce a clash between the +aggressive colonials and the crafty Indians. As the settlers +pressed farther westward into the domain of the red men, +arrogantly grazing their stock over the cherished hunting-grounds +of the Cherokees, the savages, who were already well disposed +toward the French, began to manifest a deep indignation against +the British colonists because of this callous encroachment upon +their territory. During the sporadic forays by scattered bands of +Northern Indians upon the Catawbas and other tribes friendly to +the pioneers the isolated settlements at the back part of the +Carolinas suffered rude and sanguinary onslaughts. In the summer +of 1753 a party of northern Indians warring in the French +interest made their appearance in Rowan County, which had just +been organized, and committed various depredations upon the +scattered settlements. To repel these attacks a band of the +Catawbas sallied forth, encountered a detached party of the +enemy, and slew five of their number. Among the spoils, +significantly enough, were silver crucifixes, beads, +looking-glasses, tomahawks and other implements of war, all of +French manufacture. + +Intense rivalry for the good will of the near-by southern tribes +existed between Virginia and South Carolina. In strong +remonstrance against the alleged attempt of Governor Dinwiddie of +Virginia to alienate the Cherokees, Catawbas, Muscogees, and +Chickasaws from South Carolina and to attach them to Virginia, +Governor Glen of South Carolina made pungent observations to +Dinwiddie: "South Carolina is a weak frontier colony, and in case +of invasion by the French would be their first object of attack. +We have not much to fear, however, while we retain the affection +of the Indians around us; but should we forfeit that by any +mismanagement on our part, or by the superior address of the +French, we are in a miserable situation. The Cherokees alone have +several thousand gunmen well acquainted with every inch of the +province . . . their country is the key to Carolina." By a treaty +concluded at Saluda (November 24, 1753), Glen promised to build +the Cherokees a fort near the lower towns, for the protection of +themselves and their allies; and the Cherokees on their part +agreed to become the subjects of the King of Great Britain and +hold their lands under him. This fort, erected this same year on +the headwaters of the Savannah, within gunshot distance of the +important Indian town of Keowee, was named Fort Prince George. +"It is a square," says the founder of the fort (Governor Glen to +the Board of Trade, August 26, 1754), "with regular Bastions and +four Ravelins it is near Two hundred foot from Salient Angle to +Salient Angle and is made of Earth taken out of the Ditch, +secured with fachines and well rammed with a banquet on the +Inside for the men to stand upon when they fire over, the +Ravelins are made of Posts of Lightwood which is very durable, +they are ten foot in length sharp pointed three foot and a half +in the ground." The dire need for such a fort in the back country +was tragically illustrated by the sudden onslaught upon the +"House of John Gutry & James Anshers" in York County by a party +of sixty French Indians (December 16, 1754), who brutally +murdered sixteen of the twenty-one persons present, and carried +off as captives the remaining five." + +At the outbreak of the French and Indian War in 1754 North +Carolina voted twelve thousand pounds for the raising of troops +and several thousand pounds additional for the construction of +forts--a sum considerably larger than that voted by Virginia. A +regiment of two hundred and fifty men was placed under the +command of Colonel James Innes of the Cape Fear section; and the +ablest officer under him was the young Irishman from the same +section, Lieutenant Hugh Waddell. On June 3, 1754, Dinwiddie +appointed Innes, his close friend, commander-in-chief of all the +forces against the French; and immediately after the disaster at +Great Meadows (July, 1754), Innes took command. Within two months +the supplies for the North Carolina troops were exhausted; and as +Virginia then failed to furnish additional supplies, Colonel +Innes had no recourse but to disband his troops and permit them +to return home. Appointed governor of Fort Cumberland by General +Braddock, he was in command there while Braddock advanced on his +disastrous march. + +The lesson of Braddock's defeat (July 9, 1755) was memorable in +the history of the Old Southwest. Well might Braddock exclaim +with his last breath: "Who would have thought it? . . . We shall +know better how to deal with them another time." Led on by the +reckless and fiery Beaujeu, wearing an Indian gorget about his +neck, the savages from the protection of trees and rough +defenses, a pre pared ambuscade, poured a galling fire into the +compact divisions of the English, whose scarlet coats furnished +ideal targets. The obstinacy of the British commanders in +refusing to permit their troops to fight Indian fashion was +suicidal; for as Herman Alriclis wrote Governor Morris of +Pennsylvania (July 22, 1755): " . . . the French and Indians had +cast an Intrenchment across the road before our Army which they +Discovered not Untill they came Close up to it, from thence and +both sides of the road the enemy kept a constant fireing on them, +our Army being so confused, they could not fight, and they would +not be admitted by the Genl or Sir John St. Clair, to break thro' +their Ranks and Take behind trees." Daniel Boone, who went from +North Carolina as a wagoner in the company commanded by Edward +Brice Dobbs, was on the battle-field; but Dobbs's company at the +time was scouting in the woods. When the fierce attack fell upon +the baggage a train, Boone succeeded in effecting his escape only +by cutting the traces of his team and fleeing on one of the +horses. To his dying day Boone continued to censure Braddock's +conduct, and reprehended especially his fatal neglect to employ +strong flank-guards and a sufficient number of Provincial scouts +thoroughly acquainted with the wilderness and all the wiles and +strategies of savage warfare. + +For a number of months following Braddock's defeat there was a +great rush of the frightened people southward. In a letter to +Dinwiddie, Washington expresses the apprehension that Augusta, +Frederick, and Hampshire County will soon be depopulated, as the +whole back country is in motion toward the southern colonies. +During this same summer Governor Arthur Dobbs of North Carolina +made a tour of exploration through the western part of the +colony, seeking a site for a fort to guard the frontier. The +frontier company of fifty men which was to garrison the projected +fort was placed under the command of Hugh Waddell, now promoted +to the rank of captain, though only twenty-one years old. In +addition to Waddell's company, armed patrols were required for +the protection of the Rowan County frontier; and during the +summer Indian alarms were frequent at the Moravian village of +Bethabara, whose inhabitants had heard with distress on March +31st of the slaughter of eleven Moravians on the Mahoni and of +the ruin of Gnadenhutten. Many of the settlers in the outlying +districts of Rowan fled for safety to the refuge of the little +village; and frequently every available house, every place of +temporary abode was filled with panic stricken refugees. So +persistent were the depredations of the Indians and so alarmed +were the scattered Rowan settlers by the news of the murders and +the destruction of Vaul's Fort in Virginia (June 25, 1756) that +at a conference on July 5th the Moravians "decided to protect our +houses with palisades, and make them safe before the enemy should +in vade our tract or attack us, for if the people were all going +to retreat we would be the last left on the frontier and the +first point of attack." By July 23d, they had constructed a +strong defense for their settlement, afterward called the "Dutch +Fort" by the Indians. The principal structure was a stockade, +triangular in plan, some three hundred feet on a side, enclosing +the principal buildings of the settlement; and the gateway was +guarded by an observation tower. The other defense was a stockade +embracing eight houses at the mill some distance away, around +which a small settlement had sprung up. + +During the same year the fort planned by Dobbs was erected upon +the site he had chosen--between Third and Fourth creeks; and the +commissioners Richard Caswell and Francis Brown, sent out to +inspect the fort, made the following picturesque report to the +Assembly (December 21, 1756): + +"That they had likewise viewed the State of Fort Dobbs, and found +it to be a good and Substantial Building of the Dimentions +following (that is to say) The Oblong Square fifty three feet by +forty, the opposite Angles Twenty four feet and Twenty-Two In +Height Twenty four and a half feet as by the Plan annexed +Appears, The Thickness of the Walls which are made of Oak Logs +regularly Diminished from sixteen Inches to Six, it contains +three floors and there may be discharged from each floor at one +and the same time about one hundred Musketts the same is +beautifully scituated in the fork of Fourth Creek a Branch of the +Yadkin River. And that they also found under Command of Cap' Hugh +Waddel Forty six Effective men Officers and Soldiers, the said +Officers and Soldiers Appearing well and in good Spirits." + +As to the erection of a fort on the Tennessee, promised the +Cherokees by South Carolina, difficulties between the governor of +that province and of Virginia in regard to matters of policy and +the proportionate share of expenses made effective cooperation +between the two colonies well-nigh impossible. Glen, as we have +seen, had resented Dinwiddie's efforts to win the South Carolina +Indians over to Virginia's interest. And Dinwiddie had been very +indignant when the force promised him by the Indians to aid +General Braddock did not arrive, attributing this defection in +part to Glen's negotiations for a meeting with the chieftains and +in part to the influence of the South Carolina traders, who kept +the Indians away by hiring them to go on long hunts for furs and +skinns. But there was no such contention between Virginia and +North Carolina. Dinwiddie and Dobbs arranged (November 6, 1755) +to send a commission from these colonies to treat with the +Cherokees and the Catawbas. Virginia sent two commissioners, +Colonel William Byrd, third of that name, and Colonel Peter +Randolph; while North Carolina sent one, Captain Hugh Waddell. +Salisbury, North Carolina, was the place of rendezvous. The +treaty with the Catawbas was made at the Catawba Town, presumably +the village opposite the mouth of Sugaw Creek, in York County, +South Carolina, on February 20-21, 1756; that with the Cherokees +on Broad River, North Carolina, March 13-17. As a result of the +negotiations and after the receipt of a present of goods, the +Catawbas agreed to send forty warriors to aid Virginia within +forty days; and the Cherokees, in return for presents and +Virginia's promise to contribute her proportion toward the +erection of a strong fort, undertook to send four hundred +warriors within forty days, "as soon as the said fort shall be +built." Virginia and North Carolina thus wisely cooperated to +"straighten the path" and "brighten the chain" between the white +and the red men, in important treaties which Have largely escaped +the attention of historians." + +On May 25, 1756, a conference was held at Salisbury between King +Heygler and warriors of the Catawba nation on the one side and +Chief Justice Henley, doubtless attended by Captain Waddell and +his frontier company, on the other. King Heygler, following the +lead set by the Cherokees, petitioned the Governor of North +Carolina to send the Catawbas some ammunition and to "build us a +fort for securing our old men, women and children when we turn +out to fight the Enemy on their coming." The chief justice +assured the King that the Catawbas would receive a necessary +supply of ammunition (one hundred pounds of gunpowder and four +hundred pounds of lead were later sent them) and promised to urge +with the governor their request to have a fort built as soon as +possible. Pathos not unmixed with dry humor tinges the eloquent +appeal of good old King Heygler, ever the loyal friend of the +whites, at this conference: + +"I desire a stop may be put to the selling of strong Liquors by +the White people to my people especially near the Indian nation. +IF THE WHITE PEOPLE MAKE STRONG DRINK, LET THEM. SELL IT TO ONE +ANOTHER, OR DRINK IT IN THEIR OWN FAMILIES. This will avoid a +great deal of mischief which otherwise will, happen from my +people getting drunk and quarrelling with the White people. I +have no strong prisons like you to confine them for it. Our only +way is to put them under ground and all these (pointing proudly +to his Warriors) will be ready to do that to those who shall +deserve it." + +In response to this request, the sum of four thousand pounds was +appropriated by the North Carolina Assembly for the erection of +"a Fort on our western frontier to protect and secure the +Catawbas" and for the support of two companies of fifty men each +to garrison this and another fort building on the sea coast. The +commissioners appointed for the purpose recommended (December 21, +1756) a site for the fort "near the 'Catawba nation"; and on +January 20, 1757, Governor Dobbs reported; " We are now building +a Fort in the midst of their towns at their own Request." The +fort thereupon begun must have stood near the mouth of the South +Fork of the Catawba River, as Dobbs says it was in the "midst" of +their towns, which are situated a "few miles north and south of +38 degrees" and might properly be included within a circle of +thirty miles radius." + +During the succeeding months many depredations were committed by +the Indians upon the exposed and scattered settlements. Had it +not been for the protection afforded by all these forts, by the +militia companies under Alexander Osborne of Rowan and Nathaniel +Alexander of Anson, and by a special company of patrollers under +Green and Moore, the back settlers who had been so outrageously +"pilfered" by the Indians would have "retired from the Frontier +into the inner settlements." + + + +CHAPTER V. In Defense of Civilization + +We give thanks and praise for the safety and peace vouchsafed us +by our Heavenly Father in these times of war. Many of our +neighbors, driven hither and yon like deer before wild beasts, +came to us for shelter, yet the accustomed order of our +congregation life was not disturbed, no, not even by the more +than 150 Indians who at sundry times passed by, stopping for a +day at a time and being fed by us.--Wachovia Community Diary, +1757 + + +With commendable energy and expedition Dinwiddie and Dobbs, +acting in concert, initiated steps for keeping the engagements +conjointly made by the two colonies with the Cherokees and the +Catawbas in tile spring and summer of 1756. Enlisting sixty men, +"most of them Artificers, with Tools and Provisions," Major +Andrew Lewis proceeded in the late spring to Echota in the +Cherokee country. Here during the hot summer months they erected +the Virginia Fort on the path from Virginia, upon the northern +bank of the Little Tennessee, nearly opposite the Indian town of +Echota and about twenty-five miles southwest of Knoxville." While +the fort was in process of construction, the Cherokees were +incessantly tampered with by emissaries from the Nuntewees and +the Savannahs in the French interest, and from the French +themselves at the Alibamu Fort. So effective were these +machinations, supported by extravagant promises and doubtless +rich bribes, that the Cherokees soon were outspokenly expressing +their desire for a French fort at Great Tellico. + +Dinwiddie welcomed the departure from America of Governor Glen of +South Carolina, who in his opinion had always acted contrary to +the king's interest. From the new governor, William Henry +Lyttelton, who arrived in Charleston on June 1, 1756, he hoped to +secure effective cooperation in dealing with the Cherokees and +the Catawbas. This hope was based upon Lyttelton's recognition, +as stated in Dinwiddie's words, of the "Necessity of strict Union +between the whole Colonies, with't any of them considering their +particular Interest separate from the general Good of the whole." +After constructing the fort "with't the least assistance from +South Carolina," Major Lewis happened by accident upon a grand +council being held in Echota in September. At that time he +discovered to his great alarm that the machinations of the French +had already produced the greatest imaginable change in the +sentiment of the Cherokees. Captain Raymond Demere of the +Provincials, with two hundred English troops, had arrived to +garrison the fort; but the head men of all the Upper Towns were +secretly influenced to agree to write a letter to Captain Demere, +ordering him to return immediately to Charleston with all the +troops under his command. At the grand council, Atta-kulla-kulla, +the great Cherokee chieftain, passionately declared to the head +men, who listened approvingly, that "as to the few soldiers of +Captain Demere that was there, he would take their Guns, and give +them to his young men to hunt with and as to their clothes they +would soon be worn out and their skins would be tanned, and be of +the same colour as theirs, and that they should live among them +as slaves." With impressive dignity Major Lewis rose and +earnestly pleaded for the observance of the terms of the treaty +solemnly negotiated the preceding March. In response, the crafty +and treacherous chieftains desired Lewis to tell the Governor of +Virginia that "they had taken up the Hatchet against all Nations +that were Enemies to the English"; but Lewis, an astute student +of Indian Psychology, rightly surmised that all their glib +professions of friendship and assistance were "only to put a +gloss on their knavery." So it proved; for instead of the four +hundred warriors promised under the treaty for service in +Virginia, the Cherokees sent only seven warriors, accompanied by +three women. Al though the Cherokees petitioned Virginia for a +number of men to garrison the Virginia fort, Dinwiddie postponed +sending the fifty men provided for by the Virginia Assembly until +he could reassure himself in regard to the "Behaviour and +Intention" of the treacherous Indian allies. This proved to be a +prudent decision; for not long after its erection the Virginia +fort was destroyed by the Indians. + +Whether on account of the dissatisfaction expressed by the +Cherokees over the erection of the Virginia fort or because of a +recognition of the mistaken policy of garrisoning a work erected +by Virginia with troops sent from Charleston, South Carolina +immediately proceeded to build another stronghold on the southern +bank of the Tennessee at the mouth of Tellico River, some seven +miles from the site of the Virginia fort; and here were posted +twelve great guns, brought thither at immense labor through the +wilderness. To this fort, named Fort Loudoun in honor of Lord +Loudoun, then commander-in-chief of all the English forces in +America, the Indians allured artisans by donations of land; and +during the next three or four years a little settlement sprang up +there. + +The frontiers of Virginia suffered most from the incursions of +hostile Indians during the fourteen months following May 1, 1755. +In July, the Rev. Hugh McAden records that he preached in +Virginia on a day set apart for fasting and prayer "on account of +the wars and many murders, committed by the savage Indians on the +back inhabitants." On July 30th a large party of Shawano Indians +fell upon the New River settlement and wiped it out of existence. +William Ingles was absent at the time of the raid; and Mrs. +Ingles, who was captured, afterward effected her escape. The +following summer (June 25, 1756), Fort Vaux on the headwaters of +the Roanoke, under the command of Captain John Smith, was +captured by about one hundred French and Indians, who burnt the +fort, killed John Smith junior, John Robinson, John Tracey and +John Ingles, wounded four men, and captured twenty-two men, +women, and children. Among the captured was the famous Mrs. Mary +Ingles, whose husband, John Ingles, was killed; but after being +"carried away into Captivity, amongst whom she was barbarously +treated," according to her own statement, she finally escaped and +returned to Virginia." The frontier continued to be infested by +marauding bands of French and Indians; and Dinwiddie gloomily +confessed to Dobbs (July 22d): "I apprehend that we shall always +be harrass'd with fly'g Parties of these Banditti unless we form +an Expedit'n ag'st them, to attack 'em in y'r Towns." Such an +expedition, known as the Sandy River Expedition, had been sent +out in February to avenge the massacre of the New River settlers; +but the enterprise engaged in by about four hundred Virginians +and Cherokees under Major Andrew Lewis and Captain Richard +Pearis, proved a disastrous failure. Not a single Indian was +seen; and the party suffered extraordinary hardships and narrowly +escaped starvation. + +In conformity with his treaty obligations with the Catawbas, +Governor Dobbs commissioned Captain Hugh Waddell to erect the +fort promised the Catawbas at the spot chosen by the +commissioners near the mouth of the South Fork of the Catawba +River. This fort, for which four thousand pounds had been +appropriated, was for the most part completed by midsummer, 1757. +But owing, it appears, both to the machinations of the French and +to the intermeddling of the South Carolina traders, who desired +to retain the trade of the Catawbas for that province, Oroloswa, +the Catawba King Heygler, sent a "talk" to Governor Lyttelton, +requesting that North Carolina desist from the work of +construction and that no fort be built except by South Carolina. +Accordingly, Governor Dobbs ordered Captain Waddell to discharge +the workmen (August 11, 1757); and every effort was made for many +months thereafter to conciliate the Catawbas, erstwhile friends +of North Carolina. The Catawba fort erected by North Carolina was +never fully completed; and several years later South Carolina, +having succeeded in alienating the Catawbas from North Carolina, +which colony had given them the best possible treatment, built +for them a fort at the mouth of Line Creek on the east bank of +the Catawba River. + +In the spring and summer of 1758 the long expected Indian allies +arrived in Virginia, as many as four hundred by May--Cherokees, +Catawbas, Tuscaroras, and Nottaways. But Dinwiddie was wholly +unable to use them effectively; and in order to provide amusement +for them, he directed that they should go "a scalping" with the +whites--"a barbarous method of war," frankly acknowledged the +governor, "introduced by the French, which we are oblidged to +follow in our own defense." Most of the Indian allies +discontentedly returned home before the end of the year, but the +remainder waited until the next year, to take part in the +campaign against Fort Duquesne. Three North Carolina companies, +composed of trained soldiers and hardy frontiersmen, went through +this campaign under the command of Major Hugh Waddell, the +"Washington of North Carolina." Long of limb and broad of chest, +powerful, lithe, and active, Waddell was an ideal leader for this +arduous service, being fertile in expedient and skilful in the +employment of Indian tactics. With true provincial pride Governor +Dobbs records that Waddell "had great honor done him, being +employed in all reconnoitring parties, and dressed and acted as +an Indian; and his sergeant, Rogers, took the only Indian +prisoner, who gave Mr. Forbes certain intelligence of the forces +in Fort Duquesne, upon which they resolved to proceed." This +apparently trivial incident is remarkable, in that it proved to +be the decisive factor in a campaign that was about to be +abandoned. The information in regard to the state of the garrison +at Fort Duquesne, secured from the Indian, for the capture of +whom two leading officers had offered a reward of two hundred and +fifty pounds, emboldened Forbes to advance rather than to retire. +Upon reaching the fort (November 25th), he found it abandoned by +the enemy. Sergeant Rogers never received the reward promised by +General Forbes and the other English officer; but some time +afterward he was compensated by a modest sum from the colony of +North Carolina. + +A series of unfortunate occurrences, chiefly the fault of the +whites, soon resulted in the precipitation of a terrible Indian +outbreak. A party of Cherokees, returning home in May, 1758, +seized some stray horses on the frontier of Virginia--never +dreaming of any wrong, says an old historian, as they saw it +frequently done by the whites. The owners of the horses, hastily +forming a party, went in pursuit of the Indians and killed twelve +or fourteen of the number. The relatives of the slain Indians, +greatly incensed, vowed vengeance upon the whites. Nor was the +tactless conduct of Forbes calculated to quiet this resentment; +for when Atta-kulla-kulla and nine other chieftains deserted in +disgust at the treatment accorded them, they were pursued by +Forbes's orders, apprehended and disarmed. This rude treatment, +coupled with the brutal and wanton murder of some Cherokee +hunters a little earlier, by an irresponsible band of Virginians +under Captain Robert Wade, still further aggravated the Indians. + +Incited by the French, who had fled to the southward after the +fall of Fort Duquesne, parties of bloodthirsty young Indians +rushed down upon the settlements and left in their path death and +desolation along the frontiers of the Carolinas. On the upper +branch of the Yadkin and below the South Yadkin near Fort Dobbs +twenty-two whites fell in swift succession before the secret +onslaughts of the savages from the lower Cherokee towns. Many of +the settlers along the Yadkin fled to the Carolina Fort at +Bethabara and the stockade at the mill; and the sheriff of Rowan +County suffered siege by the Cherokees, in his home, until +rescued by a detachment under Brother Loesch from Bethabara. +While many families took refuge in Fort Dobbs, frontiersmen under +Captain Morgan Bryan ranged through the mountains to the west of +Salisbury and guarded the settlements from the hostile incursions +of the savages. So gravely alarmed were the Rowan settlers, +compelled by the Indians to desert their planting and crops, that +Colonel Harris was despatched post-haste for aid to Cape Fear, +arriving there on July 1st. With strenuous energy Captain +Waddell, then stationed in the east, rushed two companies of +thirty men each to the rescue, sending by water-carriage six +swivel guns and ammunition on before him; and these +reinforcements brought relief at last to the harassed Rowan +frontiers." During the remainder of the year, the borders were +kept clear by bold and tireless rangers-under the leadership of +expert Indian fighters of the stamp of Grifth Rutherford and +Morgan Bryan. + +When the Cherokee warriors who had wrought havoc along the North +Carolina border in April arrived at their town of Settiquo, they +proudly displayed the twenty-two scalps of the slain Rowan +settlers. Upon the demand for these scalps by Captain Demere at +Fort Loudon and under direction of Atta-kulla-kulla, the Settiquo +warriors surrendered eleven of the scalps to Captain Demere who, +according to custom in time of peace, buried them. New murders on +Pacolet and along the Virginia Path, which occurred shortly +afterward, caused gloomy forebodings; and it was plain, says a +contemporary gazette, that "the lower Cherokees were not +satisfied with the murder of the Rowan settlers, but intended +further mischief". On October 1st and again on October 31st, +Governor Dobbs received urgent requests from Governor Lyttelton, +asking that the North Carolina provincials and militia cooperate +to bring him assistance. Although there was no law requiring the +troops to march out of the province and the exposed frontiers of +North Carolina sorely needed protection, Waddell, now +commissioned colonel, assembled a force of five small companies +and marched to the aid of Governor Lyttelton. But early in +January, 1760, while on the march, Waddell received a letter from +Lyttelton, informing him that the assistance was not needed and +that a treaty of peace had been negotiated with the Cherokees. + + + +CHAPTER VI. Crushing the Cherokees + +Thus ended the Cherokee war, which was among the last humbling +strokes given to the expiring power of France in North America.- +-Hewatt: An Historical Account of the Rise and Progress of the +Colonies of South Carolina and Georgia. 1779. + + +Governor Lyttelton's treaty of "peace", negotiated with the +Cherokees at the close of 1759, was worse than a crime: it was a +crass and hideous blunder. His domineering attitude and +tyrannical treatment of these Indians had aroused the bitterest +animosity. Yet he did not realize that it was no longer safe to +trust their word. No sooner did the governor withdraw his army +from the borders than the cunning Cherokees, whose passions had +been inflamed by what may fairly be called the treacherous +conduct of Lyttelton, rushed down with merciless ferocity upon +the innocent and defenseless families on the frontier. On +February 1, 1760, while a large party (including the family of +Patrick Calhoun), numbering in all about one hundred and fifty +persons, were removing from the Long Cane settlement to Augusta, +they were suddenly attacked by a hundred mounted Cherokees, who +slaughtered about fifty of them. After the massacre, many of the +children were found helplessly wandering in the woods. One man +alone carried to Augusta no less than nine of the pitiful +innocents, some horribly mutilated with the tomahawk, others +scalped, and all yet alive. + +Atrocities defying description continued to be committed, and +many people were slain. The Cherokees, under the leadership of +Si-lou-ee, or the Young Warrior of Estatoe, the Round O, Tiftoe, +and others, were baffled in their persistent efforts to capture +Fort Prince George. On February 16th the crafty Oconostota +appeared before the fort and under the pretext of desiring some +White man to accompany him on a visit to the governor on urgent +business, lured the commander, Lieutenant Coytomore, and two +attendants to a conference outside the gates. At a preconceived +signal a volley of shots rang out; the two attendants were +wounded, and Lieutenant Coytomore, riddled with bullets, fell +dead. Enraged by this act of treachery, the garrison put to death +the Indian hostages within. During the abortive attack upon the +fort, Oconostota, unaware of the murder of the hostages, was +heard shouting above the din of battle: "Fight strong, and you +shall be relieved." + +Now began the dark days along the Rowan border, which were so +sorely to test human endurance. Many refugees fortified +themselves in the different stockades; and Colonel Hugh Waddell +with his redoubtable frontier company of Indian-fighters awaited +the onslaught of the savages, who were reported to have passed +through the mountain defiles and to be approaching along the +foot-hills. The story of the investment of Fort Dobbs and the +splendidly daring sortie of Waddell and Bailey is best told in +Waddell's report to Governor Dobbs (February 29, 1760): + +"For several Days I observed a small party of Indians were +constantly about the fort, I sent out several parties after them +to no purpose, the Evening before last between 8 & 9 o'clock I +found by the Dogs making an uncommon Noise there must be a party +nigh a Spring which we sometimes use. As my Garrison is but +small, and I was apprehensive it might be a scheme to draw out +the Garrison, I took our Capt. Bailie who with myself and party +made up ten: We had not marched 300 yds. from the fort when we +were attacked by at least 60 or 70 Indians. I had given my party +Orders not to fire until I gave the word, which they punctually +observed: We rec'd the Indians' fire: When I perceived they had +almost all fired, I ordered my party to fire which We did not +further than 12 steps each loaded with a Bullet and 7 Buck Shot, +they had nothing to cover them as they were advancing either to +tomahawk us or make us Prisoners: They found the fire very hot +from so small a Number which a good deal confused them: I then +ordered my party to retreat, as I found the Instant our skirmish +began another party had attacked the fort, upon our reinforcing +the garrison the Indians were soon repulsed with I am sure a +considerable Loss, from what I myself saw as well as those I can +confide in they cou'd not have less than 10 or 12 killed and +wounded; The next Morning we found a great deal of Blood and one +dead whom I suppose they cou'd not find in the night. On my side +I had 2 Men wounded one of whom I am afraid will die as he is +scalped, the other is in way of Recovery, and one boy killed near +the fort whom they durst not advance to scalp. I expected they +would have paid me another visit last night, as they attack all +Fortifications by Night, but find they did not like their +Reception." + +Alarmed by Waddell's "offensive-defensive," the Indians abandoned +the siege. Robert Campbell, Waddell's ranger, who was scalped in +this engagement, subsequently recovered from his wounds and was +recompensed by the colony with the sum of twenty pounds. + +In addition to the frontier militia, four independent companies +were now placed under Waddell's command. Companies of volunteers +scoured the woods in search of the lurking Indian foe. These +rangers, who were clad in hunting-shirts and buckskin leggings, +and who employed Indian tactics in fighting, were captained by +such hardy leaders as the veteran Morgan Bryan, the intrepid +Griffith Ruthe ford, the German partisan, Martin Phifer +(Pfeiffer), and Anthony Hampton, the father of General Wade +Hampton. They visited periodically a chain of "forest castles" +erected by the settlers--extending all the way from Fort Dobbs +and the Moravian fortifications in the Wachau to Samuel +Stalnaker's stockade on the Middle Fork of the Holston in +Virginia. About the middle of March, thirty volunteer Rowan +County rangers encountered a band of forty Cherokees, who +fortified themselves in a deserted house near the Catawba River. +The famous scout and hunter, John Perkins, assisted by one of his +bolder companions, crept up to the house and flung lighted +torches upon the roof. One of the Indians, as the smoke became +suffocating and the flames burned hotter, exclaimed: "Better for +one to die bravely than for all to perish miserably in the +flames," and darting forth, dashed rapidly hither and thither, in +order to draw as many shots as possible. This act of superb +self-sacrifice was successful; and while the rifles of the +whites, who riddled the brave Indian with balls, were empty, the +other savages made a wild dash for liberty. Seven fell thus under +the deadly rain of bullets; but many escaped. Ten of the Indians, +all told, lost their scalps, for which the volunteer rangers were +subsequently paid one hundred pounds by the colony of North +Carolina. + +Beaten back from Fort Dobbs, sorely defeated along the Catawba, +hotly pursued by the rangers, the Cherokees continued to lurk in +the shadows of the dense forests, and at every opportunity to +fall suddenly upon way faring settlers and isolated cabins remote +from any stronghold. On March 8th William Fish, his son, and +Thompson, a companion, were riding along the "trace," in search +of provisions for a group of families fortified on the Yadkin, +when a flight of arrows hurtled from the cane-brake, and Fish and +his son fell dead. Although pierced with two arrows, one in the +hip and one clean through his body, Thompson escaped upon his +fleet horse; and after a night of ghastly suffering finally +reached the Carolina Fort at Bethabara. The good Dr. Bonn, by +skilfully extracting the barbed shafts from his body, saved +Thompson's life. The pious Moravians rejoiced over the recovery +of the brave messenger, whose sensational arrival gave them +timely warning of the close proximity of the Indians. While +feeding their cattle, settlers were shot from ambush by the +lurking foe; and on March 11th, a family barricaded within a +burning house, which they were defending with desperate courage, +were rescued in the nick of time by the militia. No episode from +Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales surpasses in melancholy +interest Harry Hicks's heroic defense of his little fort on Bean +Island Creek. Surrounded by the Indians, Hicks and his family +took refuge within the small outer palisade around his humble +home. Fighting desperately against terrific odds, he was finally +driven from his yard into his log cabin, which he continued to +defend with dauntless courage. With every shot he tried to send a +redskin to the happy hunting-grounds; and it was only after his +powder was exhausted that he fell, fighting to the last, beneath +the deadly tomahawk. So impressed were the Indians by his bravery +that they spared the life of his wife and his little son; and +these were afterward rescued by Waddell when he marched to the +Cherokee towns in 1761. + +The kindly Moravians had always entertained with generous +hospitality the roving bands of Cherokees, who accordingly held +them in much esteem and spoke of Bethabara as "the Dutch Fort, +where there are good people and much bread." But now, in these +dread days, the truth of their daily text was brought forcibly +home to the Moravians: "Neither Nehemiah nor his brethren put off +their clothes, but prayed as they watched." With Bible in one +hand and rifle in the other, the inhabitant of Wachovia sternly +marched to religious worship. No Puritan of bleak New England +ever showed more resolute courage or greater will to defend the +hard-won outpost of civilization than did the pious Moravian of +the Wachau. At the new settlement of Bethania on Easter Day, more +than four hundred souls, including sixty rangers, listened +devoutly to the eloquent sermon of Bishop Spangenberg concerning +the way of salvation--the while their arms, stacked without the +Gemein Haus, were guarded by the watchful sentinel. On March 14th +the watchmen at Bethania with well-aimed shots repelled the +Indians, whose hideous yells of baffled rage sounded down the +wind like "the howling of a hundred wolves". Religion was no +protection against the savages; for three ministers journeying to +the present site of Salem were set upon by the red men--one +escaping, another suffering capture, and the third, a Baptist, +losing his life. A little later word came to Fort Dobbs that John +Long and Robert Gillespie of Salisbury had been shot from ambush +and scalped--Long having been pierced with eight bullets and +Gillespie with seven. + +There is one beautiful incident recorded by the Moravians, which +has a truly symbolic significance. While the war was at its +height, a strong party of Cherokees, who had lost their chief, +planned in retaliation to attack Bethabara. "When they went +home," sets forth the Moravian Diary, "they said they had been to +a great town, where there were a great many people, where the +bells rang often, and during the night, time after time, a horn +was blown, so that they feared to attack the town and had taken +no prisoners." The trumpet of the watchman, announcing the +passing of the hour, had convinced the Indians that their plans +for attack were discovered; and the regular evening bell, +summoning the pious to prayer, rang in the stricken ears of the +red men like the clamant call to arms. + +Following the retirement from office of Governor Lyttelton, +Lieutenant-Governor Bull proceeded to prosecute the war with +vigor. On April 1, 1760, twelve hundred men under Colonel +Archibald Montgomerie arrived at Charleston, with instructions to +strike an immediate blow and to relieve Fort Loudon, then +invested by the Cherokees. With his own force, two hundred and +ninety-five South Carolina Rangers, forty picked men of the new +"levies," and "a good number of guides," Montgomerie moved from +Fort Ninety-Six on May 28th. On the first of June, crossing +Twelve-Mile River, Montgomerie began the campaign in earnest, +devastating and burning every Indian village in the Valley of +Keowee, killing and capturing more than a hundred of the +Cherokees, and destroying immense stores of corn. Receiving no +reply to his summons to the Cherokees of the Middle and Upper +Towns to make peace or suffer like treatment, Montgomerie took up +his march from Fort Prince George on June 24th, resolved to carry +out his threat. On the morning of the 27th, he was drawn into an +ambuscade within six miles of Et-chow-ee, eight miles south of +the present Franklin, North Carolina, a mile and a half below +Smith's Bridge, and was vigorously attacked from dense cover by +some six hundred and thirty warriors led by Si-lou-ee. Fighting +with Indian tactics, the Provincial Rangers under Patrick Calhoun +particularly distinguished themselves; and the bloodcurdling +yells of the painted savages were responded to by the wild huzzas +of the kilted Highlanders who, waving their Scotch bonnets, +impetuously charged the redskins and drove them again and again +from their lurking-places. Nevertheless Montgomerie lost from +eighty to one hundred in killed and wounded, while the loss of +the Indians was supposed to be about half the loss of the whites. +Unable to care for his wounded and lacking the means of removing +his baggage, Montgomerie silently withdrew his forces. In so +doing, he acknowledged defeat, since he was compelled to abandon +his original intention of relieving the beleaguered garrison of +Fort London. + +Captain Demere and his devoted little band, who had been +resolutely holding out, were now left to their tragic fate. After +the bread was exhausted, the garrison was reduced to the +necessity of eating dogs and horses; and the loyal aid of the +Indian wives of some of the garrison, who secretly brought them +supplies of food daily, enabled them to hold out still longer. +Realizing at last the futility of prolonging the hopeless +contest, Captain Demere surrendered the fort on August 8, 1760. +At daylight the next morning, while on the march to Fort Prince +George, the soldiers were set upon by the treacherous Cherokees, +who at the first onset killed Captain Demere and twenty-nine +others. A humane chieftain, Outassitus, says one of the gazettes +of the day, "went around the field calling upon the Indians to +desist, and making such representations to them as stopped the +further progress and effects of their barbarous and brutal rage," +which expressed itself in scalping and hacking off the arms and +legs of the defenseless whites. Atta-kulla-kulla, who was +friendly to the whites, claimed Captain Stuart, the second +officer, as his captive, and bore him away by stealth. After nine +days' journey through the wilderness they encountered an advance +party under Major Andrew Lewis, sent out by Colonel Byrd, head of +a relieving army, to rescue and succor any of the garrison who +might effect their escape. Thus Stuart was restored to his +friends. This abortive and tragic campaign, in which the victory +lay conclusively with the Indians, ended when Byrd disbanded his +new levies and Montgomerie sailed from Charleston for the north +(August, 1760). + +During the remainder of the year, the province of North Carolina +remained free of further alarms from the Indians. But the view +was generally entertained that one more joint Effort of North +Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia would have to be made in +order to humble the Cherokees. At the sessions of the North +Carolina Assembly in November and again in December, matters in +dispute between Governor Dobbs and the representatives of the +people made impossible the passage of a proposed aid bill, +providing for five hundred men to cooperate with Virginia and +South Carolina. Nevertheless volunteers in large numbers +patriotically marched from North Carolina to Charleston and the +Congaree (December, 1760, to April, 1761), to enlist in the +famous regiment being organized by Colonel Thomas Middleton. On +March 31, 1761, Governor Dobbs called together the Assembly to +act upon a letter received from General Amherst, outlining a more +vigorous plan of campaign appropriate to the succession of a +young and vigorous sovereign, George III. An aid bill was passed, +providing twenty thousand pounds for men and supplies; and one +regiment of five companies of one hundred men each, under the +command of Colonel Hugh Waddell, was mustered into service for +seven months' duty, beginning May 1, 1761. + +On July 7, 1761, Colonel James Grant, detached from the main army +in command of a force of twenty-six hundred men, took up his +march from Fort Prince George. Attacked on June l0th two miles +south of the spot where Montgomerie was engaged the preceding +year, Grant's army, after a vigorous engagement lasting several +hours, drove off the Indians. The army then proceeded at leisure +to lay waste the fifteen towns of the Middle Settlements; and, +after this work of systematic devastation was over, returned to +Fort Prince George. Peace was concluded in September as the +result of this campaign; and in consequence the frontier was +pushed seventy miles farther to the west. + +Meantime, Colonel Waddell with his force of five hundred North +Carolinians had acted in concert with Colonel William Byrd, +commanding the Virginia detachment. The combined forces went into +camp at Captain Samuel Stalnaker's old place on the Middle Fork +of Holston. Because of his deliberately dilatory policy, Byrd was +superseded in the command by Colonel Adam Stephen. Marching their +forces to the Long Island of Holston, Stephen and Waddell erected +there Fort Robinson, in compliance with the instructions of +Governor Fauquier, of Virginia. The Cherokees, heartily tired of +the war, now sued for peace, which was concluded, independent of +the treaty at Charleston, on November 19, 1761. + +The successful termination of this campaign had an effect of +signal importance in the development of the expansionist spirit. +The rich and beautiful lands which fell under the eye of the +North Carolina and Virginia pioneers under Waddell, Byrd, and +Stephen, lured them irresistibly on to wider casts for fortune +and bolder explorations into the unknown, beckoning West. + + + +CHAPTER VII. The Land Companies + +It was thought good policy to settle those lands as fast as +possible, and that the granting them to men of the first +consequence who were likeliest and best able to procure large +bodies of people to settle on them was the most probable means of +effecting the end proposed.--Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia +to the Earl of Hillsborough: 1770. + + +Although for several decades the Virginia traders had been +passing over the Great Trading Path to the towns of the Cherokees +and the Catawbas, it was not until the early years of the +eighteenth century that Virginians of imaginative vision directed +their eyes to the westward, intent upon crossing the mountains +and locating settlements as a firm barrier against the +imperialistic designs of France. Acting upon his oft-expressed +conviction that once the English settlers had established +themselves at the source of the James River "it would not be in +the power of the French to dislodge them," Governor Alexander +Spotswood in 1716, animated with the spirit of the pioneer, led +an expedition of fifty men and a train of pack-horses to the +mountains, arduously ascended to the summit of the Blue Ridge, +and claimed the country by right of discovery in behalf of his +sovereign. In the journal of John Fontaine this vivacious account +is given of the historic episode: "I graved my name on a tree by +the river side; and the Governor buried a bottle with a paper +enclosed on which he writ that he took possession of this place +in the name and for King George the First of England. We had a +good dinner, and after it we got the men together and loaded all +their arms and we drank the King's health in Burgundy and fired a +volley, and all the rest of the Royal Family in claret and a +volley. We drank the Governor's health and fired another volley." + +By this jovial picnic, which the governor afterward commemorated +by presenting to each of the gentlemen who accompanied him a +golden horseshoe, inscribed with the legend, Sic juvat +transcendere montes, Alexander Spotswood anticipated by a third +of a century the more ambitious expedition on behalf of France by +Celoron de Bienville (see Chapter III), and gave a memorable +object-lesson in the true spirit of westward expansion. During +the ensuing years it began to dawn upon the minds of men of the +stamp of William Byrd and Joshua Gee that there was imperative +need for the establishment of a chain of settlements in the +trans-Alleghany, a great human wall to withstand the advancing +wave of French influence and occupation. By the fifth decade of +the century, as we have seen, the Virginia settlers, with their +squatter's claims and tomahawk rights, had pushed on to the +mountains; and great pressure was brought to bear upon the +council to issue grants for vast tracts of land in the uncharted +wilderness of the interior. + +At this period the English ministry adopted the aggressive policy +already mentioned in connection with the French and Indian war, +indicative of a determination to contest with France the right to +occupy the interior of the continent. This policy had been +inaugurated by Virginia with the express purpose of stimulating +the adoption of a similar policy by North Carolina and +Pennsylvania. Two land companies, organized almost +simultaneously, actively promoted the preliminaries necessary to +settlement, despatching parties under expert leadership to +discover the passes through the mountains and to locate the best +land in the trans-Alleghany. + +In June, 1749, a great corporation, the Loyal Land Company of +Virginia, received a grant of eight hundred thousand acres above +the North Carolina line and west of the mountains. Dr. Thomas +Walker, an expert surveyor, who in company with several other +gentlemen had made a tour of exploration through eastern +Tennessee and the Holston region in 1748, was chosen as the agent +of this company. Starting from his home in Albemarle County, +Virginia, March 6, 1750, accompanied by five stalwart pioneers, +Walker made a tour of exploration to the westward, being absent +four months and one week. On this journey, which carried the +party as far west as the Rockcastle River (May 11th) and as far +north as the present Paintsville, Kentucky, they named many +natural objects, such as mountains and rivers, after members of +the party. Their two principal achievements were the erection of +the first house built by white men between the Cumberland +Mountains and the Ohio River a feat, however, which led to no +important developments; and the discovery of the wonderful gap in +the Alleghanies to which Walker gave the name Cumberland, in +honor of the ruthless conqueror at Culloden, the "bloody duke." + +In 1748 the Ohio Company was organized by Colonel Thomas Lee, +president of the Virginia council, and twelve other gentlemen, of +Virginia and Maryland. In their petition for five hundred +thousand acres, one of the declared objects of the company was +"to anticipate the French by taking possession of that country +southward of the Lakes to which the French had no right . . . ." +By the royal order of May 19, 1749, the company was awarded two +hundred thousand acres, free of quit-rent for ten years; and the +promise was made of an additional award of the remainder +petitioned for, on condition of seating a hundred families upon +the original grant and the building and maintaining of a fort. +Christopher Gist, summoned from his remote home on the Yadkin in +North Carolina, was instructed "to search out and discover the +Lands upon the river Ohio & other adjoining branches of the +Mississippi down as low as the great Falls thereof." In this +journey, which began at Colonel Thomas Cresap's, in Maryland, in +October, 1750, and ended at Gist's home on May 18, 1751, Gist +visited the Lower Shawnee Town and the Lower Blue Licks, ascended +Pilot Knob almost two decades before Find lay and Boone, from the +same eminence, "saw with pleasure the beautiful level of +Kentucky," intersected Walker's route at two points, and crossed +Cumberland Mountain at Pound Gap on the return journey. This was +a far more extended journey than Walker's, enabling Gist to +explore the fertile valleys of the Muskingum, Scioto, and Miami +rivers and to gain a view of the beautiful meadows of Kentucky. + +It is eminently significant of the spirit of the age, which was +inaugurating an era of land hunger unparalleled in American +history, that the first authentic records of the trans-Alleghany +were made by surveyors who visited the country as the agents of +great land companies. The outbreak of the French and Indian War +so soon afterward delayed for a decade and more any important +colonization of the West. Indeed, the explorations and findings +of Walker and Gist were almost unknown, even to the companies +they represented. But the conclusion of peace in 1763, which gave +all the region between the mountains and the Mississippi to the +British, heralded the true beginning of the westward expansionist +movement in the Old Southwest, and inaugurated the constructive +leadership of North Carolina in f he occupation and colonization +of the imperial domain of Kentucky and the Ohio Valley. + +In the middle years of the century many families of Virginia +gentry removed to the back country of North Carolina in the +fertile region ranging from Williamsborough on the east to +Hillsborough on the west. There soon arose in this section of the +colony a society marked by intellectual distinction, social +graces, and the leisured dignity of the landlord and the large +planter. So conspicuous for means, intellect, culture, and +refinement were the people of this group, having "abundance of +wealth and leisure for enjoyment," that Governor Josiah Martin, +in passing through this region some years later, significantly +observes: "They have great preeminence, as well with respect to +soil and cultivation, as to the manners and condition of the +inhabitants, in which last respect the difference is so great +that one would be led to think them people of another region." +This new wealthy class which was now turning its gaze toward the +unoccupied lands along the frontier was "dominated by the +democratic ideals of pioneers rather than by the aristocratic +tendencies of slave-holding planters." From the cross- +fertilization of the ideas of two social groups--this back- +country gentry, of innate qualities of leadership, democratic +instincts, economic independence, and expansive tendencies, and +the primitive pioneer society of the frontier, frugal in taste, +responsive to leadership, bold, ready, and thorough in execution- +-there evolved the militant American expansion in the Old +Southwest. + +A conspicuous figure in this society of Virginia emigrants was a +young man named Richard Henderson, whose father had removed with +his family from Hanover County, Virginia, to Bute, afterward +Granville County, North Carolina, in 1742. Educated at home by a +private tutor, he began his career as assistant of his father, +Samuel Henderson, the High Sheriff of Granville County; and after +receiving a law-license, quickly acquired an extensive practice. +"Even in the superior courts where oratory and eloquence are as +brilliant and powerful as in Westminster hall," records an +English acquaintance, "he soon became distinguished and eminent, +and his superior genius shone forth with great splendour, and +universal applause." This young attorney, wedded to the daughter +of an Irish lord, often visited Salisbury on his legal circuit; +and here he became well acquainted with Squire Boone, one of the +"Worshipfull Justices," and often appeared in suits before him. +By his son, the nomadic Daniel Boone, conspicuous already for his +solitary wanderings across the dark green mountains to the +sun-lit valleys and boundless hunting-grounds beyond, Henderson +was from time to time regaled with bizarre and fascinating tales +of western exploration; and Boone, in his dark hour of poverty +and distress, when he was heavily involved financially, turned +for aid to this friend and his partner, who composed the law-firm +of Williams and Henderson. + +Boone's vivid descriptions of the paradise of the West stimulated +Henderson's imaginative mind and attracted his attention to the +rich possibilities of unoccupied lands there. While the Board of +Trade in drafting the royal proclamation of October 7, 1763, +forbade the granting of lands in the vast interior, which was +specifically reserved to the Indians, it was clearly not their +intention to set permanent western limits to the colonies. The +prevailing opinion among the shrewdest men of the period was well +expressed by George Washington, who wrote his agent for +preempting western lands: "I can never look upon that +proclamation in any other light (but I say this between +ourselves) than as a temporary expedient to quiet the minds of +the Indians." And again in 1767: "It (the proclamation of 1763) +must fall, of course, in a few years, especially when those +Indians consent to our occupying the lands. Any person, +therefore, who neglects the present opportunity of hunting out +good lands, and in some measure marking out and distinguishing +them for his own, in order to keep others from settling them, +will never regain it." Washington had added greatly to his +holdings of bounty lands in the West by purchasing at trivial +prices the claims of many of the officers and soldiers. Three +years later we find him surveying extensive tracts along the Ohio +and the Great Kanawha, and, with the vision of the expansionist, +making large plans for the establishment of a colony to be seated +upon his own lands. Henderson, too, recognized the importance of +the great country west of the Appalachians. He agreed with the +opinion of Benjamin Franklin, who in 1756 called it "one of the +finest in North America for the extreme richness and fertility of +the land, the healthy temperature of the air and the mildness of +the climate, the plenty of hunting, fishing and fowling, the +facility of trade with the Indians and the vast convenience of +inland navigation or water carriage." Henderson therefore +proceeded to organize a land company for the purpose of acquiring +and colonizing a large domain in the West. This partnership, +which was entitled Richard Henderson and Company, was composed of +a few associates, including Richard Henderson, his uncle and +law-partner, John Williams, and, in all probability, their close +friends Thomas and Nathaniel Hart of Orange County, North +Carolina, immigrants from Hanover County, Virginia. + +Seizing the opportunity presented just after the conclusion of +peace, the company engaged Daniel Boone as scout and surveyor. He +was instructed, while hunting and trapping on his own account, to +examine, with respect to their location and fertility, the lands +which he visited, and to report his findings upon his return. The +secret expedition must have been transacted with commendable +circumspection; for although in after years it became common +knowledge among his friends that he had acted as the company's +agent, Boone himself consistently refrained from betraying the +confidence of his employers. Upon a similar mission, Gist had +carefully concealed from the suspicious Indians the fact that he +carried a compass, which they wittily termed "land stealer"; and +Washington likewise imposed secrecy upon his land agent Crawford, +insisting that the operation be carried on under the guise of +hunting game." The discreet Boone, taciturn and given to keeping +his own counsel, in one instance at least deemed it advantageous +to communicate the purpose of his mission to some hunters, well +known to him, in order to secure the results of their information +in regard to the best lands they had encountered in the course of +their hunting expedition. Boone came among the hunters, known as +the "Blevens connection," at one of their Tennessee station camps +on their return from a long hunt in Kentucky, in order, as +expressed in the quaint phraseology of the period, to be +"informed of the geography and locography of these woods, saying +that he was employed to explore them by Henderson & Company." The +acquaintance which Boone on this occasion formed with a member of +the party, Henry Scaggs, the skilled hunter and explorer, was +soon to bear fruit; for shortly afterward Scaggs was employed as +prospector by the same land company. In 1764 Scaggs had passed +through Cumberland Gap and hunted for the season on the +Cumberland; and accordingly the following year, as the agent of +Richard Henderson and Company, he was despatched on an extended +exploration to the lower Cumberland, fixing his station at the +salt lick afterward known as Mansker's Lick. + +Richard Henderson thus, it appears, "enlisted the Harts and +others in an enterprise which his own genius planned," says Peck, +the personal acquaintance and biographer of Boone, "and then +encouraged several hunters to explore the country and learn where +the best lands lay." Just why Henderson and his associates did +not act sooner upon the reports brought back by the +hunters--Boone and Scaggs and Callaway, who accompanied Boone in +1764 in the interest of the land company "is not known; but in +all probability the fragmentary nature of these reports, however +glowing and enthusiastic, was sufficient cause for the delay of +five years before the land company, through the agency of Boone +and Findlay, succeeded in having a thorough exploration inside of +the Kentucky region. Delay was also caused by rival claims to the +territory. In the Virginia Gazette of December 1, 1768, Henderson +must have read with astonishment not unmixed with dismay that +"the Six Nations and all their tributaries have granted a vast +extent of country to his majesty, and the Proprietaries of +Pennsylvania, and settled an advantageous boundary line between +their hunting country and this, and the other colonies to the +Southward as far as the Cherokee River, for which they received +the most valuable present in goods and dollars that was ever +given at any conference since the settlement of America." The +news was now bruited about through the colony of North Carolina, +that the Cherokees were hot in their resentment because the +Northern Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees and the +perpetual disputants for the vast Middle Ground of Kentucky, had +received at the Treaty of Fort Stanwix, November 5, 1768, an +immense compensation from the crown for the territory which they, +the Cherokees, claimed from time immemorial. Only three weeks +before, John Stuart, Superintendent for Indian Affairs in the +Southern Department, had negotiated with the Cherokees the Treaty +of Hard Labor, South Carolina (October 14th), by which Governor +Tryon's line of 1767, from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, was +continued direct to Colonel Chiswell's mine, the present +Wytheville, Virginia, and thence in a straight Brie to the mouth +of the Great Kanawha. Thus at the close of the year 1768 the +crown through both royal governor and superintendent of Indian +affairs acknowledged in fair and open treaty the right of the +Cherokees, whose Tennessee villages guarded the gateway, to the +valley lands east of the mountain barrier as well as to the dim +mid-region of Kentucky. In the very act of negotiating the Treaty +of Fort Stanwix, Sir William Johnson privately acknowledged that +possession of the trans-Alleghany could be legally obtained only +by extinguishing the title of the Cherokees. + +These conflicting claims soon led to collisions between the +Indians and the company's settlers. In the spring of 1769 +occurred one of those incidents in the westward advance which, +though slight in itself, was to have a definite bearing upon the +course of events in later years. In pursuance of his policy, as +agent of the Loyal Land Company, of promoting settlement upon the +company's lands, Dr. Thomas Walker, who had visited Powell's +Valley the preceding year and come into possession of a very +large tract there, simultaneously made proposals to one party of +men including the Kirtleys, Captain Rucker, and others, and to +another party led by Joseph Martin, trader of Orange County, +Virginia, afterward a striking figure in the Old Southwest. The +fevered race by these bands of eighteenth-century "sooners" for +possession of an early "Cherokee Strip" was won by the latter +band, who at once took possession and began to clear; so that +when the Kirtleys arrived, Martin coolly handed them "a letter +from Dr. Walker that informed them that if we got to the valley +first, we were to have 21,000 acres of land, and they were not to +interfere with us." Martin and his companions were delighted with +the beautiful valley at the base of the Cumberland, quickly "eat +and destroyed 23 deer--15 bears--2 buffaloes and a great quantity +of turkeys," and entertained gentlemen from Virginia and Maryland +who desired to settle more than a hundred families there. The +company reckoned, however, without their hosts, the Cherokees, +who, fortified by the treaty of Hard Labor (1768) which left this +country within the Indian reservation, were determined to drive +Martin and his company out. While hunting on the Cumberland +River, northwest of Cumberland Gap, Martin and his company were +surrounded and disarmed by a party of Cherokees who said they had +orders from Cameron, the royal agent, to rob all white men +hunting on their lands. When Martin and his party arrived at +their station in Powell's Valley, they found it broken up and +their goods stolen by the Indians, which left them no recourse +but to return to the settlements in Virginia. It was not until +six years later that Martin, under the stable influence of the +Transylvania Company, was enabled to return to this spot and +erect there the station which was to play an integral part in the +progress of westward expansion. + +Before going on to relate Boone's explorations of Kentucky under +the auspices of the land company, it will be convenient to turn +back for a moment and give some account of other hunters and +explorers who visited that territory between the time of its +discovery by Walker and Gist and the advent of Boone. + + + +CHAPTER VIII. The Long Hunters in the Twilight Zone + +The long Hunters principally resided in the upper countries of +Virginia & North Carolina on New River & Holston River, and when +they intended to make a long Hunt (as they calls it) they +Collected near the head of Holston near whare Abingdon now stands +. . . .--General William Hall. + + +Before the coming of Walker and Gist in 1750 and 1751 +respectively, the region now called Kentucky had, as far as we +know, been twice visited by the French, once in 1729 when +Chaussegros de Lery and his party visited the Big Bone Lick, and +again in the summer of 1749 when the Baron de Longueuil with four +hundred and fifty-two Frenchmen and Indians, going to join +Bienville in an expedition against "the Cherickees and other +Indians lying at the back of Carolina and Georgia," doubtless +encamped on the Kentucky shore of the Ohio. Kentucky was also +traversed by John Peter Salling with his three adventurous +companions in their journey through the Middle West in 1742. But +all these early visits, including the memorable expeditions of +Walker and Gist, were so little known to the general public that +when John Filson wrote the history of Kentucky in 1784 he +attributed its discovery to James McBride in 1754. More +influential upon the course of westward expansion was an +adventure which occurred in 1752, the very year in which the +Boones settled down in their Vadkin home. + +In the autumn of 1752, a Pennsylvania trader, John Findlay, with +three or four companions, descended the Ohio River in a canoe as +far as the falls at the present Louisville, Kentucky, and +accompanied a party of Shawnees to their town of +Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, eleven miles east of what is now Winchester. + +This was the site of the "Indian Old Corn Field," the Iroquois +name for which ("the place of many fields," or "prairie") was Ken +-ta-ke, whence came the name of the state. + +Five miles east of this spot, where still may be seen a mound and +an ellipse showing the outline of the stockade, is the famous +Pilot Knob, from the summit of which the fields surrounding the +town lie visible in their smooth expanse. During Findlay's stay +at the Indian town other traders from Pennsylvania and Virginia, +who reported that they were "on their return from trading with +the Cuttawas (Catawbas), a nation who live in the Territories of +Carolina," assembled in the vicinity in January, 1753. Here, as +the result of disputes arising from their barter, they were set +upon and captured by a large party of straggling Indians +(Coghnawagas from Montreal) on January 26th; but Findlay and +another trader named James Lowry were so fortunate as to escape +and return through the wilderness to the Pennsylvania +settlements." The incident is of important historic significance; +for it was from these traders, who must have followed the Great +Warriors' Path to the country of the Catawbas, that Findlay +learned of the Ouasioto (Cumberland) Gap traversed by the Indian +path. His reminiscences of this gateway to Kentucky, of the site +of the old Indian town on Lulbegrud Creek, a tributary of the Red +River, and of the Pilot Knobwere sixteen years later to fire +Boone to his great tour of exploration in behalf of the +Transylvania Company. + +During the next two decades, largely because of the hostility of +the savage tribes, only a few traders and hunters from the east +ranged through the trans-Alleghany. But in 1761, a party of +hunters led by a rough frontiersman, Elisha Walden, penetrated +into Powell's Valley, followed the Indian trail through +Cumberland Gap, explored the Cumberland River, and finally +reached the Laurel Mountain where, encountering a party of +Indians, they deemed it expedient to return. With Walden went +Henry Scaggs, afterward explorer for the Henderson Land Company, +William Elevens and Charles Cox, the famous Virginia hunters, one +Newman, and some fifteen other stout pioneers. Their itinerary +may be traced from the names given to natural objects in honor of +members of the party--Walden's Mountain and Walden's Creek, +Scaggs' Ridge and Newman's Ridge. Following the peace of 1763, +which made travel in this region moderately safe once more, the +English proceeded to occupy the territory which they had won. In +1765 George Croghan with a small party, on the way to prepare the +inhabitants of the Illinois country for transfer to English +sovereignty, visited the Great Bone Licks of Kentucky (May 30th, +31st); and a year later Captain Harry Gordon, chief engineer in +the Western Department in North America, visited and minutely +described the same licks and the falls. But these, and numerous +other water-journeys and expeditions of which no records were +kept, though interesting enough in themselves, had little bearing +upon the larger phases of westward expansion and colonization. + +The decade opening with the year 1765 is the epoch of bold and +ever bolder exploration--the more adventurous frontiersmen of the +border pushing deep into the wilderness in search of game, lured +on by the excitements of the chase and the profit to be derived +from the sale of peltries. In midsummer, 1766, Captain James +Smith, Joshua Horton, Uriah Stone, William Baker, and a young +mulatto slave passed through Cumberland Gap, hunted through the +country south of the Cherokee and along the Cumberland and +Tennessee rivers, and as Smith reports "found no vestige of any +white man." During the same year a party of five hunters from +South Carolina, led by Isaac Lindsey, penetrated the Kentucky +wilderness to the tributary of the Cumberland, named Stone's +River by the former party, for one of their number. Here they +encountered two men, who were among the greatest of the western +pioneers, and were destined to leave their names in historic +association with the early settlement of Kentucky, James Harrod +and Michael Stoner, a German, both of whom had descended the Ohio +from Fort Pitt. With the year 1769 began those longer and more +extended excursions into the interior which were to result in +conveying at last to the outside world graphic and detailed +information concerning "the wonderful new country of Cantucky." +In the late spring of this year Hancock and Richard Taylor (the +latter the father of President Zachary Taylor), Abraham +Hempinstall, and one Barbour, all true-blue frontiersmen, left +their homes in Orange County, Virginia, and hunted extensively in +Kentucky and Arkansas. Two of the party traveled through Georgia +and East and West Florida; while the other two hunted on the +Washita during the winter of 1770-1. Explorations of this type +became increasingly hazardous as the animosity of the Indians +increased; and from this time onward for a number of years almost +all the parties of roving hunters suffered capture or attack by +the crafty red men. In this same year Major John McCulloch, +living on the south branch of the Potomac, set out accompanied by +a white man-servant and a negro, to explore the western country. +While passing down the Ohio from Pittsburgh McCulloch was +captured by the Indians near the mouth of the Wabash and carried +to the present site of Terre Haute, Indiana. Set free after four +or five months, he journeyed in company with some French +voyageurs first to Natchez and then to New Orleans, whence he +made the sea voyage to Philadelphia. Somewhat later, Benjamin +Cleveland (afterward famous in the Revolution), attended by four +companions, set out from his home on the upper Yadkin to explore +the Kentucky wilderness. After passing through Cumberland Gap, +they encountered a band of Cherokees who plundered them of +everything they had, even to their hats and shoes, and ordered +them to leave the Indian hunting-grounds. On their return journey +they almost starved, and Cleveland, who was reluctantly forced to +kill his faithful little hunting-dog, was wont to declare in +after years that it was the sweetest meat he ever ate. + +Fired to adventure by the glowing accounts brought back by Uriah +Stone, a much more formidable band than any that had hitherto +ventured westward--including Uriah Stone as pilot, Gasper +Mansker, John Rains, Isaac Bledsoe, and a dozen others--assembled +in June, 1769, in the New River region. "Each Man carried two +horses," says an early pioneer in describing one of these +parties, "traps, a large supply of powder and led, and a small +hand vise and bellows, files and screw plate for the purpose of +fixing the guns if any of them should get out of fix." Passing +through Cumberland Gap, they continued their long journey until +they reached Price's Meadow, in the present Wayne County, +Kentucky, where they established their encampment. In the course +of their explorations, during which they gave various names to +prominent natural features, they established their "station camp" +on a creek in Sumner County, Tennessee, whence originated the +name of Station Camp Creek. Isaac Bledsoe and Gasper Mansker, +agreeing to travel from here in opposite directions along a +buffalo trace passing near the camp, each succeeded in +discovering the famous salt-lick which bears his name--namely +Bledsoe's Lick and Mansker's Lick. The flat surrounding the lick, +about one hundred acres in extent, discovered by Bledsoe, +according to his own statement "was principally Covered with +buffelows in every direction--not hundreds but thousands." As he +sat on his horse, he shot down two deer in the lick; but the +buffaloes blindly trod them in the mud. They did not mind him and +his horse except when the wind blew the scent in their nostrils, +when they would break and run in droves. Indians often lurked in +the neighbourhood of these hunters -plundering their camp, +robbing them, and even shooting down one of their number, Robert +Crockett, from ambush. After many trials and vicissitudes, which +included a journey to the Spanish Natchez and the loss of a great +mass of peltries when they were plundered by Piomingo and a war +party of Chickasaws, they finilly reached home in the late spring +of 1770." + +The most notable expedition of this period, projected under the +auspices of two bold leaders extraordinarily skilled in +woodcraft, Joseph Drake and Henry Scaggs, was organized in the +early autumn of 1770. This imposing band of stalwart hunters from +the New River and Holston country, some forty in number, garbed +in hunting shirts, leggings, and moccasins, with three +pack-horses to each man, rifles, ammunition, traps, dogs, +blankets, and salt, pushed boldly through Cumberland Gap into the +heart of what was later justly named the "Dark and Bloody Ground" +(see Chapter XIV)--"not doubting," says an old border chronicler, +"that they were to be encountered by Indians, and to subsist on +game." From the duration of their absence from home, they +received the name of the Long Hunters--the romantic appellation +by which they are known in the pioneer history of the Old +Southwest. Many natural objects were named by this party--in +particular Dick's River, after the noted Cherokee hunter, Captain +Dick, who, pleased to be recognized by Charles Scaggs, told the +Long Hunters that on HIS river, pointing it out, they would find +meat plenty--adding with laconic signifigance: "Kill it and go +home." From the Knob Lick, in Lincoln County, as reported by a +member of the party, "they beheld largely over a thousand +animals, including buffaloe, elk, bear, and deer, with many wild +turkies scattered among them; all quite restless, some playing, +and others busily employed in licking the earth . . . . The +buffaloe and other animals had so eaten away the soil, that they +could, in places, go entirely underground." Upon the return of a +detachment to Virginia, fourteen fearless hunters chose to +remain; and one day, during the absence of some of the band upon +a long exploring trip, the camp was attacked by a straggling +party of Indians under Will Emery, a halfbreed Cherokee. Two of +the hunters were carried into captivity and never heard of again; +a third managed to escape. In embittered commemoration of the +plunder of the camp and the destruction of the peltries, they +inscribed upon a poplar, which had lost its bark, this emphatic +record, followed by their names: + +2300 Deer Skins lost Ruination by God + +Undismayed by this depressing stroke of fortune, they continued +their hunt in the direction of the lick which Bledsoe had +discovered the preceding year. Shortly after this discovery, a +French voyageur from the Illinois who had hunted and traded in +this region for a decade, Timothe de Monbreun, subsequently +famous in the history of Tennessee, had visited the lick and +killed an enormous number of buffaloes for their tallow and +tongues with which he and his companion loaded a keel boat and +descended the Cumberland. An early pioneer, William Hall, learned +from Isaac Bledsoe that when "the long hunters Crossed the ridge +and came down on Bledsoe's Creek in four or five miles of the +Lick the Cane had grown up so thick in the woods that they +thought they had mistaken the place until they Came to the Lick +and saw what had been done . . . . One could walk for several +hundred yards a round the Lick and in the lick on buffellows +Skuls, & bones and the whole flat round the Lick was bleached +with buffellows bones, and they found out the Cause of the Canes +growing up so suddenly a few miles around the Lick which was in +Consequence of so many buffellows being killed." + +This expedition was of genuine importance, opening the eyes of +the frontiersmen to the charms of the country and influencing +many to settle subsequently in the West, some in Tennessee, some +in Kentucky. The elaborate and detailed information brought back +by Henry Scaggs exerted an appreciable influence, no doubt, in +accelerating the plans of Richard Henderson and Company for the +acquisition and colonization of the trans-Alleghany. But while +the "Long Hunters" were in Tennessee and Kentucky the same region +was being more extensively and systematically explored by Daniel +Boone. To his life, character, and attainments, as the typical +"long hunter" and the most influential pioneer we may now turn +our particular attention. + + + +CHAPTER IX. Daniel Boone and Wilderness Exploration + +Here, where the hand of violence shed the blood of the innocent; +where the horrid yells of the savages, and the groans of the +distressed, sounded in our ears, we now hear the praises and +adorations of our Creator; where wretched wigwams stood, the +miserable abodes of savages, we behold the foundations of cities +laid, that, in all probability, will equal the glory of the +greatest upon earth.--Daniel Boone, 1781. + + +The wandering life of a border Nimrod in a surpassingly beautiful +country teeming with game was the ideal of the frontiersman of +the eighteenth century. AS early as 1728, while running the +dividing line between North Carolina and Virginia, William Byrd +encountered along the North Carolina frontier the typical figure +of the professional hunter: "a famous Woodsman, call'd +Epaphroditus Bainton. This Forester Spends all his time in +ranging the Woods, and is said to make great Havock among the +Deer, and other Inhabitants of the Forest, not much wilder than +himself." By the middle of the century, as he was threading his +way through the Carolina piedmont zone, the hunter's paradise of +the Yadkin and Catawba country, Bishop Spangenberg found ranging +there many hunters, living like Indians, who killed thousands of +deer each year and sold the skins in the local markets or to the +fur-traders from Virginia whose heavy pack-trains with their +tinkling bells constantly traversed the course of the Great +Trading Path. The superlative skill of one of these hunters, both +as woodsman and marksman, was proverbial along the border. The +name of Daniel Boone became synonymous with expert huntsmanship +and almost uncanny wisdom in forest lore. The bottoms of the +creek near the Boone home, three miles west of present +Mocksville, contained a heavy growth of beech, which dropped +large quantities of its rich nuts or mast, greatly relished by +bears; and this creek received its name, Bear Creek, because +Daniel and his father killed in its rich bottoms ninety-nine +bears in a single hunting-season. After living for a time with +his young wife, Rebecca Bryan, in a cabin in his father's yard, +Daniel built a home of his own upon a tract of land, purchased +from his father on October 12, 1759, and lying on Sugar Tree, a +tributary of Dutchman's Creek. Here he dwelt for the next five +years, with the exception of the period of his temporary removal +to Virginia during the terrible era of the Indian war. Most of +his time during the autumn and winter, when he was not engaged in +wagoning or farming, he spent in long hunting-journeys into the +mountains to the west and northwest. During the hunting-season of +1760 he struck deeper than ever before into the western mountain +region and encamped in a natural rocky shelter amidst fine +hunting-grounds, in what is now Washington County in east +Tennessee. Of the scores of inscriptions commemorative of his +hunting-feats, which Boone with pardonable pride was accustomed +throughout his life time to engrave with his hunting-knife upon +trees and rocks, the earliest known is found upon a leaning beech +tree, only recently fallen, near his camp and the creek which +since that day has borne his name. This is a characteristic and +enduring record in the history of American exploration + + D. Boon +CillED A. BAR On + Tree + in The + yEAR + 1760 + +Late in the summer of the following year Boone marched under the +command of the noted Indian-fighter of the border, Colonel Hugh +Waddell, in his campaign against the Cherokees. From the lips of +Waddell, who was outspoken in his condemnation of Byrd's futile +delays in road-cutting and fort-building, Boone learned the true +secret of success in Indian warfare, which was lost upon +Braddock, Forbes, and later St. Clair: that the art of defeating +red men was to deal them a sudden and unexpected blow, before +they had time either to learn the strength of the force employed +against them or to lay with subtle craft their artful ambuscade. + +In the late autumn of 1761, Daniel Boone and Nathaniel Gist, the +son of Washington's famous guide, who were both serving under +Waddell, temporarily detached themselves from his command and led +a small party on a "long hunt" in the Valley of the Holston, +While encamping near the site of Black's Fort, subsequently +built, they were violently assailed by a pack of fierce wolves +which they had considerable difficulty in beating off; and from +this incident the locality became known as Wolf Hills (now +Abingdon, Virginia). + + +From this time forward Boone's roving instincts had full sway. +For many months each year he threaded his way through that +marvelously beautiful country of western North Carolina +felicitously described as the Switzerland of America. Boone's +love of solitude and the murmuring forest was surely inspired by +the phenomenal beauties of the country' through which he roamed +at will. Blowing Rock on one arm of a great horseshoe of +mountains and Tryon Mountain upon the other arm, overlooked an +enormous, primeval bowl, studded by a thousand emerald-clad +eminences. There was the Pilot Mountain, the towering and +isolated pile which from time immemorial had served the +aborigines as a guide in their forest wanderings; there was the +dizzy height of the Roan on the border; there was Mt. Mitchell, +portentous in its grandeur, the tallest peak on the continent +east of the Rockies; and there was the Grandfather, the oldest +mountain on earth according to geologists, of which it has been +written: + +Oldest of all terrestrial things--still holding +Thy wrinkled forehead high; +Whose every scam, earth's history enfolding, +Grim science doth defy! + +Thou caught'st the far faint ray from Sirius rising, +When through space first was hurled +The primal gloom of ancient voids surprising, +This atom, called the World! + +What more gratifying to the eye of the wanderer than the +luxuriant vegetation and lavish profusion of the gorgeous flowers +upon the mountain slopes, radiant rhododendron, rosebay, and +laurel, and the azalea rising like flame; or the rare beauties of +the water--the cataract of Linville, taking its shimmering leap +into the gorge, and that romantic river poetically celebrated in +the lines: + +Swannanoa, nymph of beauty, +I would woo thee in my rhyme, +Wildest, brightest, loveliest river +Of our sunny Southern clime. + * * * +Gone forever from the borders +But immortal in thy name, +Are the Red Men of the forest +Be thou keeper of their fame! +Paler races dwell beside thee, +Celt and Saxon till thy lands +Wedding use unto thy beauty +Linking over thee their hands. + +The long rambling excursions which Boone made through western +North Carolina and eastern Tennessee enabled him to explore every +nook and corner of the rugged and beautiful mountain region. +Among the companions and contemporaries with whom he hunted and +explored the country were his little son James and his brother +Jesse; the Linville who gave the name to the beautiful falls; +Julius Caesar Dugger, whose rock house stood near the head of Elk +Creek; and Nathaniel Gist, who described for him the lofty +gateway to Kentucky, through which Christopher Gist had passed in +1751. Boone had already heard of this gateway, from Findlay, and +it was one of the secret and cherished ambitions of his life to +scale the mountain wall of the Appalachians and to reach that +high portal of the Cumberland which beckoned to the mysterious +new Eden beyond. Although hunting was an endless delight to Boone +he was haunted in the midst of this pleasure, as was Kipling's +Explorer, by the lure of the undiscovered: + +Till a voice as bad as conscience, rang interminable changes +On one everlasting whisper day and night repeated--so: +'Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the ranges- +- +'Something lost behind the ranges. Lost and waiting for you. Go.' + +Of Boone's preliminary explorations for the land company known as +Richard Henderson and Company, an account has already been given; +and the delay in following them up has been touched on and in +part explained. Meanwhile Boone transferred his efforts for a +time to another field. Toward the close of the summer of 1765 a +party consisting of Major John Field, William Hill, one +Slaughter, and two others, all from Culpeper County, Virginia, +visited Boone and induced him to accompany them on the "long +Journey" to Florida, whither they were attracted by the liberal +offer of Colonel James Grant, governor of the eastern section, +the Florida of to-day. On this long and arduous expedition they +suffered many hardships and endured many privations, found little +game, and on one occasion narrowly escaped starvation. They +explored Florida from St. Augustine to Pensacola; and Boone, who +relished fresh scenes and a new environment, purchased a house +and lot in Pensacola in anticipation of removal thither. But upon +his return home, finding his wife unwilling to go, Boone once +more turned his eager eye toward the West, that mysterious and +alluring region beyond the great range, the fabled paradise of +Kentucky. + +The following year four young men from the Yadkin, Benjamin +Cutbird, John Stewart (Boone's brother-in-law who afterwards +accompanied him to Kentucky), John Baker, and James Ward made a +remarkable journey to the westward, crossing the Appalachian +mountain chain over some unknown route, and finally reaching the +Mississippi. The significance of the journey, in its bearing upon +westward expansion, inheres in the fact that while for more than +half a century the English traders from South Carolina had been +winning their way to the Mississippi along the lower routes and +Indian trails, this was the first party from either of the +Carolinas, as far as is known, that ever reached the Mississippi +by crossing the great mountain barrier. When Cutbird, a superb +woodsman and veritable Leather stocking, narrated to Boone the +story of his adventures, it only confirmed Boone in his +determination to find the passage through the mountain chain +leading to the Mesopotamia of Kentucky. + +Such an enterprise was attended by terrible dangers. During 1766 +and 1767 the steady encroachments of the white settlers upon the +ancestral domain which the Indians reserved for their imperial +hunting-preserve aroused bitter feelings of resentment among the +red men. Bloody reprisal was often the sequel to such +encroachment. The vast region of Tennessee and the +trans-Alleghany was a twilight zone, through which the savages +roamed at will. From time to time war parties of northern +Indians, the inveterate foes of the Cherokees, scouted through +this no-man's land and even penetrated into the western region of +North Carolina, committing murders and depredations upon the +Cherokees and the whites indiscriminately. During the summer of +1766, while Boone's friend and close connection, Captain William +Linville, his son John, and another young man, named John +Williams, were in camp some ten miles below Linville Falls, they +were unexpectedly fired upon by a hostile band of Northern +Indians, and before they had time to fire a shot, a second volley +killed both the Linvilles and severely wounded Williams, who +after extraordinary sufferings finally reached the settlements." +In May, 1767, four traders and a half-breed child of one of them +were killed in the Cherokee country. In the summer of this year +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina laid out the boundary +line of the Cherokees, and upon his return issued a proclamation +forbidding any purchase of land from the Indians and any issuance +of grants for land within one mile of the boundary line. Despite +this wise precaution, seven North Carolina hunters who during the +following September had lawlessly ventured into the mountain +region some sixty miles beyond the boundary were fired upon, and +several of them killed, by the resentful Cherokees Undismayed by +these signs of impending danger, undeterred even by the tragic +fate of the Linvilles, Daniel Boone, with the determination of +the indomitable pioneer, never dreamed of relinquishing his +long-cherished design. Discouraged by the steady disappearance of +game under the ruthless attack of innumerable hunters, Boone +continued to direct his thoughts toward the project of exploring +the fair region of Kentucky. The adventurous William Hill, to +whom Boone communicated his purpose, readily consented to go with +him; and in the autumn of 1768 Boone and Hill, accompanied, it is +believed, by Squire Boone, Daniel's brother, set forth upon their +almost inconceivably hazardous expedition. They crossed the Blue +Ridge and the Alleghanies, the Holston and Clinch rivers near +their sources, and finally reached the head waters of the West +Fork of the Big Sand. Surmising from its course that this stream +must flow into the Ohio, they pushed on a hundred miles to the +westward and finally, by following a buffalo path, reached a +salt-spring in what is now Floyd County, in the extreme eastern +section of Kentucky. Here Boone beheld great droves of buffalo +that visited the salt-spring to drink the water or lick the +brackish soil. After spending the winter in hunting and trapping, +the Boones and Hill, discouraged by the forbidding aspect of the +hill-country which with its dense growth of laurel was +exceedingly difficult to penetrate, abandoned all hope of finding +Kentucky by this route and wended their arduous way back to the +Yadkin. + +The account of Boone's subsequent accomplishment of his purpose +must be postponed to the next chapter. + + + +CHAPTER X. Daniel Boone in Kentucky + +He felt very much as Columbus did, gazing from his caravel on San +Salvador; as Cortes, looking down, from the crest of Ahualco, on +the Valley of Mexico; or Vasco Nunez, standing alone on the peak +of Darien, and stretching his eyes over the hitherto undiscovered +waters of the Pacific.---William Gilmore Simms: Views and +Reviews. + + +A chance acquaintance formed by Daniel Boone, during the French +and Indian War, with the Irish lover of adventure, John Findlay, +was the origin of Boone's cherished longing to reach the El +Dorado of the West. In this slight incident we may discern the +initial inspiration for the epochal movement of westward +expansion. Findlay was a trader and horse peddler, who had early +migrated to Carlisle, Pennsylvania. He had been licensed a trader +with the Indians in 1747. During the same year he was married to +Elizabeth Harris, daughter of John Harris, the Indian-trader at +Harris's Ferry on the Susquehanna River, after whom Harrisburg +was named. During the next eight years Findlay carried on his +business of trading in the interior. Upon the opening of the +French and Indian War he was probably among "the young men about +Paxtang who enlisted immediately," and served as a waggoner in +Braddock's expedition. Over the campfires, during the ensuing +campaign in 1765, young Boone was an eager listener to Findlay's +stirring narrative of his adventures in the Ohio Valley and on +the wonderfully beautiful levels of Kentucky in 1752. The fancies +aroused in his brooding mind by Findlay's moving recital and his +description of an ancient passage through the Ouasioto or +Cumberland Gap and along the course of the Warrior's Path, +inspired him with an irrepressible longing to reach that alluring +promised land which was the perfect realization of the hunter's +paradise. + +Thirteen years later, while engaged in selling pins, needles, +thread, and Irish linens in the Yadkin country, Findlay learned +from the Pennsylvania settlers at Salisbury or at the Forks of +the Yadkin of Boone's removal to the waters of the upper Yadkin. +At Boone's rustic home, in the winter of 1768-9, Findlay visited +his old comrade-in-arms of Braddock's campaign. On learning of +Boone's failure during the preceding year to reach the Kentucky +levels by way of the inhospitable Sandy region, Findlay again +described to him the route through the Ouasioto Gap traversed +sixteen years before by Pennsylvania traders in their traffic +with the Catawbas. Boone, as we have seen, knew that Christopher +Gist, who had formerly lived near him on the upper Yadkin, had +found some passage through the lofty mountain defiles; but he had +never been able to discover the passage. Findlay's renewed +descriptions of the immense herds of buffaloes he had seen in +Kentucky, the great salt-licks where they congregated, the +abundance of bears, deer, and elk with which the country teemed, +the innumerable flocks of wild turkeys, geese, and ducks, aroused +in Boone the hunter's passion for the chase; while the beauty of +the lands, as mirrored in the vivid fancy of the Irishman, +inspired him with a new longing to explore the famous country +which had, as John Filson records, "greatly engaged Mr. Findlay's +attention." + +In the comprehensive designs of Henderson, now a judge, for +securing a "graphic report of the trans-Alleghany region in +behalf of his land company", Boone divined the means of securing +the financial backing for an expedition of considerable size and +ample equipment. In numerous suits for debt, aggregating hundreds +of dollars, which had been instituted against Boone by some of +the leading citizens of Rowan, Williams and Henderson had acted +as Boone's attorneys. In order to collect their legal fees, they +likewise brought suit against Boone; but not wishing to press the +action against the kindly scout who had hitherto acted as their +agent in western exploration, they continued the litigation from +court to court, in lieu of certain "conditions performed" on +behalf of Boone, during his unbroken absence, by his attorney in +this suit, Alexander Martin. Summoned to appear in 1769 at the +March term of court at Salisbury, Boone seized upon the occasion +to lay before Judge Henderson the designs for a renewed and +extended exploration of Kentucky suggested by the golden +opportunity of securing the services of Findlay as guide. Shortly +after March 6th, when Judge Henderson reached Salisbury, the +conference, doubtless attended by John Stewart, Boone's +brother-in-law, John Findlay, and Boone, who were all present at +this term of court, must have been held, for the purpose of +devising ways and means for the expedition. Peck, the only +reliable contemporary biographer of the pioneer, who derived many +facts from Boone himself and his intimate acquaintances, draws +the conclusion (1847): "Daniel Boone was engaged as the master +spirit of this exploration, because in his judgment and fidelity +entire confidence could be reposed . . . . He was known to +Henderson and encouraged by him to make the exploration, and to +examine particularly the whole country south of the Kentucky--or +as then called the Louisa River." As confidential agent of the +land company, Boone carried with him letters and instructions for +his guidance upon this extended tour of exploration." + +On May 1, 1769, with Findlay as guide, and accompanied by four of +his neighbors, John Stewart, a skilled woodsman, Joseph Holden, +James Mooney, and William Cooley, Boone left his "peaceable +habitation" on the upper Yadkin and began his historic journey +"in quest of the country of Kentucky." Already heavily burdened +with debts, Boone must have incurred considerable further +financial obligations to Judge Henderson and Colonel Williams, +acting for the land company, in order to obtain the large amount +of supplies requisite for so prolonged an expedition. Each of the +adventurers rode a good horse of strength and endurance; and +behind him were securely strapped the blanket, ammunition, salt, +and cooking-utensils so indispensable for a long sojourn in the +wilderness. In Powell's Valley they doubtless encountered the +party led thither by Joseph Martin (see Chapter VII), and there +fell into the "Hunter's Trail" commented on in a letter written +by Martin only a fortnight before the passing of Boone's +cavalcade. Crossing the mountain at the Ouasioto Gap, they made +their first "station camp" in Kentucky on the creek, still named +after that circumstance, on the Red Lick Fork. After a +preliminary journey for the purpose of locating the spot, Findlay +led the party to his old trading-camp at Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki, +where then (June 7, 1769) remained but charred embers of the +Indian huts, with some of the stockading and the gate-posts still +standing. In Boone's own words, he and Findlay at once "proceeded +to take a more thorough survey of the country;" and during the +autumn and early winter, encountering on every hand apparently +inexhaustible stocks of wild game and noting the ever-changing +beauties of the country, the various members of the party made +many hunting and exploring journeys from their "station camp" as +base. On December 22, 1769, while engaged in a hunt, Boone and +Stewart were surprised and captured by a large party of +Shawanoes, led by Captain Will, who were returning from the +autumn hunt on Green River to their villages north of the Ohio. +Boone and Stewart were forced to pilot the Indians to their main +camp, where the savages, after robbing them of all their peltries +and supplies and leaving them inferior guns and little +ammunition, set off to the northward. They left, on parting, this +menacing admonition to the white intruders: "Now, brothers, go +home and stay there. Don't come here any more, for this is the +Indians' hunting-ground, and all the animals, skins, and furs are +ours. If you are so foolish as to venture here again, you may be +sure the wasps and yellow jackets will sting you severely." + +Chagrined particularly by the loss of the horses, Boone and +Stewart for two days pursued the Indians in hot haste. Finally +approaching the Indians' camp by stealth in the dead of night, +they secured two of the horses, upon which they fled at top +speed. In turn they were immediately pursued by a detachment of +the Indians, mounted upon their fleetest horses; and suffered the +humiliation of recapture two days later. Indulging in wild +hilarity over the capture of the crestfallen whites, the Indians +took a bell from one of the horses and, fastening it about +Boone's neck, compelled him under the threat of brandished +tomahawks to caper about and jingle the bell, jeering at him the +while with the derisive query, uttered in broken English: "Steal +horse, eh?" With as good grace as they could summon--wry smiles +at best--Boone and Stewart patiently endured these humiliations, +following the Indians as captives. Some days later (about January +4, 1770), while the vigilance of the Indians was momentarily +relaxed, the captives suddenly plunged into a dense canebrake and +in the subsequent confusion succeeded in effecting their escape. +Finding their camp deserted upon their return, Boone and Stewart +hastened on and finally overtook their companions. Here Boone was +both surprised and delighted to encounter his brother Squire, +loaded down with supplies. Having heard nothing from Boone, the +partners of the land company had surmised that he and his party +must have run short of ammunition, flour, salt, and other things +sorely needed in the wilderness; and because of their desire that +the party should remain, in order to make an exhaustive +exploration of the country, Squire Boone had been sent to him +with supplies. Findlay, Holden, Mooney, and Cooley returned to +the settlements; but Stewart, Squire Boone, and Alexander Neely, +who had accompanied Squire, threw in their lot with the intrepid +Daniel, and fared forth once more to the stirring and bracing +adventures of the Kentucky wilderness. In Daniel Boone's own +words, he expected "from the furs and peltries they had an +opportunity of taking . . . to recruit his shattered +circumstances; discharge the debts he had contracted by the +adventure; and shortly return under better auspices, to settle +the newly discovered country." + +Boone and his party now stationed themselves near the mouth of +the Red River, and soon provided themselves, against the hard. +ships of the long winter, with jerk, bear's oil, buffalo tallow, +dried buffalo tongues, fresh meat, and marrow-bones as food, and +buffalo robes and bearskins as shelter from the inclement +weather. Neely had brought with him, to while away dull hours, a +copy of "Gulliver's Travels"; and in describing Neely's +successful hunt for buffalo one day, Boone in after years +amusingly deposed: "In the year 1770 I encamped on Red River with +five other men, and we had with us for our amusement the History +of Samuel Gulliver's Travels, wherein he gave an account of his +young master, Glumdelick, careing him on market day for a show to +a town called Lulbegrud. A young man of our company called +Alexander Neely came to camp and told us he had been that day to +Lulbegrud, and had killed two Brobdignags in their capital." Far +from unlettered were pioneers who indulged together in such +literary chat and gave to the near-by creek the name (after Dean +Swift's Lorbrugrud) of Lulbegrud which name, first seen on +Filson's map of Kentucky (1784), it bears to this day. From one +of his long, solitary hunts Stewart never returned; and it was +not until five years later, while cutting out the Transylvania +Trail, that Boone and his companions discovered, near the old +crossing at Rockcastle, Stewart's remains in a standing hollow +sycamore. The wilderness never gave up its tragic secret. + +The close of the winter and most of the spring were passed by the +Boones, after Neely's return to the settlements, in exploration, +hunting, and trapping beaver and otter, in which sport Daniel +particularly excelled. Owing to the drain upon their ammunition, +Squire was at length compelled to return to the settlements for +supplies; and Daniel, who remained alone in the wilderness to +complete his explorations for the land company, must often have +shared the feelings of Balboa as, from lofty knob or towering +ridge, he gazed over the waste of forest which spread from the +dim out lines of the Alleghanies to the distant waters of the +Mississippi. He now proceeded to make those remarkable solitary +explorations of Kentucky which have given him immortality-- +through the valley of the Kentucky and the Licking, and along the +"Belle Riviere" (Ohio) as low as the falls. He visited the Big +Bone Lick and examined the wonderful fossil remains of the +mammoth found there. Along the great buffalo roads, worn several +feet below the surface of the ground, which led to the Blue +Licks, he saw with amazement and delight thousands of huge shaggy +buffalo gamboling, bellowing, and making the earth rumble beneath +the trampling of their hooves. One day, while upon a cliff near +the junction of the Kentucky and Dick's Rivers, he suddenly found +himself hemmed in by a party of Indians. Seizing his only chance +of escape, he leaped into the top of a maple tree growing beneath +the cliffs and, sliding to safety full sixty feet below, made his +escape, pursued by the sound of a chorus of guttural "Ughs" from +the dumbfounded savages. + +Finally making his way back to the old camp, Daniel was rejoined +there by Squire on July 27, 1770. During the succeeding months, +much of their time was spent in hunting and prospecting in +Jessamine County, where two caves are still known as Boone's +caves. Eventually, when ammunition and supplies had once more run +low, Squire was compelled a second time to return to the +settlements. Perturbed after a time by Squire's failure to rejoin +him at the appointed time, Daniel started toward the settlements, +in search of him; and by a stroke of good fortune encountered him +along the trail. Overjoyed at this meeting (December, 1770) the +indomitable Boones once more plunged into the wilderness, +determined to conclude their explorations by examining the +regions watered by the Green and Cumberland rivers and their +tributaries. In after years, Gasper Mansker, the old German +scout, was accustomed to describe with comic effect the +consternation created among the Long Hunters, while hunting one +day on Green River, by a singular noise which they could not +explain. Stealthily slipping from tree to tree, Mansker finally +beheld with mingled surprise and amusement a hunter, bareheaded, +stretched flat upon his back on a deerskin spread on the ground, +singing merrily at the top of his voice! It was Daniel Boone, +joyously whiling away the solitary hours in singing one of his +favorite songs of the border. In March, 1771, after spending some +time in company with the Long Hunters, the Boones, their horses +laden with furs, set their faces homeward. On their return +journey, near Cumberland Gap, they had the misfortune to be +surrounded by a party of Indians who robbed them of their guns +and all their peltries. With this humiliating conclusion to his +memorable tour of exploration, Daniel Boone, as he himself says, +"once more reached home after experiencing hardships which would +defy credulity in the recital." + +Despite the hardships and the losses, Boone had achieved the +ambition of years: he had seen Kentucky, which he "esteemed a +second paradise." The reports of his extended explorations, which +he made to Judge Henderson, were soon communicated to the other +partners of the land company; and their letters of this period, +to one another, bristle with glowing and minute descriptions of +the country, as detailed by their agent. Boone was immediately +engaged to act in the company's behalf to sound the Cherokees +confidentially with respect to their willingness to lease or sell +the beautiful hunting-grounds of the trans-Alleghany. The high +hopes of Henderson and his associates at last gave promise of +brilliant realization. Daniel Boone's glowing descriptions of +Kentucky excited in their minds, says a gifted early chronicler, +the "spirit of an enterprise which in point of magnitude and +peril, as well as constancy and heroism displayed in its +execution, has never been paralleled in the history of America." + + + +CHAPTER XI. The Regulators + +It is not a persons labour, nor yet his effects that will do, but +if he has but one horse to plow with, one bed to lie on, or one +cow to give a little milk for his children, they must all go to +raise money which is not to be had. And lastly if his personal +estate (sold at one tenth of its value) will not do, then his +lands (which perhaps has cost him many years of toil and labour) +must go the same way to satisfy, these cursed hungry +caterpillars, that are eating and will eat out the bowels of our +Commonwealth, if they be not pulled down from their nests in a +very short time.--George Sims: A Serious Address to the +Inhabitants of Granville County, containing an Account of our +deplorable Situation we suffer .... and some necessary Hints with +Respect to a Reformation. June 6, 1765. + + +It is highly probable that even at the time of his earlier +explorations in behalf of Richard Henderson and Company, Daniel +Boone anticipated speedy removal to the West. Indeed, in the very +year of his first tour in their interest, Daniel and his wife +Rebeckah sold all their property in North Carolina, consisting of +their home and six hundred and forty acres of land, and after +several removals established themselves upon the upper Yadkin. +This removal and the later western explorations just outlined +were due not merely to the spirit of adventure and discovery. +Three other causes also were at work. In the first place there +was the scarcity of game. For fifteen years the shipments of +deerskins from Bethabara to Charleston steadily increased; and +the number of skins bought by Gammern, the Moravian storekeeper, +ran so high that in spite of the large purchases made at the +store by the hunters he would sometimes run entirely out of +money. Tireless in the chase, the far roaming Boone was among +"the hunters, who brought in their skins from as far away as the +Indian lands"; and the beautiful upland pastures and mountain +forests, still teeming with deer and bear, doubtless lured him to +the upper Yadkin, where for a time in the immediate neighborhood +of his home abundance of game fell before his unerring rifle. +Certainly the deer and other game, which were being killed in +enormous numbers to satisfy the insatiable demand of the traders +at Salisbury, the Forks, and Bethabara, became scarcer and +scarcer; and the wild game that was left gradually fled to the +westward. Terrible indeed was the havoc wrought among the elk; +and it was reported that the last elk was killed in western North +Carolina as early as 1781. + +Another grave evil of the time with which Boone had to cope in +the back country of North Carolina was the growth of undisguised +outlawry, similar to that found on the western plains of a later +era. This ruthless brigand age arose as the result of the +unsettled state of the country and the exposed condition of the +settlements due to the Indian alarms. When rude borderers, +demoralized by the enforced idleness attendant upon fort life +during the dark days of Indian invasion, sallied forth upon +forays against the Indians, they found much valuable +property--horses, cattle, and stock--left by their owners when +hurriedly fleeing to the protection of the frontier stockades. +The temptations thus afforded were too great to resist; and the +wilder spirits of the backwoods, with hazy notions of private +rights, seized the property which they found, slaughtered the +cattle, sold the horses, and appropriated to their own use the +temporarily abandoned household goods and plantation tools. The +stealing of horses, which were needed for the cultivation of the +soil and useful for quickly carrying unknown thieves beyond the +reach of the owner and the law, became a common practice; and was +carried on by bands of outlaws living remote from one another and +acting in collusive concert. + +Toward the end of July, 1755, when the Indian outrages upon the +New River settlements in Virginia had frightened away all the +families at the Town Fork in the Yadkin country, William Owen, a +man of Welsh stock, who had settled in the spring of 1752 in the +upper Yadkin near the Mulberry Fields, was suspected of having +robbed the storekeeper on the Meho. Not long afterward a band of +outlaws who plundered the exposed cabins in their owners' +absence, erected a rude fort in the mountain region in the rear +of the Yadkin settlements, where they stored their ill-gotten +plunder and made themselves secure from attack. Other members of +the band dwelt in the settlements, where they concealed their +robber friends by day and aided them by night in their nefarious +projects of theft and rapine. + +The entire community was finally aroused by the bold depredations +of the outlaws; and the most worthy settlers of the Yadkin +country organized under the name of Regulators to break up the +outlaw band. When it was discovered that Owen, who was well known +at Bethabara, had allied himself with the highwaymen, one of the +justices summoned one hundred men; and seventy, who answered the +call, set forth on December 26, 1755, to seek out the outlaws and +to destroy their fortress. Emboldened by their success, the +latter upon one occasion had carried off a young girl of the +settlements. Daniel Boone placed himself at the head of one of +the parties, which included the young girl's father, to go to her +rescue; and they fortunately succeeded in effecting the release +of the frightened maiden. One of the robbers was apprehended and +brought to Salisbury, where he was thrown into prison for his +crimes. Meanwhile a large amount of plunder had been discovered +at the house of one Cornelius Howard; and the evidences of his +guilt so multiplied against him that he finally confessed his +connection with the outlaw band and agreed to point out their +fort in the mountains. + +Daniel Boone and George Boone joined the party of seventy men, +sent out by the colonial authorities under the guidance of +Howard, to attack the stronghold of the bandits. Boone afterward +related that the robbers' fort was situated in the most fitly +chosen place for such a purpose that he could imagine--beneath an +overhanging cliff of rock, with a large natural chimney, and a +considerable area in front well stockaded. The frontiersmen +surrounded the fort, captured five women and eleven children, and +then burned the fort to the ground. Owen and his wife, +Cumberland, and several others were ultimately made prisoners; +but Harman and the remainder of the band escaped by flight. Owen +and his fellow captives were then borne to Salisbury, +incarcerated in the prison there, and finally (May, 1756) +condemned to the gallows. Owen sent word to the Moravians, +petitioning them to adopt his two boys and to apprentice one to a +tailor, the other to a carpenter. But so infuriated was Owen's +wife by Howard's treachery that she branded him as a second +Judas; and this at once fixed upon him the sobriquet "Judas" +Howard-a sobriquet he did not live long to bear, for about a year +later he was ambushed and shot from his horse at the crossing of +a stream. He thus paid the penalty of his betrayal of the outlaw +band. For a number of years, the Regulators continued to wage war +against the remaining outlaws, who from time to time committed +murders as well as thefts. As late as January, 1768, the +Regulators caught a horse thief in the Hollows of Surry County +and brought him to Bethabara, whence Richter and Spach took him +to the jail at Salisbury. After this year, the outlaws were heard +of no more; and peace reigned in the settlements. + +Colonel Edmund Fanning--of whom more anon--declared that the +Regulation began in Anson County which bordered upon South +Carolina. Certain it is that the upper country of that province +was kept in an uproar by civil disturbances during this early +period. Owing to the absence of courts in this section, so remote +from Charleston, the inhabitants found it necessary, for the +protection of property and the punishment of outlaws, to form an +association called, like the North Carolina society, the +Regulation. Against this association the horse thieves and other +criminals made common cause, and received tacit support from +certain more reputable persons who condemned "the irregularity of +the Regulators." The Regulation which had been thus organized in +upper South Carolina as early as 1764 led to tumultuous risings +of the settlers; and finally in the effort to suppress these +disorders, the governor, Lord Charles Montagu, appointed one +Scovil, an utterly unworthy representative, to carry out his +commands. After various disorders, which became ever more +unendurable to the law-abiding, matters came to a crisis (1769) +as the result of the high-handed proceedings of Scovil, who +promiscuously seized and flung into prison all the Regulators he +could lay hands on. In the month of March the back country rose +in revolt against Scovil and a strong body of the settlers was on +the point of attacking the force under his command when an +eleventh-hour letter arrived from Montagu, dismissing Scovil from +office. Thus was happily averted, by the narrowest of margins, a +threatened precursor of the fight at Alamance in 1771 (see +Chapter XII). As the result of the petition of the Calhouns and +others, courts were established in 1760, though not opened until +four years later. Many horse thieves were apprehended, tried, and +punished. Justice once more held full sway. + +Another important cause for Boone's removal from the neighborhood +of Salisbury into the mountain fastnesses was the oppressive +administration of the law by corrupt sheriffs, clerks, and +tax-gatherers, and the dissatisfaction of the frontier squatters +with the owners of the soil. At the close of the year 1764 +reports reached the town of Wilmington, after the adjournment of +the assembly in November, of serious disturbances in Orange +County, due, it was alleged, to the exorbitant exactions of the +clerks, registers, and some of the attorneys. As a result of this +disturbing news, Governor Dobbs issued a proclamation forbidding +any officer to take illegal fees. Troubles had been brewing in +the adjacent county of Granville ever since the outbreak of the +citizens against Francis Corbin, Lord Granville's agent (January +24, 1759), and the issuance of the petition of Reuben Searcy and +others (March 23d) protesting against the alleged excessive fees +taken and injustices practised by Robert (Robin) Jones, the +famous lawyer. These disturbances were cumulative in their +effect; and the people at last (1765 ) found in George Sims, of +Granville, a fit spokesman of their cause and a doughty champion +of popular rights. In his "Serious Address to the Inhabitants of +Granville County, containing an Account of our deplorable +Situation we suffer . . . and some necessary Hints with Respect +to a Reformation," recently brought to light, he presents a +crushing indictment of the clerk of the county court, Samuel +Benton, the grandfather of Thomas Hart Benton. After describing +in detail the system of semi-peonage created by the merciless +exactions of lawyers and petty court officials, and the +insatiable greed of "these cursed hungry caterpillars," Sims with +rude eloquence calls upon the people to pull them down from their +nests for the salvation of the Commonwealth. + +Other abuses were also recorded. So exorbitant was the charge for +a marriage-license, for instance, that an early chronicler +records "The consequence was that some of the inhabitants on the +head-waters of the Yadkin took a short cut. They took each other +for better or for worse; and considered themselves as married +without further ceremony." The extraordinary scarcity of currency +throughout the colony, especially in the back country, was +another great hardship and a perpetual source of vexation. All +these conditions gradually became intolerable to the uncultured +but free spirited men of the back country. Events were slowly +converging toward a crisis in government and society. Independent +in spirit, turbulent in action, the backwoodsmen revolted not +only against excessive taxes, dishonest sheriffs, and +extortionate fees, but also against the rapacious practices of +the agents of Lord Granville. These agents industriously picked +flaws in the titles to the lands in Granville's proprietary upon +which the poorer settlers were seated; and compelled them to pay +for the land if they had not already done so, or else to pay the +fees twice over and take out a new patent as the only remedy of +the alleged defect in their titles. In Mecklenburg County the +spirit of backwoods revolt flamed out in protest against the +proprietary agents. Acting under instructions to survey and close +bargains for the lands or else to eject those who held them, +Henry Eustace McCulloh, in February, 1765, went into the county +to call a reckoning. The settlers, many of whom had located +without deeds, indignantly retorted by offering to buy only at +their own prices, and forbade the surveyors to lay out the +holdings when this smaller price was declined. They not only +terrorized into acquiescence those among them who were willing to +pay the amount charged for the lands, but also openly declared +that they would resist by force any sheriff in ejectment +proceedings. On May 7th an outbreak occurred; and a mob, led by +Thomas Polk, set upon John Frohock, Abraham Alexander, and +others, as they were about to survey a parcel of land, and gave +them a severe thrashing, even threatening the young McCulloh with +death. + +The choleric backwoodsmen, instinctively in agreement with +Francis Bacon, considered revenge as a sort of wild justice. +Especial objects of their animosity were the brothers Frohock, +John and Thomas, the latter clerk of the court at Salisbury, and +Edmund Fanning, a cultured gentleman-adventurer, associate +justice of the superior court. So rapacious and extortionate were +these vultures of the courts who preyed upon the vitals of the +common people, that they were savagely lampooned by Rednap +Howell, the backwoods poet-laureate of the Regulation. The temper +of the back country is well caught in Howell's lines anent this +early American "grafter", the favorite of the royal governor: + +When Fanning first to Orange came, +He looked both pale and wan; +An old patched coat was on his back, +An old mare he rode on. + +Both man and mare wan't worth five pounds, +As I've been often told; +But by his civil robberies, +He's laced his coat with gold. + +The germs of the great westward migration in the coming decade +were thus working among the people of the back country. If the +tense nervous energy of the American people is the transmitted +characteristic of the border settlers, who often slept with +loaded rifle in hand in grim expectation of being awakened by the +hideous yells, the deadly tomahawk, and the lurid firebrand of +the savage, the very buoyancy of the national character is in +equal measure "traceable to the free democracy founded on a +freehold inheritance of land." The desire for free land was the +fundamental factor in the development of the American democracy. +No colony exhibited this tendency more signally than did North +Carolina in the turbulent days of the Regulation. The North +Carolina frontiersmen resented the obligation to pay quit-rents +and firmly believed that the first occupant of the soil had an +indefeasible right to the land which he had won with his rifle +and rendered productive by the implements of toil. Preferring the +dangers of the free wilderness to the paying of tribute to +absentee landlords and officials of an intolerant colonial +government, the frontiersman found title in his trusty rifle +rather than in a piece of parchment, and was prone to pay his +obligations to the owner of the soil in lead rather than in gold. + + + +CHAPTER XII. Watauga--Haven of Liberty + +The Regulators despaired of seeing better times and therefore +quitted the Province. It is said 1,500 departed since the Battle +of Alamance and to my knowledge a great many more are only +waiting to dispose of their plantations in order to follow them.- +-Reverend Morgan Edwards, 1772. + + +The five years (1766-1771) which saw the rise, development, and +ultimate defeat of the popular movement known as the Regulation, +constitute a period not only of extraordinary significance in +North Carolina but also of fruitful consequences in the larger +movements of westward expansion. With the resolute intention of +having their rulers "give account of their stewardship," to +employ their own words, the Sandy Creek Association of Baptists +(organized in 1758), in a series of papers known as Regulators' +Advertisements (1766-8) proceeded to mature, through popular +gatherings, a rough form of initiative and referendum. At length, +discouraged in its efforts, and particularly in the attempt to +bring county officials to book for charging illegal fees, this +association ceased actively to function. It was the precursor of +a movement of much more drastic character and formidable +proportions, chiefly directed against Colonel Edmund Fanning and +his associates. This movement doubtless took its name, "the +Regulation," from the bands of men already described who were +organized first in North Carolina and later in South Carolina, to +put down highwaymen and to correct many abuses in the back +country, such as the tyrannies of Scovil and his henchmen. +Failing to secure redress of their grievances through legal +channels, the Regulators finally made such a powerful +demonstration in support of their refusal to pay taxes that +Governor William Tryon of North Carolina, in 1768, called out the +provincial militia, and by marching with great show of force +through the disaffected regions, succeeded temporarily in +overawing the people and thus inducing them to pay their +assessments. + +The suits which had been brought by the Regulators against Edmund +Fanning, register, and Francis Nash, clerk, of Orange County, +resulted in both being "found guilty of taking too high fees." +Fanning immediately resigned his commission as register; while +Nash, who in conjunction with Fanning had fairly offered in 1766 +to refund to any one aggrieved any fee charged by him which the +Superior Court might hold excessive, gave bond for his appearance +at the next court. Similar suits for extortion against the three +Froliocks in Rowan County in 1769 met with failure, however; and +this outcome aroused the bitter resentment of the Regulators, as +recorded by Herman Husband in his "Impartial Relation." During +this whole period the insurrectionary spirit of the people, who +felt themselves deeply aggrieved but recognized their inability +to secure redress, took the form of driving local justices from +the bench and threatening court officials with violence. + +At the session of the Superior Court at Hillsborough, September +22, 1770, an elaborate petition prepared by the Regulators, +demanding unprejudiced juries and the public accounting for taxes +by the sheriffs, was handed to the presiding justice by James +Hunter, a leading Regulator. This justice was our acquaintance, +Judge Richard Henderson, of Granville County, the sole high +officer in the provincial government from the entire western +section of the colony. In this petition occur these trenchant +words: "As we are serious and in good earnest and the cause +respects the whole body of the people it would be loss of time to +enter into arguments on particular points for though there are a +few men who have the gift and art of reasoning, yet every man has +a feeling and knows when he has justice done him as well as the +most learned." On the following Monday (September 24th), upon +convening of court, some one hundred and fifty Regulators, led by +James Hunter, Herman Husband, Rednap Howell, and others, armed +with clubs, whips, and cudgels, surged into the court-room and +through their spokesman, Jeremiah Fields, presented a statement +of their grievances. "I found myself," says Judge Henderson, +"under a necessity of attempting to soften and turn away the fury +of these mad people, in the best manner in my power, and as such +could well be, pacify their rage and at the same time preserve +the little remaining dignity of the court." + +During an interim, in which the Regulators retired for +consultation, they fell without warning upon Fanning and gave him +such rough treatment that he narrowly escaped with his life. The +mob, now past control, horsewhipped a number of leading lawyers +and citizens gathered there at court, and treated others, notably +the courtly Mr. Hooper of Boston, "with every mark of contempt +and insult." Judge Henderson was assured by Fields that no harm +should come to him provided he would conduct the court in +accordance with the behest of the Regulators: namely, that no +lawyer, save the King's Attorney, should be admitted to the +court, and that the Regulators' cases should be tried with new +jurors chosen by the Regulators. With the entire little village +terrorized by this campaign of "frightfulness," and the court +wholly unprotected, Judge Henderson reluctantly acknowledged to +himself that "the power of the judiciary was exhausted." +Nevertheless, he says, "I made every effort in my power +consistent with my office and the duty the public is entitled to +claim to preserve peace and good order." Agreeing under duress to +resume the session the following day, the judge ordered an +adjournment. But being unwilling, on mature reflection, to permit +a mockery of the court and a travesty of justice to be staged +under threat and intimidation, he returned that night to his home +in Granville and left the court adjourned in course. Enraged by +the judge's escape, the Regulators took possession of the court +room the following morning, called over the cases, and in futile +protest against the conditions they were powerless to remedy, +made profane entries which may still be seen on the record: +"Damned rogues," "Fanning pays cost but loses nothing," "Negroes +not worth a damn, Cost exceeds the whole," "Hogan pays and be +damned," and, in a case of slander, "Nonsense, let them argue for +Ferrell has gone hellward." + +The uprising of these bold and resolute, simple and imperfectly +educated people, which had begun as a constitutional struggle to +secure justice and to prevent their own exploitation by dishonest +lawyers of the county courts, now gave place to open anarchy and +secret incendiarism. In the dead of night, November 12th and +14th, Judge Henderson's barn, stables, and dwelling house were +fired by the Regulators and went up in flames. Glowing with a +sense of wrong, these misguided people, led on by fanatical +agitators, thus vented their indiscriminate rage, not only upon +their op pressors, but also upon men wholly innocent of injuring +them--men of the stamp of William Hooper, afterward signer of the +Declaration of Independence, Alexander Martin, afterward governor +and United States Senator,,and Richard Henderson, popular +representative of the back country and a firm champion of due +process of law. It is perhaps not surprising in view of these +events that Governor Tryon and the ruling class, lacking a +sympathy broad enough to ensure justice to the oppressed people, +seemed to be chiefly impressed with the fact that a widespread +insurrection was in progress, threatening not only life and +property, but also civil government itself. The governor called +out the militia of the province and led an army of well nigh one +thousand men and officers against the Regulators, who had +assembled at Alamance to the number of two thousand. Tryon stood +firm upon the demands that the people should submit to government +and disperse at a designated hour. The Regulators, on their side, +hoped to secure the reforms they desired by intimidating the +governor with a great display of force. The battle was a tragic +fiasco for the Regulators, who fought bravely, but without +adequate arms or real leadership. With the conclusion of this +desultory action, a fight lasting about two hours (May 16, 1771), +the power of the Regulators was completely broken." + + +Among these insurgents there was a remarkable element, an element +whose influence upon the course of American history has been but +imperfectly understood which now looms into prominence as the +vanguard of the army of westward expansion. There were some of +the Regulators who, though law-abiding and conservative, were +deeply imbued with ideas of liberty, personal independence, and +the freedom of the soil. Through the influence of Benjamin +Franklin, with whom one of the leaders of the group, Herman +Husband, was in constant correspondence, the patriotic ideas then +rapidly maturing into revolutionary sentiments furnished the +inspiration to action. As early as 1766, the Sandy Creek leaders, +referred to earlier in this chapter, issued a call to each +neighborhood to send delegates to a gathering for the purpose of +investigating the question "whether the free men of this country +labor under any abuses of power or not." The close connection +between the Sandy Creek men and the Sons of Liberty is amply +demonstrated in this paper wherein the Sons of Liberty in +connection with the "stamp law" are praised: for "redeeming us +from Tyranny" and for having "withstood the lords in Parliament +in behalf of true liberty." Upon the records of the Dutchman's +Creek Church, of "regular" Baptists, at the Forks of the Yadkin, +to which Daniel Boone's family belonged, may be found this +memorable entry, recognizing the "American Cause" well-nigh a +year before the declaration of independence at Philadelphia: "At +the monthly meeting it was agreed upon concerning the American +Cause, if any of the brethren see cause to join it they have the +liberty to do it without being called to an account by the +church. But whether they join or do not join they should be used +with brotherly love. + +The fundamental reasons underlying the approaching westward +hegira are found in the remarkable petition of the Regulators of +An son County (October 9, 1769), who request that "Benjamin +Franklin or some other known PATRIOT" be appointed agent of the +province in London to seek redress at the source. They exposed +the basic evil in the situation by pointing out that, in +violation of the law restricting the amount of land that might be +granted to each person to six hundred and forty acres, much of +the most fertile territory in the province had been distributed +in large tracts to wealthy landlords. In consequence "great +numbers of poor people are necessitated to toil in the +cultivation of the bad Lands whereon they hardly can subsist." It +was these poor people, "thereby deprived of His Majesties +liberality and Bounty," who soon turned their gaze to the +westward and crossed the mountains in search of the rich, free +lands of the trans-Alleghany region. + +This feverish popular longing for freedom, stimulated by the +economic pressure of thousands of pioneers who were annually +entering North Carolina, set in motion a wave of migration across +the mountains in 1769. Long before Alamance, many of the true +Americans, distraught by apparently irremediable injustices, +plunged fearlessly into the wilderness, seeking beyond the +mountains a new birth of liberty, lands of their own selection +free of cost or quit-rents, and a government of their own +choosing and control."' The glad news of the rich valleys beyond +the mountains early lured such adventurous pioneers as Andrew +Greer and Julius Caesar Dugger to the Watauga country. The +glowing stories, told by Boone, and disseminated in the back +country by Henderson, Williams, and the Harts, seemed to give +promise to men of this stamp that the West afforded relief from +oppressions suffered in North Carolina. During the winter of +1768-9 there was also a great rush of settlers from Virginia into +the valley of the Holston. A party from Augusta County, led by +men who had been delighted with the country viewed seven years +before when they were serving under Colonel William Byrd against +the Cherokees, found that this region, a wilderness on their +outward passage in 1768, was dotted with cabins on every spot +where the grazing was good, upon their return the following year. +Writing to Hillsborough on October 18, 1770, concerning the "many +hundred families" in the region from Green River to the branches +of the Holston, who refused to comply with the royal proclamation +of 1763, Acting-Governor Nelson of Virginia reports that "very +little if any Quit Rents have been received for His Majesty's use +from that Quarter for some time past"--the people claiming that +"His Majesty hath been pleased to withdraw his protection from +them since 1763." + +In the spring of 1770, with the express intention of discovering +suitable locations for homes for himself and a number of others, +who wished to escape the accumulating evils of the times, James +Robertson of Orange County, North Carolina, made an arduous +journey to the pleasing valley of the Watauga. Robertson, who was +born in Brunswick County, Virginia, June 28, 1742, of excellent +Scotch-Irish ancestry, was a noteworthy figure of a certain type- +-quiet, reflective, conservative, wise, a firm believer in the +basic principles of civil Liberty and the right of local +self-government. Robertson spent some time with a man named +Honeycut in the Watauga region, raised a crop of corn, and chose +for himself and his friends suitable locations for settlement. +Lost upon his return in seeking the mountain defiles traversed by +him on the outward journey, Robertson probably escaped death from +starvation only through the chance passing of two hunters who +succored him and set him upon the right path. On arriving in +Orange he found political and social conditions there much worse +than before, many of the colonists declining to take the +obligatory oath of allegiance to the British Crown after the +Battle of Alamance, preferring to carve out for themselves new +homes along the western waters. Some sixteen families of this +stamp, indignant at the injustices and oppressions of British +rule, and stirred by Robertson's description of the richness and +beauty of the western country, accompanied him to Watauga shortly +after the battle. + +This vanguard of the army of westward advance, independent +Americans in spirit with a negligible sprinkling of Loyalists, +now swept in a great tide into the northeastern section of +Tennessee. The men of Sandy Creek, actuated by independent +principles but out of sympathy with the anarchic side of the +Regulation, left the colony almost to a man. "After the defeat of +the Regulators," says the historian of the Sandy Creek +Association, "thousands of the oppressed, seeing no hope of +redress for their grievances, moved into and settled east +Tennessee. A large proportion of these were of the Baptist +population. Sandy Creek Church which some time previous to 1771, +numbered 606, was afterward reduced to fourteen members!" This +movement exerted powerful influence in stimulating westward +expansion. Indeed, it was from men of Regulating principles- +-Boone, Robertson, and the Searcys--who vehemently condemned the +anarchy and incendiarism of 1770, that Judge Henderson received +powerful cooperation in the opening up of Kentucky and Tennessee. + +The several treaties concerning the western boundary of white +settlement, concluded in close succession by North Carolina, +Virginia, and the Crown with the Southern and Northern Indians, +had an important bearing upon the settlement of Watauga. The +Cherokee boundary line, as fixed by Governor Tryon (1767) and by +John Stuart (1768), ran from Reedy River to Tryon Mountain, +thence straight to Chiswell's Mine, and thence direct to the +mouth of the Great Kanawha River. By the treaty at Fort Stanwix +(November 5, 1768), in the negotiation of which Virginia was +represented by Dr. Thomas Walker and Major Andrew Lewis, the Six +Nations sold to the Crown their shadowy claim to a vast tract of +western country, including in particular all the land between the +Ohio and the Tennessee Rivers. The news of the cession resulted +in a strong southwestward thrust of population, from the +neighborhood of Abingdon, in the direction of the Holston Valley. +Recognizing that hundreds of these settlers were beyond the line +negotiated by Stuart, but on lands not yet surveyed, Governor +Botetourt instructed the Virginia commissioners to press for +further negotiations, through Stuart, with the Cherokees. +Accordingly, on October 18, 1770, a new treaty was made at +Lochaber, South Carolina, by which a new line back of Virginia +was established, beginning at the intersection of the North +Carolina-Cherokee line (a point some seventy odd miles east of +Long Island), running thence in a west course to a point six +miles east of Long Island, and thence in a direct course to the +confluence of the Great Kanawha and Ohio Rivers. At the time of +the treaty, it was agreed that the Holston River, from its +intersection with the North Carolina-Virginia line, and down the +course of the same, should be a temporary southern boundary of +Virginia until the line should be ascertained by actual survey. A +strong influx of population into the immense new triangle thus +released for settlement brought powerful pressure to bear upon +northern Tennessee, the point of least resistance along the +western barrier. Singularly enough, this advance was not opposed +by the Cherokees, whose towns were strung across the extreme +southeast corner of Tennessee. + +When Colonel John Donelson ran the line in the latter part of +1771, The Little Carpenter, who with other Indian chiefs +accompanied the surveying party, urged that the line agreed upon +at Lochaber should break off at the head of the Louisa River, and +should run thence to the mouth thereof, and thence up the Ohio to +the mouth of the Great Kanawha. For this increase in the +territory of Virginia they of course expected additional payment. +As a representative of Virginia, Donelson agreed to the proposed +alteration in the boundary line; and accordingly promised to send +the Cherokees, in the following spring, a sum alleged by them to +have been fixed at five hundred pounds, in compensation for the +additional area. This informal agreement, it is believed, was +never ratified by Virginia; nor was the promised compensation +ever paid the Cherokees. + +Under the belief that the land belonged to Virginia, Jacob Brown +with one or two families from North Carolina settled in 1771 upon +a tract of land on the northern bank of the Nonachunheh +(corruption, Nolichucky) River. During the same year, an +experimental line run westward from Steep Rock and Beaver Creek +by Anthony Bledsoe showed that upon the extension of the boundary +line, these settlers would fall within the bounds of North +Carolina. Although thus informally warned of the situation, the +settlers made no move to vacate the lands. But in the following +year, after the running of Donelson's line, Alexander Cameron, +Stuart's deputy, required "all persons who had made settlements +beyond the said line to relinquish them." Thus officially warned, +Brown and his companions removed to Watauga. Cameron's order did +not apply, however, to the settlement, to the settlement north of +the Holston River, south and east of Long Island; and the +settlement in Carter's Valley, although lying without the +Virginia boundary, strangely enough remained unmolested. The +order was directed at the Watauga settlers, who were seated south +of the Holston River in the Watauga Valley. + +The plight in which the Watauga settlers now found themselves was +truly desperate; and the way in which they surmounted this +apparently insuperable difficulty is one of the most striking and +characteristic events in the pre-Revolutionary history of the Old +Southwest. It exhibits the indomitable will and fertile resource +of the American character at the margin of desperation. The +momentous influence of the Watauga settlers, inadequately +reckoned hitherto by historians, was soon to make itself +powerfully felt in the first epochal movement of westward +expansion. + + + +CHAPTER XIII. Opening the Gateway--Dunmore's War + +Virginia, we conceive, can claim this Country [Kentucky] with the +greatest justice and propriety, its within the Limits of their +Charter. They Fought and bled for it. And had it not been for the +memorable Battle, at the Great Kanaway those vast regions had yet +continued inaccessable.--The Harrodsburg Petition. June 7-15, +1776. + + +It was fortunate for the Watauga settlers that the Indians and +the whites were on the most peaceful terms with each other at the +time the Watauga Valley was shown, by the running of the boundary +line, to lie within the Indian reservation. With true American +self reliance, the settlers met together for deliberation and +counsel, and deputed James Robertson and John Been, as stated by +Tennessee's first historian, "to treat with their landlords, and +agree upon articles of accommodation and friendship. The attempt +succeeded. For though the Indians refused to give up the land +gratuitously, they consented, for a stipulated amount of +merchandise, muskets, and other articles of convenience, to lease +all the country on the waters of the Watauga." In addition to the +land thus leased for ten years, several other tracts were +purchased from the Indians by Jacob Brown, who reoccupied his +former location on the Nolichucky. + +In taking this daring step, the Watauga settlers moved into the +spotlight of national history. For the inevitable consequence of +leasing the territory was the organization of a form of +government for the infant settlement. Through his familiarity +with the North Carolina type of "association," in which the +settlers had organized for the purpose of "regulating" abuses, +and his acquaintance with the contents of the "Impartial +Relation," in which Husband fully expounded the principles and +practices of this association, Robertson was peculiarly fitted +for leadership in organizing this new government. The convention +at which Articles of Association, unfortunately lost, were drawn +up, is noteworthy as the first governmental assemblage of +free-born American citizens ever held west of the Alleghanies. +The government then established was the first free and +independent government, democratic in spirit, representative in +form, ever organized upon the American continent. In describing +this mimic republic, the royal Governor of Virginia says: "They +appointed magistrates, and framed laws for their present +occasion, and to all intents and purposes, erected themselves +into, though an inconsiderable, yet a separate State." The most +daring spirit in this little state was the young John Sevier, of +French Huguenot family (originally spelled Xavier), born in +Augusta County, Virginia, on September 23, 1745. It was from +Millerstown in Shenandoah County where he was living the +uneventful life of a small farmer, that he emigrated (December, +1773) to the Watauga region. With his arrival there begins one of +the most fascinating and romantic careers recorded in the varied +arid stirring annals of the Old Southwest. In this daring and +impetuous young fellow, fair-haired, blue-eyed, magnetic, +debonair--of powerful build, splendid proportions, and athletic +skill--we hold the gallant exemplar of the truly heroic life of +the border. The story of his life, thrilling in the extreme, is +rich in all the multi-colored elements which impart romance to +the arduous struggle of American civilization in the opening +years of the republic. + +The creative impulses in the Watauga commonwealth are hinted at +by Dunmore, who serves, in the letter above quoted, that Watauga +"sets a dangerous example to the people America, of forming +governments distinct from and independent of his Majesty's +authority." + +It is true that the experiment was somewhat limited. The +organization of the Watauga association, which constituted a +temporary expedient to meet a crisis in the affairs of a frontier +community cut off by forest wilderness and mountain barriers from +the reach of the arm of royal or provincial government, is not to +be compared with the revolutionary assemblage at Boonesborough, +May 23, 1775, or with the extraordinary demands for inde pendence +in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, during the same month. +Nevertheless the Watauga settlers defied both North Carolina and +the Crown, by adopting the laws of Virginia and by ignoring +Governor Josiah Martin's proclamation (March 26, 1774) "requiring +the said settlers immediately to retire from the Indian +Territories." Moreover, Watauga really was the parent of a series +of mimic republics in the Old Southwest, gradually tending toward +higher forms of organization, with a larger measure of individual +liberty. Watauga, Transylvania, Cumberland, Franklin represent +the evolving political genius of a free people under the creative +leadership of three constructive minds--James Robertson, John +Sevier, and Richard Henderson. Indeed, Watauga furnished to Judge +Henderson precisely the "dangerous example" of which Dunmore +prophetically speaks. + +Immediately upon his return in 1771 from the extended exploration +of Kentucky, Daniel Boone as already noted was engaged as secret +agent, to treat with the Cherokees for the lease or purchase of +the trans-Alleghany region, on behalf of Judge Henderson and his +associates. Embroiled in the exciting issues of the Regulation +and absorbed by his confining duties as colonial judge, Henderson +was unable to put his bold design into execution until after the +expiration of the court itself which ceased to exist in 1773. +Disregarding the royal proclamation of 1763 and Locke's +Fundamental Constitutions for the Carolinas, which forbade +private parties to purchase lands from the Indians, Judge +Henderson applied to the highest judicial authorities in England +to know if there was any law in existence forbidding purchase of +lands from the Indian tribes. Lord Mansfield gave Judge Henderson +the "sanction of his great authority in favor of the purchase." +Lord Chancellor Camden and Mr. Yorke had officially advised the +King in 1757, in regard to the petition of the East Indian +Company, "that in respect to such territories as have been, or +shall be acquired by treaty or grant from the Great Mogul, or any +of the Indian princes or governments, your Majesty's letters +patent are NOT NECESSARY; the property of the soil vesting in the +company by the Indian grant subject only to your Majesties right +of sovereignty over the settlements, as English settlements, and +over the inhabitants, as English subjects, who carry with them +your Majesties laws wherever they form colonies, and receive your +Majesties protection by virtue of your royal charters." This +opinion, with virtually no change, was rendered in regard to the +Indian tribes of North America by the same two authorities, +certainly as early as 1769; and a true copy, made in London, +April 1, 1772, was transmitted to Judge Henderson. Armed with the +legal opinions received from England, Judge Henderson was fully +persuaded that there was no legal bar whatsoever to his seeking +to acquire by purchase from the Cherokees the vast domain of the +trans-Alleghany. A golden dream of empire, with its promise of an +independent republic in the form of a proprietary colony, casts +him under the spell of its alluring glamour. + +In the meantime, the restless Boone, impatient over the delay in +the consummation of Judge Henderson's plans, resolved to +establish himself in Kentucky upon his own responsibility. +Heedless of the question of title and the certain hazards +incident to invading the territory of hostile savages, Boone +designated a rendezvous in Powell's Valley where he and his party +of five families were to be met by a band under the leadership of +his connections, the Bryans, and another company led by Captain +William Russell, a daring pioneer of the Clinch Valley. A small +detachment of Boone's party was fiercely attacked by Shawanoes in +Powell's Valley on October 10, 1773, and almost all were killed, +including sons of Boone and Russell, and young John and Richard +Mendenhall of Guilford County, North Carolina. As the result of +this bloody repulse, Boone's attempt to settle in Kentucky at +this time was definitely abandoned. His failure to effect a +settlement in Kentucky was due to that characteristic disregard +of the territorial rights of the Indians which was all too common +among the borderers of that period. + +This failure was portentous of the coming storm. The reign of the +Long Hunters was over. Dawning upon the horizon was the day of +stern adventurers, fixed in the desperate and lawless resolve to +invade the trans-Alleghany country and to battle savagely with +the red man for its possession. More successful than Boone was +the McAfee party, five in number, from Botetourt County, +Virginia, who between May l0th and September 1, 1773, safely +accomplished a journey through Kentucky and carefully marked +well-chosen sites for future location." An ominous incident of +the time was the veiled warning which Cornstalk, the great +Shawanoe chieftain, gave to Captain Thomas Bullitt, head of a +party of royal surveyors, sent out by Lord Dunmore, Governor of +Virginia. Cornstalk at Chillicothe, June 7, 1773, warned Bullitt +concerning the encroachments of the whites, "designed to deprive +us," he said, "of the hunting of the country, as usual . . . the +hunting we stand in need of to buy our clothing." During the +preceding summer, George Rogers Clark, an aggressive young +Virginian, with a small party, had descended the Ohio as low as +Fish Creek, where he built a cabin; and in this region for many +months various parties of surveyors were busily engaged in +locating and surveying lands covered by military grants. Most +significant of the ruthless determination of the pioneers to +occupy by force the Kentucky area was the action of the large +party from Monongahela, some forty in number, led by Captain +James Harrod, who penetrated to the present Miller County, where +in June, 1774, they made improvements and actually laid out a +town. + +A significant, secretly conducted movement, of which historians +have taken but little account, was now in progress under the +manipulation of Virginia's royal governor. As early as 1770 Dr. +John Connolly proposed the establishment of an extensive colony +south of the Ohio; and the design of securing such territory from +the Indians found lodgment in the mind of Lord Dunmore. But this +design was for the moment thwarted when on October 28, 1773, an +order was issued from the Privy Council chamber in Whitehall +granting an immense territory, including all of the present West +Virginia and the land alienated to Virginia by Donelson's +agreement with the Cherokees (1772), to a company including +Thomas Walpole, Samuel Wharton, Benjamin Franklin, and others. +This new colony, to be named "Vandalia," seemed assured. A clash +between Dunmore and the royal authorities was imminent; for +Virginia under her sea-to-sea charter claimed the vast middle +region of the continent, extending without known limit to west +and northwest. Moreover, Dunmore was interested in great land +speculations on his own account; and while overtly vindicating +Virginia's claim to the trans-Alleghany by despatching parties of +surveyors to the western wilderness to locate and survey lands +covered by military grants, he with the collusion of certain +members of the "Honourable Board," his council, as charged by +Washington, was more than "lukewarm," secretly restricting as +rigorously as he dared the extent and number of the soldiers' +allotments. According to the famous Virginia Remonstrance, he was +in league with "men of great influence in some of the neighboring +states" to secure, under cover of purchases from the Indians, +large tracts of country between the Ohio and the Mississippi." In +shaping his plans Dunmore had the shrewd legal counsel of Patrick +Henry, who was equally intent upon making for himself a private +purchase from the Cherokees. It was Henry's legal opinion that +the Indiana purchase from the Six Nations by the Pennsylvania +traders at Fort Stanwix (November 5, 1768) was valid; and that +purchase by private individuals from the Indians gave full and +ample title. In consequence of these facts, William Murray, in +behalf of himself and his associates of the Illinois Land +Company, and on the strength of the Camden Yorke decision, +purchased two large tracts, on the Illinois and Ohio +respectively, from the Illinois Indians (July 5, 1773); and in +order to win the support of Dunmore, who was ambitious to make a +fortune in land speculation, organized a second company, the +Wabash (Ouabache) Land Company, with the governor as the chief +share-holder. In response to Murray's petition on behalf of the +Illinois Land Company, Dunmore (May, 1774) recommended it to Lord +Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies, and urged that it +be granted; and in a later letter he disingenuously disclaimed +any personal interest in the Illinois speculation. + +The party of surveyors sent out under the direction of Colonel +William Preston, on the request of Washington and other leading +eastern men, in 1774 located lands covered by military grants on +the Ohio and in the Kentucky area for prominent Virginians, +including Washington, Patrick Henry, William Byrd, William +Preston, Arthur Campbell, William Fleming, and Andrew Lewis, +among others, and also a large tract for Dr. Connolly. Certain of +these grants fell within the Vandalia area; and in his reply +(September 10, 1774) to Dunmore's letter, Lord Dartmouth sternly +censured Dunmore for allowing these grants, and accused the white +settlers of having brought on, by such unwarrantable aggressions, +the war then raging with the Indians. This charge lay at the door +of Dunmore himself; and there is strong evidence that Dunmore +personally fomented the war, ostensibly in support of Virginia's +charter rights, but actually in order to further his own +speculative designs." Dunmore's agent, Dr. Connolly, heading a +party posing as Virginia militia, fired without provocation upon +a delegation of Shawanoe chiefs assembled at Fort Pitt (January, +1774). Taking advantage of the alarming situation created by the +conflict of the claims of Virginia and Pennsylvania, Connolly, +inspired by Dunmore without doubt, then issued an incendiary +circular (April 21, 1774), declaring a state of war to exist. +Just two weeks before the Battle of the Great Kanawha, Patrick +Henry categorically stated, in conversation with Thomas Wharton: + +"that he was at Williamsburg with Ld. D. when Dr. Conolly first +came there, that Conolly is a chatty, sensible man, and informed +Ld. Dunmore of the extreme richness of the lands which lay on +both sides of the Ohio; that the prohibitory orders which had +been sent him relative to the land on the hither side (or +Vandalia) had caused him to turn his thoughts to the opposite +shore, and that as his Lordship was determined to settle his +family in America he was really pursueing this war, in order to +obtain by purchase or treaty from the natives a tract of +territory on that side; he then told me that he was convinced +from every authority that the law knew, that a purchase from the +natives was as full and ample a title as could be obtained, that +they had Lord Camden and Mr. York's opinion on that head, which +opinion with some others that Ld. Dunmore had consulted, and with +the knowledge Conolly had given him of the quality of the country +and his determined resolution to settle his family on this +continent, were the real motives or springs of the present +expedition." + +At this very time, Patrick Henry, in conjunction with William +Byrd 3d and others, was negotiating for a private purchase of +lands from the Cherokees; and when Wharton, after answering +Henry's inquiry as to where he might buy Indian goods, remarked: +"It's not possible you mean to enter the Indian trade at this +period," Henry laughingly replied: "The wish-world is my hobby +horse." "From whence I conclude," adds Wharton, "he has some +prospect of making a purchase of the natives, but where I know +not." + +The war, thus promulgated, we believe, at Dunmore's secret +instigation and heralded by a series of ghastly atrocities, came +on apace. After the inhuman murder of the family of Logan, the +Indian chieftain, by one Greathouse and his drunken companions +(April 30th), Logan, who contrary to romantic views was a +blackhearted and vengeful savage, harried the Tennessee and +Virginia borders, burning and slaughtering. Unable to arouse the +Cherokees, owing to the opposition of Atta-kulla-kulla, Logan as +late as July 21st said in a letter to the whites: "The Indians +are not angry, only myself," and not until then did Dunmore begin +to give full execution to his warlike plans. The best woodsmen of +the border, Daniel Boone and the German scout Michael Stoner, +having been despatched on July 27th by Colonel William Preston to +warn the surveyors of the trans-Alleghany, made a remarkable +journey on foot of eight hundred miles in sixty-one days. +Harrod's company at Harrodsburg, a company of surveyors at +Fontainebleau, Floyd's party on the Kentucky, and the surveyors +at Mann's Lick, this warned, hurried in to the settlements and +were saved. Meanwhile, Dunmore, in command of the Virginia +forces, invaded territory guaranteed to the Indians by the royal +proclamation of 1763 and recently (1774) added to the province of +Quebec, a fact of which he was not aware, conducted a vigorous +campaign, and fortified Camp Charlotte, near Old Chillicothe. +Andrew Lewis, however, in charge of the other division of +Dunmore's army, was the one destined to bear the real brunt and +burden of the campaign. His division, recruited from the very +flower of the pioneers of the Old Southwest, was the most +representative body of borderers of this region that up to this +time had assembled to measure strength with the red men. It was +an army of the true stalwarts of the frontier, with fringed +leggings and hunting-capes, rifles and powder-horns, +hunting-knives and tomahawks. + +The Battle of the Great Kanawha, at Point Pleasant, was fought on +October 10, 1774, between Lewis's force, eleven hundred strong, +and the Indians, under Cornstalk, somewhat inferior in numbers. +It was a desultory action, over a greatly extended front and in +very brushy country between Crooked Creek and the Ohio. +Throughout the long day, the Indians fought with rare craft and +stubborn bravery--loudly cursing the white men, cleverly picking +off their leaders, and derisively inquiring, in regard to the +absence of the fifes: "Where are your whistles now?" Slowly +retreating, they sought to draw the whites into an ambuscade and +at a favorable moment to "drive the Long Knives like bullocks +into the river." No marked success was achieved on either side +until near sunset, when a flank movement directed by young Isaac +Shelby alarmed the Indians, who mistook this party for the +expected reinforcement under Christian, and retired across the +Ohio. In the morning the whites were amazed to discover that the +Indians, who the preceding day so splendidly heeded the echoing +call of Cornstalk, "Be strong! Be strong!", had quit the +battlefield and left the victory with the whites. + +The peace negotiated by Dunmore was durable. The governor had +accomplished his purpose, defied the authority of the crown, and + + +vindicated the claim of Virginia, to the enthusiastic +satisfaction of the backwoodsmen. While tendering their thanks to +him and avowing their allegiance to George III, at the close of +the campaign, the borderers proclaimed their resolution to exert +all their powers "for the defense of American liberty, and for +the support of her just rights and privileges, not in any +precipitous, riotous or tumultuous manner, but when regularly +called forth by the unanimous voice of our countrymen." Dunmore's +War is epochal, in that it procured for the nonce a state of +peace with the Indians, which made possible the advance of Judge +Henderson over the Transylvania Trail in 1775, and, through his +establishment of the Transylvania Fort at Boonesborough, the +ultimate acquisition by the American Confederation of the +imperial domain of the trans-Alleghany. + + + +CHAPTER XIV. Richard Henderson and the Transylvania Company + +I happened to fall in company, and have a great deal of +conversation with one of the most singular and extraordinary +persons and excentric geniuses in America, and perhaps in the +world. His name is Richard Henderson.--J. F. D. Smyth: A Tour in +the United States of America. + + +Early in 1774, chastened by his own disastrous failure the +preceding autumn, Boone advised Judge Henderson that the time was +auspicious for opening negotiations with the Cherokees for +purchasing the trans-Alleghany region." In organizing a company +for this purpose, Henderson chose men of action and resource, +leaders in the colony, ready for any hazard of life and fortune +in this gigantic scheme of colonization and promotion. The new +men included, in addition to the partners in the organization +known as Richard Henderson and Company, were Colonel John +Luttrell, destined to win laurels in the Revolution, and William +Johnston, a native of Scotland, the leading merchant of +Hillsborough. + +Meeting in Hillsborough on August 27, 1774, these men organized +the new company under the name of the Louisa Company. In the +articles then drawn up they agreed to "rent or purchase" a tract +of land from the Indian owners of the soil for the express +purpose of "settling the country." Each partner obligated himself +to "furnish his Quota of Expenses necessary towards procuring the +grant." In full anticipation of the grave dangers to be +encountered, they solemnly bound themselves, as "equal sharers in +the property," to "support each other with our lives and +fortunes." Negotiations with the Indians were begun at once. +Accompanied by Colonel Nathaniel Hart and guided by the +experienced Indian-trader, Thomas Price, Judge Henderson visited +the Cherokee chieftains at the Otari towns. After elaborate +consultations, the latter deputed the old chieftain, +Atta-kulla-kulla, a young buck, and a squaw, "to attend the said +Henderson and Hart to North Carolina, and there examine the Goods +and Merchandize which had been by them offered as the +Consideration of the purchase." The goods purchased at Cross +Creek (now Fayetteville, North Carolina), in which the Louisa +Company "had embarked a large amount," met the entire approval of +the Indians--the squaw in particular shrewdly examining the goods +in the interest of the women of the tribe. + +On January 6, 1775, the company was again enlarged, and given the +name of the Transylvania Company-the three new partners being +David Hart, brother to Thomas and Nathaniel, Leonard Henley +Bullock, a prominent citizen of Granville, and James Hogg, of +Hillsborough, a native Scotchman and one of the most influential +men in the colony. In the elaborate agreement drawn up reference +is explicitly made to the contingency of "settling and voting as +a proprietor and giving Rules and Regulations for the Inhabitants +etc." Hillsborough was the actual starting-point for the westward +movement, the first emigrants, traveling thence to the Sycamore +Shoals of the Watauga. In speaking of the departure of the +settlers, the first movement of extended and permanent westward +migration, an eye-witness quaintly says: "At this place +[Hillsborough] I saw the first party of emigrant families that +moved to Kentucky under the auspices of Judge Henderson. They +marched out of the town with considerable solemnity, and to many +their destination seemed as remote as if it had been to the South +Sea Islands." Meanwhile, the "Proposals for the encouragement of +settling the lands etc.," issued on Christmas Day, 1774, were +quickly spread broadcast through the colony and along the +border." It was the greatest sensation North Carolina had known +since Alamance; and Archibald Neilson, deputy-auditor and naval +officer of the colony, inquired with quizzical anxiety: "Pray, is +Dick Henderson out of his head?" The most liberal terms, +proffered by one quite in possession of his head, were embodied +in these proposals. Land at twenty shillings per hundred acres +was offered to each emigrant settling within the territory and +raising a crop of corn before September 1, 1775, the emigrant +being permitted to take up as much as five hundred acres for him +self and two hundred and fifty acres for each tithable person +under him. In these "Proposals" there was no indication that the +low terms at which the lands were offered would be maintained +after September 1, 1775. In a letter to Governor Dunmore +(January, 1775), Colonel William Preston, county surveyor of +Fincastle County, Virginia, says "The low price he [Henderson] +proposes to sell at, together with some further encouragement he +offers, will I am apprehensive induce a great many families to +remove from this County (Fincastle) & Carolina and settle there." +Joseph Martin, states his son, "was appointed entry-Taker and +agent for the Powell Valley portion" of the Transylvania Purchase +on January 20, 1775; and "he (Joseph Martin) and others went on +in the early part of the year 1775 and made their stand at the +very spot where he had made corn several years before. In +speaking of the startling design, unmasked by Henderson, of +establishing an independent government, Colonel Preston writes to +George Washington of the contemplated "large Purchase by one Col. +Henderson of North Carolina from the Cherokees . . . . I hear +that Henderson talks with great Freedom & Indecency of the +Governor of Virginia, sets the Government at Defiance & says if +he once had five hundred good Fellows settled in that Country he +would not Value Virginia." + +Early in 1775 runners were sent off to the Cherokee towns to +summon the Indians to the treaty ground at the Sycamore Shoals of +the Watauga; and Boone, after his return from a hunt in Kentucky +in January, was summoned by Judge Henderson to aid in the +negotiations preliminary to the actual treaty. The dominating +figure in the remarkable assemblage at the treaty ground, +consisting of twelve hundred Indians and several hundred whites, +was Richard Henderson, "comely in person, of a benign and social +disposition," with countenance betokening the man of strenuous +action" noble forehead, prominent nose, projecting chin, firm-set +jaw, with kindness and openness of expression." Gathered about +him, picturesque in garb and striking in appearance, were many of +the buckskin-clad leaders of the border--James Robertson, John +Sevier, Isaac Shelby, William Bailey Smith, and their +compeers--as well as his Carolina friends John Williams, Thomas +and Nathaniel Hart, Nathaniel Henderson, Jesse Benton,and +Valentine Searcy. + +Little was accomplished on the first day of the treaty (March +14th); but on the next day, the Cherokees offered to sell the +section bargained for by Donelson acting as agent for Virginia in +1771. Although the Indians pointed out that Virginia had never +paid the promised compensation of five hundred pounds and had +therefore forfeited her rights, Henderson flatly refused to +entertain the idea of purchasing territory to which Virginia had +the prior claim. Angered by Henderson's refusal, The Dragging +Canoe, leaping into the circle of the seated savages, made an +impassioned speech touched with the romantic imagination peculiar +to the American Indian. With pathetic eloquence he dwelt upon the +insatiable land-greed of the white men, and predicted the +extinction of his race if they committed the insensate folly of +selling their beloved hunting-grounds. Roused to a high pitch of +oratorical fervor, the savage with uplifted arm fiercely exhorted +his people to resist further encroachments at all hazards--and +left the treaty ground. This incident brought the conference to a +startling and abrupt conclusion. On the following day, however, +the savages proved more tractable,agreeing to sell the land as +far as the Cumberland River. In order to secure the additional +territory watered by the tributaries of the Cumberland, Henderson +agreed to pay an additional sum of two thousand pounds. Upon this +day there originated the ominous phrase descriptive of Kentucky +when The Dragging Canoe, dramatically pointing toward the west, +declared that a DARK Cloud hung over that land, which was known +as the BLOODY GROUND. + +On the last day, March 17th, the negotiations were opened with +the signing of the "Great Grant." The area purchased, some twenty +millions of acres, included almost all the present state of +Kentucky, and an immense tract in Tennessee, comprising all the +territory watered by the Cumberland River and all its +tributaries. For "two thousand weight of leather in goods" +Henderson purchased "the lands lying down Holston and between the +Watauga lease, Colonel Donelson's line and Powell's Mountain" as +a pathway to Kentucky -the deed for which was known as the "Path +Deed." By special arrangement, Carter's Valley in this tract went +to Carter and Lucas; two days later, for two thousand pounds, +Charles Robertson on behalf of the Watauga Association purchased +a large tract in the valleys of the Holston, Watauga, and New +Rivers; and eight days later Jacob Brown purchased two large +areas, including the Nolichucky Valley. This historic treaty, +which heralds the opening of the West, was conducted with +absolute justice and fairness by Judge Henderson and his +associates. No liquor was permitted at the treaty ground; and +Thomas Price, the ablest of the Cherokee traders, deposed that +"he at that time understood the Cherokee language, so as to +comprehend everything which was said and to know that what was +observed on either side was fairly and truly translated; that the +Cherokees perfectly understood, what Lands were the subject of +the Treaty . . . ." The amount paid by the Transylvania Company +for the imperial domain was ten thousand pounds sterling, in +money and in goods. + +Although Daniel Boone doubtless assisted in the proceedings prior +to the negotiation of the treaty, his name nowhere appears in the +voluminous records of the conference. Indeed, he was not then +present; for a fortnight before the conclusion of the treaty he +was commissioned by Judge Henderson to form a party of competent +woodmen to blaze a passage through the wilderness. On March l0th +this party of thirty ax-men, under the leadership of Boone, +started from the rendezvous, the Long Island of Holston, to +engage in the arduous labor of cutting out the Transylvania +Trail. + +Henderson, the empire-builder, now faced with courage and +resolution the hazardous task of occupying the purchased +territory and establishing an independent government. No mere +financial promoter of a vast speculative enterprise, he was one +of the heroic figures of the Old Southwest; and it was his +dauntless courage, his unwavering resolve to go forward in the +face of all dangers, which carried through the armed "trek" to a +successful conclusion. At Martin's Station, where Henderson and +his party tarried to build a house in which to store their +wagons, as the road could be cleared no further, they were joined +by another party, of five adventurers from Prince William County, +Virginia." In Henderson's party were some forty men and boys, +with forty packhorses and a small amount of powder, lead, salt, +and garden-seeds. The warning freely given by Joseph Martin of +the perils of the path was soon confirmed, as appears from the +following entry in Henderson's diary: + +"Friday the 7th. [April] About Brake of Day began to snow. About +11 O'Clock received a letter from Mr. Luttrells camp that were +five persons killd on the road to the Cantuckie by Indians. Capt. +[Nathaniel] Hart, uppon the receipt of this News Retreated back +with his Company, & determined to Settle in the Valley to make +Corn for the Cantucky people. The same Day Received a Letter from +Dan. Boone, that his Company was fired uppon by Indians, Kill'd +Two of his men--tho he kept the ground & saved the Baggage &c." + +The following historic letter, which reveals alike the dogged +resolution of Boone and his reliance upon Henderson and his +company in this black hour of disaster, addressed "Colonel +Richard Henderson--these with care," is eloquent in its +simplicity + +"Dear Colonel: After my compliments to you, I shall acquaint you +of our misfortunes. On March the 25 a party of Indians fired on +my Company about half an hour before day, and killed Mr. Twitty +and his negro, and wounded Mr. Walker very deeply, but I hope he +will recover. + +"On March the 28 as we were hunting for provisions, we found +Samuel Tate's son, who gave us an account that the Indians fired +on their camp on the 27th day. My brother and I went down and +found two men killed and sculped, Thomas McDowell and Jeremiah +McFeters. I have sent a man down to all the lower companies in +order to gather them all at the mouth of Otter Creek. + +"My advice to you, Sir, is to come or send as soon as possible. +Your company is desired greatly, for the people are very uneasy, +but are willing to stay and venture their lives with you. and now +is the time to flusterate their [the Indians'] intentions, and +keep the country, whilst we are in it. If we give way to them +now, it will ever be the case. This day we start from the battle +ground, for the mouth of Otter Creek, where we shall immediately +erect a Fort, which will be done before you can come or send, +then we can send ten men to meet you, if you send for them. + +"I am, Sir, your most obedient + Omble Sarvent +Daniel Boone. + + +"N.B. We stood on the ground and guarded our baggage till day, +and lost nothing. We have about fifteen miles to Cantuck +[Kentucky River] at Otter Creek." + +This dread intelligence caused the hearts of strong men to quail +and induced some to turn back, but Henderson, the jurist-pioneer, +was made of sterner stuff. At once (April 8th) he despatched an +urgent letter in hot haste to the proprietors of Transylvania, +enclosing Boone's letter, informing them of Boone's plight and +urging them to send him immediately a large quantity of powder +and lead, as he had been compelled to abandon his supply of +saltpeter at Martin's Station. "We are all in high spirits," he +assures the proprietors, "and on thorns to fly to Boone's +assistance, and join him in defense of so fine and valuable a +country." + +Laconically eloquent is this simple entry in his diary: "Saturday +the 8th. Started abt. 10 oClock Crossed Cumberland Gap about 4 +miles met about 40 persons Returning from the Cantucky, on Acct. +of the Late Murders by the Indians could prevail on one only to +return. Memo Several Virginians who were with us return'd." + +There is no more crucial moment in early Western history than +this, in which we see the towering form of Henderson, clad in the +picturesque garb of the pioneer, with outstretched arm resolutely +pointing forward to the "dark and bloody ground," and in +impassioned but futile eloquence pleading with the pale and +panic-stricken fugitives to turn about, to join his company, and +to face once more the mortal dangers of pioneer conquest. +Significant indeed are the lines: + +Some to endure, and many to fail, +Some to conquer, and many to quail, +Toiling over the Wilderness Trail. + +The spirit of the pioneer knight-errant inspires Henderson's +words: "In this situation, some few, of genuine courage and +undaunted resolution, served to inspire the rest; by the help of +whose example, assisted by a little pride and some ostentation, +we made a shift to march on with all the appearance of gallantry, +and, cavalier like, treated every insinuation of danger with the +utmost contempt." + +Fearing that Boone, who did not even know that Henderson's +cavalcade was on the road, would be unable to hold out, Henderson +realized the imperative necessity for sending him a message of +encouragement. The bold young Virginian, William Cocke, +volunteered to brave alone the dangers of the murder-haunted +trail to undertake a ride more truly memorable and hazardous than +that of Revere. "This offer, extraordinary as it was, we could by +no means refuse," remarks Henderson, who shed tears of gratitude +as he proffered his sincere thanks and wrung the brave +messenger's hand. Equipped with "a good Queen Anne's musket, +plenty of ammunition, a tomahawk, a large cuttoe knife [French, +couteau], a Dutch blanket, and no small quantity of jerked beef," +Cocke on April l0th rode off "to the Cantuckey to Inform Capt +Boone that we were on the road." The fearful apprehensions felt +for Cocke's safety were later relieved, when along the road were +discovered his letters in forming Henderson of his arrival and of +his having been joined on the way by Page Portwood of Rowan. On +his arrival at Otter Creek, Cocke found Boone and his men, and on +relating his adventures, "came in for his share of applause." +Boone at once despatched the master woodman, Michael Stoner, with +pack-horses to assist Henderson's party, which he met on April +18th at their encampment "in the Eye of the Rich Land." Along +with "Excellent Beef in plenty," Stoner brought the story of +Boone's determined stand and an account of the erection of a rude +little fortification which they had hurriedly thrown up to resist +attack. With laconic significance Henderson pays the following +tribute to Boone which deserves to be perpetuated in national +annals: "It was owing to Boone's confidence in us, and the +people's in him, that a stand was ever attempted in order to wait +for our coming." + +In the course of their journey over the mountains and through the +wilderness, the pioneers forgot the trials of the trail in the +face of the surpassing beauties of the country. The Cumberlands +were covered with rich undergrowth of the red and white +rhododendron, the delicate laurel, the mountain ivy, the +flameazalea, the spicewood, and the cane; while the white stars +of the dogwood and the carmine blossoms of the red-bud, strewn +across the verdant background of the forest, gleamed in the eager +air of spring. "To enter uppon a detail of the Beuty & Goodness +of our Country," writes Nathaniel Henderson, "would be a task too +arduous . . . . Let it suffice to tell you it far exceeds any +country I ever saw or herd off. I am conscious its out of the +power of any man to make you clearly sensible of the great Beuty +and Richness of Kentucky." Young Felix Walker, endowed with more +vivid powers of description, says with a touch of native +eloquence: + +"Perhaps no Adventurer Since the days of donquicksotte or before +ever felt So Cheerful & Ilated in prospect, every heart abounded +with Joy & excitement . . . & exclusive of the Novelties of the +Journey the advantages & accumalations arising on the Settlement +of a new Country was a dazzling object with many of our Company . +. . . As the Cain ceased, we began to discover the pleasing & +Rapturous appearance of the plains of Kentucky, a New Sky & +Strange Earth to be presented to our view . . . . So Rich a Soil +we had never Saw before, Covered with Clover in full Bloom. the +Woods alive abounding in wild Game, turkeys so numerous that it +might be said there appeared but one flock Universally Scattered +in the woods . . . it appeared that Nature in the profusion of +her Bounties, had Spread a feast for all that lives, both for the +Animal & Rational World, a Sight so delightful to our View and +grateful to our feelings almost Induced us, in Immitation of +Columbus in Transport to Kiss the Soil of Kentucky, as he haild & +Saluted the sand on his first setting his foot on the Shores of +America." + +On the journey Henderson was joined in Powell's Valley by +Benjamin Logan, afterward so famous in Kentucky annals, and a +companion, William Galaspy. At the Crab Orchard they left +Henderson's party; and turning their course westward finally +pitched camp in the present Lincoln County, where Logan +subsequently built a fort. On Sunday, April 16th, on Scaggs's +Creek, Henderson records: "About 12 oClock Met James McAfee with +18 other persons Returning from Cantucky." They advised Henderson +of the "troublesomeness and danger" of the Indians, says Robert +McAfee junior: "but Henderson assured them that he had purchased +the whole country from the Indians, that it belonged to him, and +he had named it Transylvania . . . . Robt, Samuel, and William +McAfee and 3 others were inclined to return, but James opposed +it, alleging that Henderson had no right to the land, and that +Virginia had previously bought it. The former (6) returned with +Henderson to Boonesborough." Among those who had joined +Henderson's party was Abraham Hanks from Virginia, the maternal +grandfather of Abraham Lincoln; but alarmed by the stories +brought by Stewart and his party of fugitives, Hanks and Drake, +as recorded by William Calk on that day (April 13th), turned +back. + +At last the founder of Kentucky with his little band reached the +destined goal of their arduous journeyings. Henderson's record on +his birthday runs: "Thursday the 20th [April] Arrived at Fort +Boone on the Mouth of Oter Creek Cantuckey River where we were +Saluted by a running fire of about 25 Guns; all that was then at +Fort . . . . The men appeared in high spirits & much rejoiced in +our arrival." It is a coincidence of historic interest that just +one day after the embattled farmers at Lexington and Concord +"fired the shots heard round the world," the echoing shots of +Boone and his sturdy backwoodsmen rang out to announce the +arrival of the proprietor of Transylvania and the birth of the +American West. + + + +CHAPTER XV. Transylvania--A wilderness Commonwealth + +You are about a work of the utmost importance to the well-being +of this country in general, in which the interest and security of +each and every individual are inseparably connected .... Our +peculiar circumstances in this remote country, surrounded on all +sides with difficulties, and equally subject to one common +danger, which threatens our common overthrow, must, I think, in +their effects, secure to us an union of interests, and, +consequently, that harmony in opinion, so essential to the +forming good, wise and wholesome laws.--Judge Richard Henderson: +Address to the Legislature of Transylvania, May 23, 1775. + + +The independent spirit displayed by the Transylvania Company, and +Henderson's procedure in open defiance of the royal governors of +both North Carolina and Virginia, naturally aroused grave alarm +throughout these colonies and South Carolina. "This in my +Opinion," says Preston in a letter to George Washington (January +31, 1775), "will soon become a serious Affair, & highly deserves +the Attention of the Government. For it is certain that a vast +Number of People are preparing to go out and settle on this +Purchase; and if once they get fixed there, it will be next to +impossible to remove them or reduce them to Obedience; as they +are so far from the Seat of Government. Indeed it may be the +Cherokees will support them." Governor Martin of North Carolina, +already deeply disturbed in anticipation of the coming +revolutionary cataclysm, thundered in what was generally regarded +as a forcible-feeble proclamation (February 19, 1775) against +"Richard Henderson and his Confederates" in their "daring, unjust +and unwarrantable proceedings." In a letter to Dartmouth he +denounces "Henderson the famous invader" and dubs the +Transylvania Company "an infamous Company of land Pyrates." + +Officials who were themselves eager for land naturally opposed +Henderson's plans. Lord Dunmore, who in 1774, as we have seen, +was heavily interested in the Wabash Land Company engineered by +William Murray, took the ground that the Wabash purchase was +valid under the Camden-Yorke decision. This is so stated in the +records of the Illinois Company. Likewise under Murray's control. +But although the "Ouabache Company," of which Dunmore was a +leading member, was initiated as early as May 16, 1774, the +purchase of the territory was not formally effected until October +18, 1775--too late to benefit Dunmore, then deeply embroiled in +the preliminaries to the Revolution. Under the cover of his +agent's name, it is believed, Dunmore, with his "passion for land +and fees," illegally entered tracts aggregating thousands of +acres of land surveyed by the royal surveyors in the summer of +1774 for Dr. John Connolly. Early in this same year, Patrick +Henry, who, as already pointed out, had entered large tracts in +Kentucky in violation of Virginia's treaty obligations with the +Cherokees, united with William Byrd 3d, John Page, Ralph Wormley, +Samuel Overton, and William Christian, in the effort to purchase +from the Cherokees a tract of land west of Donelson's line, being +firmly persuaded of the validity of the Camden-Yorke opinion. +Their agent, William Kenedy, considerably later in the year, went +on a mission to the Cherokee towns, and upon his return reported +that the Indians might be induced to sell. When it became known +that Judge Henderson had organized the Transylvania Company and +anticipated Patrick Henry and his associates, Colonel Arthur +Campbell, as he himself states, applied to several of the +partners of the Transylvania Company on behalf of Patrick Henry, +requesting that Henry be taken in as a partner. It was afterward +stated, as commonly understood among the Transylvania +proprietors, that both Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson desired +to become members of the company; but that Colonel Richard +Henderson was instrumental in preventing their admission "lest +they should supplant the Colonel [Henderson] as the guiding +spirit of the company." + +Fully informed by Preston's elaborate communication on the +gravity of the situation, Dunmore acted energetically, though +tardily, to prevent the execution of Henderson's designs. On +March 21st Dunmore sent flying through the back country a +proclamation, demanding the immediate relinquishment of the +territory by "one Richard Henderson and other disorderly persons, +his associates," and "in case of refusal, and of violently +detaining such possession, that he or they be immediately fined +and imprisoned. This proclamation, says a peppery old chronicler, +may well rank with the one excepting those arch traitors and +rebels, Samuel Adams and John Hancock, from the mercy of the +British monarch. In view of Dunmore's confidence in the validity +of the Camden-Yorke decision, it is noteworthy that no mention of +the royal proclamation of 1763 occurs in his broadside; and that +he bases his objection to the Transylvania purchase upon the +king's instructions that all vacant lands "within this colony" be +laid off in tracts, from one hundred to one thousand acres in +extent, and sold at public auction. This proclamation which was +enclosed, oddly enough, in a letter of official instructions to +Preston warning him not to survey any lands "beyond the line run +by Colonel Donaldson," proved utterly ineffective. At the same +time, Dunmore despatched a pointed letter to Oconostota, +Atta-kulla-kulla, Judge's Friend, and other Cherokee chieftains, +notifying them that the sale of the great tract of land below the +Kentucky was illegal and threatening them with the king's +displeasure if they did not repudiate the sale. + +News of the plans which Henderson had already matured for +establishing an independent colony in the trans-Alleghany +wilderness, now ran like wild-fire through Virginia. In a letter +to George Washington (April 9, 1775), Preston ruefully says: +"Henderson I hear has made the Purchase & got a Conveyance of the +great and Valluable Country below the Kentucky from the +Cherokees. He and about 300 adventurers are gone out to take +Possession, who it is said intends to set up an independent +Government & form a Code of Laws for themselves. How this may be +I cant say, but I am affraid the steps taken by the Government +have been too late. Before the Purchase was made had the Governor +interfered it is believed the Indians would not have sold." + +Meanwhile Judge Henderson, with strenuous energy, had begun to +erect a large stockaded fort according to plans of his own. +Captain James Harrod with forty-two men was stationed at the +settlement he had made the preceding year, having arrived there +before the McAfees started back to Virginia; and there were small +groups of settlers at Boiling Spring, six miles southeast of +Harrods settlement, and at St. Asaph's, a mile west of the +present Stanford. A representative government for Transylvania +was then planned. When the frank and gallant Floyd arrived at the +Transylvania Fort on May 3d, he "expressed great satisfaction," +says Judge Henderson, "on being informed of the plan we proposed +for Legislation & sayd he must most heartily concur in that & +every other measure we should adopt for the well Govern'g or good +of the Community in Gen'l." In reference to a conversation with +Captain James Harrod and Colonel Thomas Slaughter of Virginia, +Henderson notes in his diary (May 8th): "Our plan of Legislation, +the evils pointed out--the remedies to be applyed &c &c &c were +Acceeded to without Hesitation. The plann was plain & Simple- +-'twas nothing novel in its essence a thousand years ago it was +in use, and found by every year's experience since to be +unexceptionable. We were in four distinct settlem'ts. Members or +delegates from every place by free choice of Individuals they +first having entered into writings solemnly binding themselves to +obey and carry into Execution Such Laws as representatives should +from time to time make, Concurred with, by A Majority of the +Proprietors present in the Country." + +In reply to inquiries of the settlers, Judge Henderson gave as +his reason for this assembling of a Transylvania Legislature that +"all power was derived from the people." Six days before the +prophetic arrival of the news of the Battle of Lexington and +eight days before the revolutionary committee of Mecklenburg +County, North Carolina, promulgated their memorable Resolves +establishing laws for independent government, the pioneers +assembled on the green beneath the mighty plane-tree at the +Transylvania Fort. In his wise and statesmanlike address to this +picturesque convention of free Americans (May 23, 1775), an +address which Felix Walker described as being "considered equal +to any of like kind ever delivered to any deliberate body in that +day and time," Judge Henderson used these memorable words: + +"You, perhaps, are fixing the palladium, or placing the first +corner stone of an edifice, the height and magnificence of whose +superstructure . . . can only become great in proportion to the +excellence of its foundation . . . . If any doubt remain amongst +you with respect to the force or efficiency of whatever laws you +now, or hereafter make, be pleased to consider that ALL POWER IS +ORIGINALLY IN THE PEOPLE; MAKE AND THEIR INTEREST, THEREFORE, BY +IMPARTIAL AND BENEFICENT LAWS, AND YOU MAY BE SURE OF THEIR +INCLINATION TO SEE THEM ENFORCED." + +An early writer, in speaking of the full blooded democracy of +these "advanced" sentiments, quaintly comments: "If Jeremy +Bentham had been in existence of manhood, he would have sent his +compliments to the President of Transylvania." This, the first +representative body of American freemen which ever convened west +of the Alleghanies, is surely the most unique colonial government +ever set up on this continent. The proceedings of this backwoods +legislature--the democratic leader ship of the principal +proprietor; the prudence exhibited in the laws for protecting +game, breeding horses, etc.; the tolerance shown in the granting +of full religious liberty--all display the acumen and practical +wisdom of these pioneer law-givers. As the result of Henderson's +tactfulness, the proprietary form of government, thoroughly +democratized in tone, was complacently accepted by the backwoods +men. From one who, though still under royal rule, vehemently +asserted that the source of all political power was the people, +and that "laws derive force and efficiency from our mutual +consent," Western democracy thus born in the wilderness was +"taking its first political lesson." In their answer to +Henderson's assertion of freedom from alien authority the +pioneers unhesitatingly declared: "That we have an absolute +right, as a political body, without giving umbrage to Great +Britain, or any of the colonies, to form rules for the government +of our little society, cannot be doubted by any sensible mind and +being without the jurisdiction of, and not answerable to any of +his Majesty's courts, the constituting tribunals of justice shall +be a matter of our first contemplation . . . ." In the +establishment of a constitution for the new colony, Henderson +with paternalistic wisdom induced the people to adopt a legal +code based on the laws of England. Out of a sense of +self-protection he reserved for the proprietors only one +prerogative not granted them by the people, the right of veto. He +clearly realized that if this power were given up, the delegates +to any convention that might be held after the first would be +able to assume the claims and rights of the proprietors. + +A land-office was formally opened, deeds were issued, and a store +was established which supplied the colonists with powder, lead, +salt, osnaburgs, blankets, and other chief necessities of pioneer +existence. Writing to his brother Jonathan from Leestown, the +bold young George Rogers Clark, soon to plot the downfall of +Transylvania, enthusiastically says (July 6, 1775): "A richer and +more Beautifull Cuntry than this I believe has never been seen in +America yet. Col. Henderson is hear and Claims all ye Country +below Kentucke. If his Claim Should be good, land may be got +Reasonable Enough and as good as any in ye World." Those who +settled on the south side of Kentucky River acknowledged the +validity of the Transylvania purchase; and Clark in his Memoir +says: "the Proprietors at first took great pains to Ingratiate +themselves in the fav'r of the people." + +In regard to the designs of Lord Dunmore, who, as noted above, +had illegally entered the Connolly grant on the Ohio and sought +to outlaw Henderson, and of Colonel William Byrd 3d, who, after +being balked in Patrick Henry's plan to anticipate the +Transylvania Company in effecting a purchase from the Cherokees, +was supposed to have tried to persuade the Cherokees to repudiate +the "Great Treaty," Henderson defiantly says: "Whether Lord +Dunmore and Colonel Byrd have interfered with the Indians or not, +Richard Henderson is equally ignorant and indifferent. The utmost +result of their efforts can only serve to convince them of the +futility of their schemes and possibly frighten some few +faint-hearted persons, naturally prone to reverence great names +and fancy everything must shrink at the magic of a splendid +title." + +Prompted by Henderson's desire to petition the Continental +Congress then in session for recognition as the fourteenth +colony, the Transylvania legislature met again on the first +Thursday in September and elected Richard Henderson and John +Williams, among others, as delegates to the gathering at +Philadelphia. Shortly afterward the Proprietors of Transylvania +held a meeting at Oxford, North Carolina (September 25, 1775), +elected Williams as the agent of the colony, and directed him to +proceed to Boonesborough there to reside until April, 1776. James +Hogg, of Hillsborough, chosen as Delegate to represent the Colony +in the Continental Congress, was despatched to Philadelphia, +bearing with him an elaborate memorial prepared by the President, +Judge Henderson, petitioning the Congress "to take the infant +Colony of Transylvania into their protection." + +Almost immediately upon his arrival in Philadelphia, James Hogg +was presented to "the famous Samuel and John Adams." The latter +warned Hogg, in view of the efforts then making toward +reconciliation between the colonies and the king, that "the +taking under our protection a body of people who have acted in +defiance of the King's proclamation, will be looked on as a +confirmation of that independent spirit with which we are daily +reproached." Jefferson said that if his advice were followed, all +the use the Virginians should make of their charter would be "to +prevent any arbitrary or oppressive government to be established +within the boundaries of it"; and that it was his wish "to see a +free government established at the back of theirs [Virginia's] +properly united with them." He would not consent, however, that +Congress should acknowledge the colony of Transylvania, until it +had the approbation of the Virginia Convention. The quit-rents +imposed by the company were denounced in Congress as a mark of +vassalage; and many advised a law against the employment of +negroes in the colony. "They even threatened us with their +opposition," says Hogg, with precise veracity, "if we do not act +upon liberal principles when we have it so much in our power to +render ourselves immortal." + + + +CHAPTER XVI. The Repulse of the Red Men + +To this short war may be properly attributed all the kind +feelings and fidelity to treaty stipulations manifested by the +Cherokees ever afterwards. General Rutherford instilled into the +Indians so great a fear of the whites, that never afterwards were +they disposed to engage in any cruelty, or destroy any of the +property of our frontier men.--David L. Swain: The Indian War of +1776. + + +During the summer of 1775 the proprietors of Transylvania were +confronted with two stupendous tasks--that of winning the favor +and support of the frontiersmen and that of rallying the rapidly +dwindling forces in Kentucky in defense of the settlements. +Recognizing the difficulty of including Martin's Station, because +of its remoteness, with the government provided for Transylvania, +Judge Henderson prepared a plan of government for the group of +settlers located in Powell's Valley. In a letter to Martin (July +30th), in regard to the recent energetic defense of the settlers +at that point against the Indians, Henderson says: "Your spirited +conduct gives me much pleasure . . . . Keep your men in heart if +possible, NOW IS OUR TIME, THE INDIANS MUST NOT DRIVE US." The +gloom which had been occasioned by the almost complete desertion +of the stations at Harrodsburg, the Boiling Spring, and the +Transylvania Fort or Boonesborough was dispelled with the return +of Boone, accompanied by some thirty persons, on September 8th, +and of Richard Callaway with a considerable party on September +26th. The crisis was now passed; and the colony began for the +first time really to flourish. The people on the south side of +the Kentucky River universally accepted proprietary rule for the +time being. But the seeds of dissension were soon to be sown +among those who settled north of the river, as well as among men +of the stamp of James Harrod, who, having preceded Henderson in +the establishment of a settlement in Kentucky, naturally resented +holding lands under the Transylvania Company. + +The great liberality of this organization toward incoming +settlers had resulted in immense quantities of land being taken +up through their land-office. The ranging, hunting, and +road-building were paid for by the company; and the entire +settlement was furnished with powder, lead, and supplies, wholly +on credit, for this and the succeeding year. "Five hundred and +sixty thousand acres of land are now entered," reports Floyd on +December 1st, "and most of the people waiting to have it run +out." After Dunmore, having lost his hold upon the situation, +escaped to the protection of a British vessel, the Fowey, Colonel +Preston continued to prevent surveys for officers' grants within +the Transylvania territory; and his original hostility to Judge +Henderson gave place to friendship and support. On December 1st, +Colonel John Williams, resident agent of the Transylvania +Company, announced at Boonesborough the long-contemplated and +widely advertised advance in price of the lands, from twenty to +fifty shillings per hundred acres, with surveying fees of four +dollars for tracts not exceeding six hundred and forty acres. At +a meeting of the Transylvania legislature, convened on December +21st, John Floyd was chosen surveyor general of the colony, +Nathaniel Henderson was placed in charge of the Entering Office, +and Richard Harrison given the post of secretary. At this meeting +of the legislature, the first open expression of discontent was +voiced in the "Harrodsburg Remonstrance," questioning the +validity of the proprietors' title, and protesting against any +increase in the price of lands, as well as the taking up by the +proprietors and a few other gentlemen of the best lands at the +Falls of the Ohio. Every effort was made to accommodate the +remonstrants, who were led by Abraham Hite. Office fees were +abolished, and the payment of quit-rents was deferred until +January 1, 1780. Despite these efforts at accommodation, grave +doubts were implanted by this Harrodsburg Remonstrance in the +minds of the people; and much discussion and discontent ensued. + +By midsummer, 1775, George Rogers Clark, a remarkably +enterprising and independent young pioneer, was "engrossing all +the land he could" in Kentucky. Upon his return to Virginia, as +he relates, he "found there was various oppinions Respecting +Henderson claim. many thought it good, others douted whether or +not Virginia coud with propriety have any pretentions to the +cuntrey." Jefferson displayed a liberal attitude toward the +claims of the Transylvania proprietors; and Patrick Henry openly +stated that, in his opinion, "their claim would stand good." But +many others, of the stamp of George Mason and George Washington, +vigorously asserted Virginia's charter rights over the Western +territory." This sharp difference of opinion excited in Clark's +mind the bold conception of seizing the leadership of the country +and making terms with Virginia under threat of secession. With +the design of effecting some final disposition in regard to the +title of the Transylvania proprietors, Judge Henderson and +Colonel Williams set off from Boonesborough about May 1st, +intending first to appeal to the Virginia Convention and +ultimately to lay their claims before the Continental Congress. +"Since they have gone," reports Floyd to Preston, "I am told most +of the men about Harrodsburg have re-assumed their former +resolution of not complying with any of the office rules +whatever. Jack Jones, it is said, is at the head of the party & +flourishes away prodigiously." John Gabriel Jones was the mere +figurehead in the revolt. The real leader, the brains of the +conspiracy, was the unscrupulous George Rogers Clark. At Clark's +instance, an eight-day election was held at Harrodsburg (June +7-15), at which time a petition to the Virginia Convention was +drawn up; and Clark and Jones were elected delegates. Clark's +plan, the scheme of a bold revolutionist, was to treat with +Virginia for terms; and if they were not satisfactory, to revolt +and, as he says, "Establish an Independent Government" . . . +"giving away great part of the Lands and disposing of the +Remainder." In a second petition, prepared by the self-styled +"Committee of West Fincastle" (June 20th), it was alleged that +"if these pretended Proprietors have leave to continue to act in +their arbitrary manner out the controul of this colony [Virginia] +the end must be evident to every well wisher to American +Liberty." + +The contest which now ensued between Richard Henderson and George +Rogers Clark, waged upon the floor of the convention and behind +the scenes, resulted in a conclusion that was inevitable at a +moment in American history marked by the signing of the +Declaration of Independence. Virginia, under the leader ship of +her new governor, Patrick Henry, put an end to the proprietary +rule of the Transylvania Company. On December 7th such part of +Transylvania as lay within the chartered limits of Virginia was +erected by the legislature of that colony into the County of +Kentucky. The proprietary form of government with its "marks of +vassalage," although liberalized with the spirit of democracy, +was unendurable to the independent and lawless pioneers, already +intoxicated with the spirit of freedom swept in on the first +fresh breezes of the Revolution. Yet it is not to be doubted that +the Transylvania Company, through the courage and moral influence +of its leaders, made a permanent contribution to the colonization +of the West, which, in providential timeliness and effective +execution, is without parallel in our early annals. + +While events were thus shaping themselves in Kentucky--events +which made possible Clark's spectacular and meteoric campaign in +the Northwest and ultimately resulted in the establishment of the +Mississippi instead of the Alleghanies as the western boundary of +the Confederation--the pioneers of Watauga were sagaciously +laying strong the foundations of permanent occupation. In +September, 1775, North Carolina, through her Provincial Congress, +provided for the appointment in each district of a Committee of +Safety, to consist of a president and twelve other members. +Following the lead thus set, the Watauga settlers assumed for +their country the name of "Washington District"; and proceeded by +unanimous vote of the people to choose a committee of thirteen, +which included James Robertson and John Sevier. This district was +organized "shortly after October, 1775, according to Felix +Walker; and the first step taken after the election of the +committee was the organization of a court, consisting of five +members. Felix Walker was elected clerk of the court thus +organized, and held the position for about four years. James +Robertson and John Sevier, it is believed, were also members of +this court. To James Robertson who, with the assistance of his +colleagues, devised this primitive type of frontier rule--a true +commission form of government, on the "Watauga Plan"--is justly +due distinctive recognition for this notable inauguration of the +independent democracy of the Old Southwest. The Watauga +settlement was animated by a spirit of deepest loyalty to the +American cause. In a memorable petition these hardy settlers +requested the Provincial Council of North Carolina not to regard +them as a "lawless mob," but to "annex" them to North Carolina +without delay. "This committee (willing to become a party in the +present unhappy contest)", states the petition, which must have +been drafted about July 15, 1776, "resolved (which is now on our +records), to adhere strictly to the rules and orders of the +Continental Congress, and in open committee acknowledged +themselves indebted to the united colonies their full proportion +of the Continental expense." + +While these disputes as to the government of the new communities +were in progress an additional danger threatened the pioneers. +For a whole year the British had been plying the various Indian +tribes from the lakes to the gulf with presents, supplies, and +ammunition. In the Northwest bounties had actually been offered +for American scalps. During the spring of 1776 plans were +concerted, chiefly through Stuart and Cameron, British agents +among the Southern Indians, for uniting the Loyalists and the +Indians in a crushing attack upon the Tennessee settlements and +the back country of North Carolina. Already the frontier of South +Carolina had passed through the horrors of Indian uprising; and +warning of the approaching invasion had been mercifully sent the +Holston settlers by Atta-kulla-kulla's niece, Nancy Ward, the +"Pocahontas of the West"--doubtless through the influence of her +daughter, who loved Joseph Martin. The settlers, flocking for +refuge into their small stockaded forts, waited in readiness for +the dreaded Indian attacks, which were made by two forces +totaling some seven hundred warriors. + +On July 20th, warned in advance of the approach of the Indians, +the borderers, one hundred and seventy in all, marched in two +columns from the rude breastwork, hastily thrown up at Eaton's +Station, to meet the Indians, double their own number, led by The +Dragging Canoe. The scouts surprised one party of Indians, +hastily poured in a deadly fire, and rushed upon them with such +impetuous fury that they fled precipitately. Withdrawing now +toward their breastwork, in anticipation of encountering there a +larger force, the backwoodsmen suddenly found themselves attacked +in their rear and in grave danger of being surrounded. Extending +their own line under the direction of Captain James Shelby, the +frontiersmen steadily met the bold attack of the Indians, who, +mistaking the rapid extension of the line for a movement to +retreat, incautiously made a headlong onslaught upon the whites, +giving the war-whoop and shouting: "The Unakas are running!" In +the ensuing hot conflict at close quarters, in some places hand +to hand, the Indians were utterly routed--The Dragging Canoe +being shot down, many warriors wounded, and thirteen left dead +upon the field. + +On the day after Thompson, Cocke, Shelby, Campbell, Madison, and +their men were thus winning the battle of the Long Island +"flats," Robertson, Sevier, and their little band of forty-two +men were engaged in repelling an attack, begun at sunrise, upon +the Watauga fort near the Sycamore Shoals. This attack, which was +led by Old Abraham, proved abortive; but as the result of the +loose investment of the log fortress, maintained by the Indians +for several weeks, a few rash venturers from the fort were killed +or captured, notably a young boy who was carried to one of the +Indian towns and burned at the stake, and the wife of the pioneer +settler, William Been, who was rescued from a like fate by the +intercession of the humane and noble Nancy Ward. It was during +this siege, according to constant tradition, that a frontier +lass, active and graceful as a young doe, was pursued to the very +stockade by the fleet-footed savages. Seeing her plight, an +athletic young officer mounted the stockade at a single leap, +shot down the foremost of the pursuers, and leaning over, seized +the maiden by the hands and lifted her over the stockade. The +maiden who sank breathless into the arms of the young officer, +John Sevier, was "Bonnie Kate Sherrill"--who, after the fashion +of true romance, afterward became the wife of her gallant +rescuer. + +While the Tennessee settlements were undergoing the trials of +siege and attack, the settlers on the frontiers of Rowan were +falling beneath the tomahawk of the merciless savage. In the +first and second weeks of July large forces of Indians penetrated +to the outlying settlements; and in two days thirty-seven persons +were killed along the Catawba River. On July 13th, the bluff old +soldier of Rowan, General Griffith Rutherford, reported to the +council of North Carolina that "three of our Captains are killed +and one wounded"; and that he was setting out that day with what +men he could muster to relieve Colonel McDowell, ten men, and one +hundred and twenty women and children, who were "besieged in some +kind of a fort." Aroused to extraordinary exertions by these +daring and deadly blows, the governments of North Carolina, South +Carolina, Virginia, and Georgia instituted a joint campaign +against the Cherokees. It was believed that, by delivering a +series of crushing blows to the Indians and so conclusively +demonstrating the overwhelming superiority of the whites, the +state governments in the Old Southwest would convince the savages +of the futility, of any attempt ever again to oppose them +seriously. + +Within less than a week after sending his despatches to the +council Rutherford set forth at the head of twenty-five hundred +men to protect the frontiers of North Carolina and to overwhelm +the foe. Leading the South Carolina army of more than eighteen +hundred men, Colonel Andrew Williamson directed his attack +against the lower Cherokee towns; while Colonel Samuel Jack led +two hundred Georgians against the Indian towns at the heads of +the Chattahoochee and Tugaloo Rivers. Assembling a force of some +sixteen hundred Virginians, Colonel William Christian +rendezvoused in August at the Long Island of Holston, where his +force was strengthened by between three and four hundred North +Carolinians under Colonels Joseph Williams and Love, and Major +Winston. The various expeditions met with little effective +opposition on the whole, succeeding everywhere in their design of +utterly laying waste the towns of the Cherokees. One serious +engagement occurred when the Indians resolutely challenged +Rutherford's advance at the gap of the Nantahala Mountains. +Indian women--heroic Amazons disguised in war-paint and armed +with the weapons of warriors and the courage of despair--fought +side by side with the Indian braves in the effort to arrest +Rutherford's progress and compass his defeat. More than forty +frontiersmen fell beneath the deadly shots of this truly Spartan +band before the final repulse of the savages. + +The most picturesque figures in this overwhelmingly successful +campaign were the bluff old Indian-fighter, Griffith Rutherford, +wearing "a tow hunting shirt, dyed black, and trimmed with white +fringe" as a uniform; Captain Benjamin Cleveland, a rude paladin +of gigantic size, strength, and courage; Lieutenant William +Lenoir (Le Noir), the gallant and recklessly brave French +Huguenot, later to win a general's rank in the Revolution; and +that militant man of God, the Reverend James Hall, graduate of +Nassau Hall, stalwart and manly, who carried a rifle on his +shoulder and, in the intervals between the slaughter of the +savages, preached the gospel to the vindictive and bloodthirsty +backwoodsmen. Such preaching was sorely needed on that campaign-- +when the whites, maddened beyond the bounds of self-control by +the recent ghastly murders, gladly availed themselves of the +South Carolina bounty offered for fresh Indian scalps. At times +they exultantly displayed the reeking patches of hair above the +gates of their stockades; at others, with many a bloody oath, +they compelled their commanders either to sell the Indian +captives into slavery or else see them scalped on the spot. +Twenty years afterward Benjamin Hawkins relates that among Indian +refugees in extreme western Georgia the children had been so +terrorized by their parents' recitals of the atrocities of the +enraged borderers in the campaign of 1776, that they ran +screaming from the face of a white man. + + + +CHAPTER XVII. The Colonization of the Cumberland + +March 31, 1760. Set out this day, and after running some +distance, met with Col. Richard Henderson, who was running the +line between Virginia and North Carolina. At this meeting we were +much rejoiced. He gave us every information we wished, and +further informed 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 without bread, and are +compelled to hunt the buffalo to preserve life.--John Donelson: +Journal of a Voyage, intended by God's permission, in the good +boat Adventure, from Fort Patrick Henry, on Holston River, to the +French Salt Springs on Cumberland River. + + +To the settlements in Tennessee and Kentucky, which they had +seized and occupied, the pioneers held on with a tenacious grip +which never relaxed. From these strongholds, won through sullen +and desperate strokes, they pushed deeper into the wilderness, +once again to meet with undimmed courage the bitter onslaughts of +their resentful foes. The crushing of the Cherokees in 1776 +relieved the pressure upon the Tennessee settlers, enabling them +to strengthen their hold and prepare effectively for future +eventualities; the possession of the gateway to Kentucky kept +free the passage for Western settlement; Watauga and its +defenders continued to offer a formidable barrier to British +invasion of the East from Kentucky and the Northwest during the +Revolution; while these Tennessee frontiersmen were destined soon +to set forth again to invade a new wilderness and at frightful +cost to colonize the Cumberland. + +The little chain of stockades along the farflung frontier of +Kentucky was tenaciously held by the bravest of the race, grimly +resolved that this chain must not break. The Revolution +precipitated against this chain wave after wave of formidable +Indian foes from the Northwest under British leadership. At the +very time when Grifth Rutherford set out for the relief of +McDowell's Fort, a marauding Indian band captured by stealth near +the Transylvania Fort, known as Boone's Fort (Boonesborough), +Elizabeth and Frances Callaway, and Jemima Boone, the daughters +of Richard Callaway and Daniel Boone, and rapidly marched them +away toward the Shawanoe towns on the Ohio. A relief party, in +two divisions, headed respectively by the young girls' fathers, +and composed among others of the lovers of the three girls, +Samuel Henderson, John Holder, and Flanders Callaway, pursued +them with almost incredible swiftness. Guided by broken twigs and +bits of cloth surreptitiously dropped by Elizabeth Callaway, they +finally overtook the unsuspecting savages, killed two of them, +and rescued the three maidens unharmed. This romantic +episode--which gave Fenimore Cooper the theme for the most +memorable scene in one of his Leatherstocking Tales had an even +more romantic sequel in the subsequent marriage of the three +pairs of lovers. + +This bold foray, so shrewdly executed and even more sagaciously +foiled, was a true precursor of the dread happenings of the +coming neighborhood of the stations; and relief was felt when the +Transylvania Fort, the great stockade planned by Judge Henderson, +was completed by the pioneers (July, 1776). Glad tidings arrived +only a few days later when the Declaration of Independence, read +aloud from the Virginia Gazette, was greeted with wild huzzas by +the patriotic backwoodsmen. During the ensuing months occasional +invasions were made by savage bands; but it was not until April +24, 1777, that Henderson's "big fort" received its first attack, +being invested by a company of some seventy-five savages. The +twenty-two riflemen in the fort drove off the painted warriors, +but not before Michael Stoner, Daniel Boone, and several others +were severely wounded. As he lay helpless upon the ground, his +ankle shattered by a bullet, Boone was lifted by Simon Kenton and +borne away upon his shoulders to the haven of the stockade amid a +veritable shower of balls. The stoical and taciturn Boone clasped +Kenton's hand and gave him the accolade of the wilderness in the +brief but heartfelt utterance; "You are a fine fellow." On July +4th of this same year the fort was again subjected to siege, when +two hundred gaudily painted savages surrounded it for two days. +But owing to the vigilance and superb markmanship of the +defenders, as well as to the lack of cannon by the besieging +force, the Indians reluctantly abandoned the siege, after leaving +a number dead upon the field. Soon afterward the arrival of two +strong bodies of prime riflemen, who had been hastily summoned +from the frontiers of North Carolina and Virginia, once again +made firm the bulwark of white supremacy in the West. + +Kentucky's terrible year, 1778, opened with a severe disaster to +the white settlers--when Boone with thirty men, while engaged in +making salt at the "Lower Salt Spring," was captured in February +by more than a hundred Indians, sent by Governor Hamilton of +Detroit to drive the white settlers from "Kentucke." Boone +remained in captivity until early summer, when, learning that his +Indian captors were planning an attack in force upon the +Transylvania Fort, he succeeded in effecting his escape. After a +break-neck journey of one hundred and sixty miles, during which +he ate but one meal, Boone finally arrived at the big fort on +June 20th. The settlers were thus given ample time for +preparation, as the long siege did not begin until September 7th. +The fort was invested by a powerful force flying the English +flag--four hundred and forty-four savages gaudy in the vermilion +and ochre of their war-paint, and eleven Frenchmen, the whole +being commanded by the French-Canadian, Captain Dagniaux de +Quindre, and the great Indian Chief, Black-fish who had adopted +Boone as a son. In the effort to gain his end de Quindre resorted +to a dishonorable stratagem, by which he hoped to outwit the +settlers and capture the fort with but slight loss. "They formed +a scheme to deceive us," says Boone, "declaring it was their +orders, from Governor Hamilton, to take us captives, and not to +destroy us; but if nine of us would come out and treat with them, +they would immediately withdraw their forces from our walls, and +return home peacably." Transparent as the stratagem was, Boone +incautiously agreed to a conference with the enemy; Callaway +alone took the precaution to guard against Indian duplicity. +After a long talk, the Indians proposed to Boone, Callaway, and +the seven or eight pioneers who accompanied them that they shake +hands in token of peace and friendship. As picturesquely +described by Daniel Trabue: + +"The Indians sayed two Indians must shake hands with one white +man to make a Double or sure peace at this time the Indians had +hold of the white men's hands and held them. Col. Calloway +objected to this but the other Indians laid hold or tryed to lay +hold of the other hand but Colonel Calloway was the first that +jerked away from them but the Indians seized the men two Indians +holt of one man or it was mostly the case and did their best to +hold them but while the man and Indians was a scuffling the men +from the Fort agreeable to Col. Calloway's order fired on them +they had a dreadful skuffel but our men all got in the fort safe +and the fire continued on both sides." + +During the siege Callaway, the leader of the pioneers, made a +wooden cannon wrapped with wagon tires, which on being fired at a +group of Indians "made them scamper perdidiously." The secret +effort of the Indians to tunnel a way underground into the fort, +being discovered by the defenders, was frustrated by a +countermine. Unable to outwit, outfight, or outmaneuver the +resourceful Callaway, de Quindre finally withdrew on September +16th, closing the longest and severest attack that any of the +fortified stations of Kentucky had ever been called upon to +withstand. + +The successful defense of the Transylvania Fort, made by these +indomitable backwoodsmen who were lost sight of by the +Continental Congress and left to fight alone their battles in the +forests, was of national significance in its results. Had the +Transylvania Fort fallen, the northern Indians in overwhelming +numbers, directed by Hamilton and led by British officers, might +well have swept Kentucky free of defenders and fallen with +devastating force upon the exposed settlements along the western +frontiers of North Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsylvania, This +defense of Boonesborough, therefore, is deserving of +commemoration in the annals of the Revolution, along with +Lexington and Bunker's Hill. Coupled with Clark's meteoric +campaign in the Northwest and the subsequent struggles in the +defense of Kentucky, it may be regarded as an event basically +responsible for the retention of the trans-Alleghany region by +the United States. The bitter struggles, desperate sieges, and +bloody reprisals of these dark years came to a close with the +expeditions of Clark and Logan in November, 1782, which +appropriately concluded the Revolution in the West by putting a +definite end to all prospect of formidable invasion of Kentucky. + +In November, 1777, "Washington District," the delegates of which +had been received in the preceding year by the Provincial +Congress of North Carolina, was formed by the North Carolina +General Assembly into Washington County; and to it were assigned +the boundaries of the whole of the present state of Tennessee. +While this immense territory was thus being definitely included +within the bounds of North Carolina, Judge Henderson on behalf of +the Transylvania Company was making a vigorous effort to secure +the reestablishment of its rights from the Virginia Assembly. By +order of the Virginia legislature, an exhaustive investigation of +the claims of the Transylvania Company was therefore made, +hearings being held at various points in the back country. On +July 18, 1777, Judge Henderson presented to the peace +commissioners for North Carolina and Virginia at the Long Island +treaty ground an elaborate memorial in behalf of the Transylvania +Company, which the commissioners unanimously refused to consider, +as not coming under their jurisdiction. Finally, after a full and +impartial discussion before the Virginia House of Delegates, that +body declared the Transylvania purchase void. But in +consideration of "the very great expense [incurred by the +company] in making the said purchase, and in settling the said +lands, by which the commonwealth is likely to receive great +advantage, by increasing its inhabitants, and establishing a +barrier against the Indians," the House of Delegates granted +Richard Henderson and Company two hundred thousand acres of land +situated between the Ohio and Green rivers, where the town of +Henderson, Kentucky, now stands. With this bursting of the +Transylvania bubble and the vanishing of the golden dreams of +Henderson and his associates for establishing the fourteenth +American colony in the heart of the trans-Alleghany, a first +romantic chapter in the history of Westward expansion comes to a +close. + +But another and more feasible project immediately succeeded. +Undiscouraged by Virginia's confiscation of Transylvania, and +disregarding North Carolina's action in extending her boundaries +over the trans-Alleghany region lying within her chartered +limits, Henderson, in whom the genius of the colonizer and the +ambition of the speculative capitalist were found in striking +conjunction, was now inspired to repeat, along broader and more +solidly practical lines, the revolutionary experiment of +Transylvania. It was not his purpose, however, to found an +independent colony; for he believed that millions of acres in the +Transylvania purchase lay within the bounds of North Carolina, +and he wished to open for colonization, settlement, and the sale +of lands, the vast wilderness of the valley of the Cumberland +supposed to lie within those confines. But so universal was the +prevailing uncertainty in regard to boundaries that it was +necessary to prolong the North Carolina-Virginia line in order to +determine whether or not the Great French Lick, the ideal +location for settlement, lay within the chartered limits of North +Carolina. + +Judge Henderson's comprehensive plans for the promotion of an +extensive colonization of the Cumberland region soon began to +take form in vigorous action. Just as in his Transylvania project +Henderson had chosen Daniel Boone, the ablest of the North +Carolina pioneers, to spy out the land and select sites for +future location, so now he chose as leader of the new colonizing +party the ablest of the Tennessee pioneers, James Robertson. +Although he was the acknowledged leader of the Watauga settlement +and held the responsible position of Indian agent for North +Carolina, Robertson was induced by Henderson's liberal offers to +leave his comparatively peaceful home and to venture his life in +this desperate hazard of new fortunes. The advance party of eight +white men and one negro, under Robertson's leadership, set forth +from the Holston settlement on February 6, 1779, to make a +preliminary exploration and to plant corn "that bread might be +prepared for the main body of emigrants in the fall." After +erecting a few cabins for dwellings and posts of defense, +Robertson plunged alone into the wilderness and made the long +journey to Post St. Vincent in the Illinois, in order to consult +with George Rogers Clark, who had entered for himself in the +Virginia Land Office several thousand acres of land at the French +Lick. After perfecting arrangements with Clark for securing +"cabin rights" should the land prove to lie in Virginia, +Robertson returned to Watauga to take command of the migration. + +Toward the end of the year two parties set out, one by land, the +other by water, for the wonderful new country on the Cumberland +of which Boone and Scaggs and Mansker had brought back such +glowing descriptions. During the autumn Judge Henderson and other +commissioners from North Carolina, in conjunction with +commissioners from Virginia, had been running out the boundary +line between the two states. On the very day--Christmas, +1779--that Judge Henderson reached the site of the Transylvania +Fort, now called Boonesborough, the swarm of colonists from the +parent hive at Watauga, under Robertson's leadership, reached the +French Lick and on New Year's Day, 1780, crossed the river on the +ice to the present site of Nashville. + +The journal of the other party, which, as has been aptly said, +reads like a chapter from one of Captain Mayne Reid's fascinating +novels of adventure, was written by Colonel John Donelson, the +father-in-law of Andrew Jackson. Setting out from Fort Patrick +Henry on Holston River, December 22, 1779, with a flotilla +consisting of about thirty flatboats, dugouts, and canoes, they +encountered few difficulties until they began to run the gauntlet +of the Chickamauga towns on the Tennessee. Here they were +furiously attacked by the Indians, terrible in their red and +black war-paint; and a well-filled boat lagging in the rear, with +smallpox on board, was driven to shore by the Indians. The +occupants were massacred; but the Indians at once contracted the +disease and died by the hundreds. This luckless sacrifice of +"poor Stuart, his family and friends," while a ghastly price to +pay, undoubtedly procured for the Cumberland settlements +comparative immunity from Indian forays until the new-comers had +firmly established themselves in their wilderness stronghold. +Eloquent of the granite endurance and courageous spirit of the +typical American pioneer in its thankfulness for sanctuary, for +reunion of families and friends, and for the humble shelter of a +log cabin, is the last entry in Donelson's diary (April 24, +1780): + +"This day we arrived at our journey's end at the Big Salt Lick, +where we have the pleasure of finding Capt. 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 +intrusted to our care, and who, some time since, perhaps, +despaired of ever meeting again. Though our prospects at present +are dreary, we have found a few log cabins which have been built +on a cedar bluff above the Lick by Capt. Robertson and his +company." + +In the midst of the famine during this terrible period of the +"hard winter," Judge Henderson was sorely concerned for the fate +of the new colony which he had projected, and immediately +proceeded to purchase at huge cost a large stock of corn. On +March 5, 1780, this corn, which had been raised by Captain +Nathaniel Hart, was "sent from Boonesborough in perogues +[pettiaugers or flatboats] under the command of William Bailey +Smith . . . . This corn was taken down the Kentucky River, and +over the Falls of Ohio, to the mouth of the Cumberland, and +thence up that river to the fort at the French Lick. It is +believed have been the only bread which the settlers had until it +was raised there in 1781." There is genuine impressiveness in +this heroic triumphing over the obstacles of obdurate nature and +this paternalistic provision for the exposed Cumberland +settlement--the purchase by Judge Henderson, the shipment by +Captain Hart, and the transportation by Colonel Smith, in an +awful winter of bitter cold and obstructed navigation, of this +indispensable quantity of corn purchased for sixty thousand +dollars in depreciated currency. + +Upon his arrival at the French Lick, shortly after the middle of +April, Judge Henderson at once proceeded to organize a government +for the little community. On May 1st articles of association were +drawn up; and important additions thereto were made on May 13th, +when the settlers signed the complete series. The original +document, still preserved, was drafted by Judge Henderson, being +written throughout in his own handwriting; and his name heads the +list of two hundred and fifty and more signatures. The +"Cumberland Compact," as this paper is called, is fundamentally a +mutual contract between the copartners of the Transylvania +Company and the settlers upon the lands claimed by the company. +It represents the collective will of the community; and on +account of the careful provisions safeguarding the rights of each +party to the contract it may be called a bill of rights. The +organization of this pure democracy was sound and +admirable--another notable early example of the commission form +of government. The most remarkable feature of this backwoods +constitution marks Judge Henderson as a pioneer in the use of the +political device so prominent to-day, one hundred and forty years +later--the "recall of judges." In the following striking clause +this innovation in government was recognized thus early in +American history as the most effective means of securing and +safeguarding justice in a democracy: + +"As often as the people in general are dissatisfied with the +doings of the Judges or Triers so to be chosen, they may call a +new selection in any of the said stations, and elect bothers in +their stead, having due respect to the number now agreed to be +elected at each station, which persons so to be chosen shall have +the same power with those in whose room or place they shall or +may be chosen to act." + +A land-office was now opened, the entry-taker being appointed by +Judge Henderson, in accordance with. the compact; and the lands, +for costs of entry, etc., were registered for the nominal fee of +ten dollars per thousand acres. But as the Transylvania Company +was never able to secure a "satisfactory and indisputable title," +the clause resulted in perpetual nonpayment. In 1783, following +the lead of Virginia in the case of Transylvania, North Carolina +declared the Transylvania Company's purchase void, but granted +the company in compensation a tract of one hundred and ninety +thousand acres in Powell's Valley. As compensation, the grants of +North Carolina and Virginia were quite inadequate, considering +the value of the service in behalf of permanent western +colonization rendered by the Transylvania company. + +James Robertson was chosen as presiding officer of the court of +twelve commissioners, and was also elected commander-in-chief of +the military forces of the eight little associated settlements on +the Cumberland. Here for the next two years the self-reliant +settlers under Robertson's wise and able leadership successfully +repelled the Indians in their guerrilla warfare, firmly +entrenched themselves in their forest-girt stronghold, and +vindicated their claim to the territory by right of occupation +and conquest. Here sprang up in later times a great and populous +city--named, strangely enough, neither for Henderson, the +founder, nor for Robertson and Donelson, the leaders of the two +colonizing parties, but for one having no association with its +history or origins, the gallant North Carolinian, General Francis +Nash, who was killed at the Battle of Germantown. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. King's Mountain + +With the utmost satisfaction I can acquaint you with the sudden +and favorable turn of our public affairs. A few days ago +destruction hung over our heads. Cornwallis with at least 1500 +British and Tories waited at Charlotte for the reinforcement of +1000 from Broad River, which reinforcement has been entirely cut +off, 130 killed and the remainder captured. Cornwallis +immediately retreated, and is now on his way toward Charleston, +with part of our army in his rear . . . .--Elizabeth Maxwell +Steel: Salisbury, October 25, 1780. + + +So thoroughly had the Cherokees been subdued by the devastations +of the campaign of 1776 that for several years thereafter they +were unable to organize for a new campaign against the +backwoodsmen along the frontiers of North Carolina and Tennessee. +During these years the Holston settlers principally busied +themselves in making their position secure, as well as in setting +their house in order by severely punishing the lawless Tory +element among them. In 1779 the Chickamaugas, with whom The +Dragging Canoe and his irreconcilable followers among the +Cherokees had joined hands after the campaign of 1776, grew so +bold in their bloody forays upon small exposed settlements that +North Carolina and Virginia in conjunction despatched a strong +expedition against them. Embarking on April l0th at the mouth of +Big Creek near the present Rogersville, Tennessee, three hundred +and fifty men led by Colonel Evan Shelby descended the Tennessee +to the fastnesses of the Chickamaugas. Meeting with no resistance +from the astonished Indians, who fled to the shelter of the +densely wooded hills, they laid waste the Indian towns and +destroyed the immense stores of goods collected by the British +agents for distribution among the red men. The Chickamaugas were +completely quelled; and during the period of great stress through +which the Tennessee frontiersmen were soon to pass, the Cherokees +were restrained through the wise diplomacy of Joseph Martin, +Superintendent of Indian affairs for Virginia. + +The great British offensive against the Southern colonies, which +were regarded as the vulnerable point in the American +Confederacy, was fully launched upon the fall of Charleston in +May, l780. Cornwallis established his headquarters at Camden; and +one of his lieutenants, the persuasive and brilliant Ferguson, +soon rallied thousands of Loyalists in South Carolina to the +British standard. When Cornwallis inaugurated his campaign for +cutting Washington wholly off from the Southern colonies by +invading North Carolina, the men upon the western waters realized +that the time had come to rise, in defense of their state and in +protection of their homes. Two hundred Tennessee riflemen from +Sullivan County, under Colonel Isaac Shelby, were engaged in +minor operations in South Carolina conducted by Colonel Charles +McDowell; and conspicuous among these engagements was the affair +at Musgrove's Mill on August 18th when three hundred horsemen led +by Colonel James Williams, a native of Granville County, North +Carolina, Colonel Isaac Shelby, and Lieutenant-Colonel Clark of +Georgia repulsed with heavy loss a British force of between four +and five hundred. + +These minor successes availed nothing in face of the disastrous +defeat of Gates by Cornwallis at Camden on August 16th and the +humiliating blow to Sumter at Rocky Mount on the following day. +Ferguson hotly pursued the frontiersmen, who then retreated over +the mountains; and from his camp at Gilbert Town he despatched a +threatening message to the Western leaders, declaring that if +they did not desist from their opposition to the British arms and +take protection under his standard, he would march his army over +the mountains and lay their country waste with fire and sword. +Stung to action, Shelby hastily rode off to consult with Sevier +at his log castle near Jonesboro; and together they matured a +plan to arouse the mountain men and attack Ferguson by surprise. +In the event of failure, these wilderness free-lances planned to +leave the country and find a home with the Spaniards in +Louisiana. + +At the original place of rendezvous, the Sycamore Shoals of the +Watauga, the overmountain men gathered on September 25th. There +an eloquent sermon was preached to them by that fiery man of God, +the Reverend Samuel Doak, who concluded his discourse with a +stirring invocation to the sword of the Lord and of Gideon--a +sentiment greeted with the loud applause of the militant +frontiersmen. Here and at various places along the march they +were joined by detachments of border fighters summoned to join +the expedition--Colonel William Campbell, who with some +reluctance had abandoned his own plans in response to Shelby's +urgent and repeated message, in command of four hundred hardy +frontiersmen from Washington County, Virginia; Colonel Benjamin +Cleveland, with the wild fighters of Wilkes known as "Cleveland's +Bulldogs"; Colonel Andrew Hampton, with the stalwart riflemen of +Rutherford; Major Joseph Winston, the cousin of Patrick Henry, +with the flower of the citizenry of Surry; the McDowells, Charles +and Joseph, with the bold borderers of Burke; Colonels Lacy and +Hill, with well-trained soldiers of South Carolina; and +Brigadier-General James Williams, leading the intrepid Rowan +volunteers. + +Before breaking camp at Quaker Meadows, the leading officers in +conference chose Colonel William Campbell as temporary officer of +the day, until they could secure a general officer from +headquarters as commander-in-chief. The object of the +mountaineers and big-game hunters was, in their own terms, to +pursue Ferguson, to run him down, and to capture him. In +pursuance of this plan, the leaders on arriving at the ford of +Green River chose out a force of six hundred men, with the best +mounts and equipment; and at daybreak on October 6th this force +of picked mounted riflemen, followed by some fifty "foot-cavalry" +eager to join in the pursuit, pushed rapidly on to the Cowpens. +Here a second selection took place; and Colonel Campbell, was +again elected commander of the detachment, now numbering some +nine hundred and ten horsemen and eighty odd footmen, which +dashed rapidly on in pursuit of Ferguson. + +The British commander had been apprised of the coming of the +over-mountain men. Scorning to make a forced march and attempt to +effect a junction with Cornwallis at Charlotte, Ferguson chose to +make a stand and dispose once for all of the barbarian horde whom +he denounced as mongrels and the dregs of mankind. After +despatching to Cornwallis a message asking for aid, Ferguson took +up his camp on King's Mountain, just south of the North Carolina +border line, in the present York County, South Carolina. Here, +after his pickets had been captured in silence, he was surprised +by his opponents. At three o'clock in the afternoon of October +7th the mountain hunters treed their game upon the heights. + +The battle which ensued presents an extraordinary contrast in the +character of the combatants and the nature of the strategy and +tactics. Each party ran true to form--Ferguson repeating +Braddock's suicidal policy of opposing bayonet charges to the +deadly fusillade of riflemen, who in Indian fashion were +carefully posted behind trees and every shelter afforded by the +natural inequalities of the ground. In the army of the Carolina +and Virginia frontiersmen, composed of independent detachments +recruited from many sources and solicitous for their own +individual credit, each command was directed in the battle by its +own leader. Campbell--like Cleveland, Winston, Williams, Lacey, +Shelby, McDowell, Sevier, and Hambright--personally led his own +division; but the nature of the fighting and the peculiarity of +the terrain made it impossible for him, though the chosen +commander of the expedition, actually to play that role in the +battle. The plan agreed upon in advance by the frontier leaders +was simple enough--to surround and capture Ferguson's camp on the +high plateau. The more experienced Indian fighters, Sevier and +Shelby, unquestionably suggested the general scheme which in any +case would doubtless have been employed by the frontiersmen; it +was to give the British "Indian play"--namely to take cover +everywhere and to fire from natural shelter. Cleveland, a +Hercules in strength and courage who had fought the Indians and +recognized the wisdom of Indian tactics, ordered his men, as did +some of the other leaders, to give way before a bayonet charge, +but to return to the attack after the charge had spent its force. + +"My brave fellows," said Cleveland, "every man must consider +himself an officer, and act from his own judgment. Fire as quick +as you can, and stand your ground as long as you can. When you +can do no better, get behind trees, or retreat; but I beg you not +to run quite off. If we are repulsed, let us make a point of +returning and renewing the fight; perhaps we may have better luck +in the second attempt than in the first." + +The plateau upon which Ferguson was encamped was the top of an +eminence some six hundred yards long and about two hundred and +fifty yards from one base across to the other; and its shape was +that of an Indian paddle, varying from one hundred and twenty +yards at the blade to sixty yards at the handle in width. +Outcropping boulders upon the outer edge of the plateau afforded +some slight shelter for Ferguson's force; but, unsuspicious of +attack, Ferguson had made no abatis to protect his camp from the +assault to which it was so vulnerable because of the protection +of the timber surrounding it on all sides. As to the disposition +of the attacking force, the center to the northeast was occupied +by Cleveland with his "Bulldogs," Hambright with his South Fork +Boys from the Catawba (now Lincoln County, North Carolina), and +Winston with his Surry riflemen; to the south were the divisions +of Joseph McDowell, Sevier, and Campbell; while Lacey's South +Carolinians, the Rowan levies under Williams, and the Watauga +borderers under Shelby were stationed upon the north side. +Ferguson's forces consisted of Provincial Rangers, one hundred +and fifty strong, and other well-drilled Loyalists, between eight +and nine hundred in number; but his strength was seriously +weakened by the absence of a foraging party of between one and +two hundred who had gone off on the morning the battle occurred. +Shelby's men, before getting into position, received a hot fire, +the opening shots of the engagement. This inspired Campbell, who +now threw off his coat, to shout encouraging orders to his men +posted on the side of the mountain opposite to Shelby's force. +When Campbell's Virginians uttered a series of piercing shouts, +the British officer, De Peyster, second in command, remarked to +his chief: "These things are ominous--these are the damned +yelling boys." + +The battle, which lasted some minutes short of an hour, was waged +with terrific ferocity. The Loyalist militia, whenever possible, +fired from the shelter of the rocks; while the Provincial Corps, +with fixed bayonets, steadily charged the frontiersmen, who fired +at close range and then rapidly withdrew to the very base of the +mountain. After each bayonet charge the Provincials coolly +withdrew to the summit, under the accumulating fire of the +returning mountaineers, who quickly gathered in their rear. Owing +to their elevated location, the British, although using the +rapid-fire breech-loading rifle invented by Ferguson himself, +found their vision deflected, and continually fired high, thus +suffering from nature's handicap, refraction. The militia, using +sharpened butcher-knives which Ferguson had taught them to +utilize as bayonets, charged against the mountaineers; but their +fire, in answer to the deadly fusillade of the expert squirrel- +shooters, was belated, owing to the fact that they could not fire +while the crudely improvised bayonets remained inserted in their +pieces. The Americans, continually firing upward, found ready +marks for their aim in the clearly delineated outlines of their +adversaries, and felt the fierce exultation which animates the +hunter who has tracked to its lair and surrounded wild game at +bay. + +The leaders of the various divisions of the mountaineers bore +themselves with impetuous bravery, recklessly rushing between the +lines of fire and with native eloquence, interspersed with +profanity, rallying their individual commands again and again to +the attack. The valiant Campbell scaled the rugged heights, +loudly encouraging his men to the ascent. Cleveland, resolutely +facing the foe, urged on is Bulldogs with the inspiriting words: +"Come, boys; let's try 'em again. We'll have better luck next +time." No sooner did Shelby's men reach the bottom of the hill, +in retreating before a charge, than their commander, fiery and +strenuous, ardently shouted: "Now boys, quickly reload your +rifles, and let's advance upon them, and give them another hell +of a fire." The most deadly charge, led by De Peyster himself, +fell upon Hambright's South Fork boys; and one of their gallant +officers, Major Chronicle, waving his military hat, was mortally +wounded, the command, "Face to the hill!", dying on his lips. +These veteran soldiers, unlike the mountaineers, firmly met the +shock of the charge, and a number of their men were shot down or +transfixed; but the remainder, reserving their fire until the +charging column was only a few feet away, poured in a deadly +volley before retiring. The gallant William Lenoir, whose +reckless bravery made him a conspicuous target for the enemy, +received several wounds and emerged from the battle with his hair +and clothes torn by balls. The ranking American officer, +Brigadier General James Williams, was mortally wounded while "on +the very top of the mountain, in the thickest of the fight"; and +as he momentarily revived, his first words were: "For God's sake, +boys, don't give up the hill." Hambright, sorely wounded, his +boot overflowing with blood and his hat riddled with three bullet +holes, declined to dismount, but pressed gallantly forward, +exclaiming in his "Pennsylvania Dutch": "Huzza, my prave poys, +fight on a few minutes more, and the pattle will be over!" On the +British side, Ferguson was supremely valorous, rapidly dashing +from one point to another, rallying his men, oblivious to all +danger. Wherever the shrill note of his silver whistle sounded, +there the fighting was hottest and the British resistance the +most stubborn. His officers fought with the characteristic +steadiness of the British soldier; and again and again his men +charged headlong against the wavering and fiery circle of the +frontiersmen. + +Ferguson's boast that "he was on King's Mountain, that he was +king of the Mountain, and God Almighty could not drive him from +it" was doubtless prompted, less by a belief in the +impregnability of his position, than by a desperate desire to +inspire confidence in his men. His location was admirably chosen +for defense against attack by troops employing regulation +tactics; but, never dreaming of the possibility of sudden +investment, Ferguson had erected no fortifications for his +encampment. His frenzied efforts on the battlefield seem like a +mad rush against fate; for the place was indefensible against the +peculiar tactics of the frontiersmen. While the mountain flamed +like a volcano and resounded with the thunder of the guns, a +steady stricture was in progress. The lines were drawn tighter +and tighter around the trapped and frantically struggling army; +and at last the fall of their commander, riddled with bullets, +proved the tragic futility of further resistance. The game was +caught and bagged to a man. When Winston, with his fox-hunters of +Surry, dashed recklessly through the woods, says a chronicler of +the battle, and the last to come into position, + +Flow'd in, and settling, circled all the lists, + +then + +From all the circle of the hills death sleeted in upon the +doomed. + +The battle was decisive in its effect--shattering the plans of +Cornwallis, which till then appeared certain of success. The +victory put a full stop to the invasion of North Carolina, which +was then well under way. Cornwallis abandoned his carefully +prepared campaign and immediately left the state. After +ruthlessly hanging nine prisoners, an action which had an +effectively deterrent effect upon future Tory murders and +depredations, the patriot force quietly disbanded. The brilliant +initiative of the buckskin-clad borderers, the strenuous energy +of their pursuit, the perfection of their surprise--all +reinforced by the employment of ideal tactics for meeting the +given situation--were the controlling factors in this +overwhelming victory of the Revolution. The pioneers of the Old +Southwest--the independent and aggressive yeomanry of North +Carolina, Virginia, and South Carolina--had risen in their might. +Without the aid or authority of blundering state governments, +they had created an army of frontiersmen, Indian-fighters, and +big-game hunters which had found no parallel or equal on the +continent since the Battle of the Great Kanawha. + + + +CHAPTER XIX. The State of Franklin + +Designs of a more dangerous nature and deeper die seem to glare +in the western revolt .... I have thought proper to issue this +manifesto, hereby warning all persons concerned in the said +revolt . . . that the honour of this State has been particularly +wounded, by seizing that by violence which, in time, no doubt, +would have been obtained by consent, when the terms of separation +would have been explained or stipulated, to the mutual +sat'isfaction of the mother and new State . . . . Let your +proposals be consistent with the honour of the State to accede +to, which by your allegiance as good citizens, you cannot violate +and I make no doubt but her generosity, in time, will meet your +wishes.--Governor Alexander Martin: Manifesto against the State +of Franklin, April 25, 1785. + + +To the shrewd diplomacy of Joseph Martin, who held the Cherokees +in check during the period of the King's Mountain campaign, the +settlers in the valleys of the Watauga and the Holston owed their +temporary immunity from Indian attack. But no sooner did Sevier +and his over-mountain men return from the battle-field of King's +Mountain than they were called upon to join in an expedition +against the Cherokees, who had again gone on the war-path at the +instigation of the British. After Sevier with his command had +defeated a small party of Indians at Boyd's Creek in December, +the entire force of seven hundred riflemen, under the command of +Colonel Arthur Campbell, with Major Joseph Martin as subordinate, +penetrated to the heart of the Indian country, burned Echota, +Chilhowee, Settiquo, Hiawassee, and seven other principal +villages, and destroyed an immense amount of property and +supplies. In March, suspecting that the arch-conspirators against +the white settlers were the Cherokees at the head waters of the +Little Tennessee, Sevier led one hundred and fifty horsemen +through the devious mountain defiles and struck the Indians a +swift and unexpected blow at Tuckasegee, near the present +Webster, North Carolina. In this extraordinarily daring raid, one +of his most brilliant feats of arms, Sevier lost only one man +killed and one wounded; while upon the enemy he inflicted the +loss of thirty killed, took many more prisoners, burned six +Indian towns, and captured many horses and supplies. Once his +deadly work was done, Sevier with his bold cavaliers silently +plunged again into the forest whence he had so suddenly emerged, +and returned in triumph to the settlements. + +Disheartened though the Indians were to see the smoke of their +burning towns, they sullenly remained averse to peace; and they +did not keep the treaty made at Long Island in July, 1781. The +Indians suffered from very real grievances at the hands of the +lawless white settlers who persisted in encroaching upon the +Indian lands. When the Indian ravages were resumed, Sevier and +Anderson, the latter from Sullivan County, led a punitive +expedition of two hundred riflemen against the Creeks and the +Chickamaugas; and employing the customary tactics of laying waste +the Indian towns, administered stern and salutary chastisement to +the copper-colored marauders. + +During this same period the settlers on the Cumberland were +displaying a grim fortitude and stoical endurance in the face of +Indian attack forever memorable in the history of the Old +Southwest. On the night of January 15, 1781, the settlers at +Freeland's Station, after a desperate resistance, succeeded in +beating off the savages who attacked in force. At Nashborough on +April 2d, twenty of the settlers were lured from the stockade by +the artful wiles of the savages; and it was only after serious +loss that they finally won their way back to the protection of +the fort. Indeed, their return was due to the fierce dogs of the +settlers, which were released at the most critical moment, and +attacked the astounded Indians with such ferocity that the +diversion thus created enabled the settlers to escape from the +deadly trap. During the next two years the history of the +Cumberland settlements is but the gruesome recital of murder +after murder of the whites, a few at a time, by the lurking +Indian foe. Robertson's dominant influence alone prevented the +abandonment of the sorely harassed little stations. The arrival +of the North Carolina commissioners for the purpose of laying off +bounty lands and settlers' preemptions, and the treaty of peace +concluded at the French Lick on November 5 and 6, 1783, gave +permanence and stability to the Cumberland settlements. The +lasting friendship of the Chickasaws was won; but the Creeks for +some time continued to harass the Tennessee pioneers. The +frontiersmen's most formidable foe, the Cherokees, stoically, +heroically fighting the whites in the field, and smallpox, +syphilis, and drunkenness at home, at last abandoned the unequal +battle. The treaty at Hopewell on November 28, 1785, marks the +end of an era--the Spartan yet hopeless resistance of the +intrepid red men to the relentless and frequently unwarranted +expropriation by the whites of the ancient and immemorial domain +of the savage. + +The skill in self-government of the isolated people beyond the +mountains, and the ability they had already demonstrated in the +organization of "associations," received a strong stimulus on +June 2, 1784, when the legislature of North Carolina ceded to the +Congress of the United States the title which that state +possessed to the land west of the Alleghanies. Among the terms of +the Cession Act were these conditions: that the ceded territory +should be formed into a separate state or states; and that if +Congress should not accept the lands thus ceded and give due +notice within two years, the act should be of no force and the +lands should revert to North Carolina. No sooner did this news +reach the Western settlers than they began to mature plans for +the organization of a government during the intervening twelve +months. Their exposed condition on the frontiers, still harassed +by the Indians, and North Carolina's delay in sending goods +promised the Indians by a former treaty, both promoted Indian +hostility; and these facts, combined with their remote location +beyond the mountains, rendering them almost inaccessible to +communication with North Carolina--all rendered the decision of +the settlers almost inevitable. Moreover, the allurements of high +office and the dazzling dreams of ambition were additional +motives sufficiently human in themselves to give driving power to +the movement toward independence. + +At a convention assembled at Jonesborough on August 23, 1784, +delegates from the counties of Washington, Sullivan, and Greene +characteristically decided to organize an "Association." They +solemnly declared by resolution: "We have a just and undeniable +right to petition to Congress to accept the session made by North +Carolina, and for that body to countenance us for forming +ourselves into a separate government, and to frame either a +permanent or temporary constitution, agreeably to a resolve of +Congress . . . ." Meanwhile, Governor Martin, largely as the +result of the prudent advice of North Carolina's representative +in Congress, Dr. Hugh Williamson, was brought to the conclusion +that North Carolina, in the passage of the cession act, had acted +precipitately. This important step had been taken without the +full consideration of the people of the state. Among the various +arguments advanced by Williamson was the impressive contention +that, in accordance with the procedure in the case of other +states, the whole expense of the huge Indian expeditions in 1776 +and the heavy militia aids to South Carolina and Georgia should +be credited to North Carolina as partial fulfilment of her +continental obligations before the cession should be irrevocably +made to the Federal government. Williamson's arguments proved +convincing; and it was thus primarily for economic reasons of far +reaching national importance that the assembly of North Carolina +(October 22 to November 25, 1784) repealed the cession act made +the preceding spring. + +Before the news of the repeal of the cession act could reach the +western waters, a second convention met at Jonesborough on +December 17th. Sentiment at this time was much divided, for a +number of the people, expecting the repeal of the cession act, +genuinely desired a continued allegiance to North Carolina. Of +these may well have been John Sevier, who afterward declared to +Joseph Martin that he had been "Draged into the Franklin measures +by a large number of the people of this country." The principal +act of this convention was the adoption of a temporary +constitution for six months and the provision for a convention to +be held within one year, at the expiration of which time this +constitution should be altered, or adopted as the permanent +constitution of the new state. The scholars on the western +waters, desiring to commemorate their aspirations for freedom, +chose as the name of the projected new state: "Frankland"--the +Land of the Free. The name finally chosen, however, perhaps for +reasons of policy, was "Franklin," in honor of Benjamin Franklin. +Meanwhile, in order to meet the pressing needs for a stable +government along the Tennessee frontier, the North Carolina +assembly, which repealed the cession act, created out of the four +western counties the District of Washington, with John Haywood as +presiding judge and David Campbell as associate, and conferred +upon John Sevier the rank of brigadier general of the new +district. The first week in December Governor Martin sent to +Sevier his military commission; and replying to Joseph Martin's +query (December 31, 1784, prompted by Governor Martin) as to +whether, in view of the repeal of the cession act, he intended to +persist in revolt or await developments, Sevier gave it out +broadcast that "we shall pursue no further measures as to a new +State." + +Owing to the remoteness of the Tennessee settlements and the +difficulty of appreciating through correspondence the atmosphere +of sentiment in Franklin, Governor Martin realized the necessity +of sending a personal representative to discover the true state +of affairs in the disaffected region beyond the mountains. For +the post of ambassador to the new government, Governor Martin +selected a man distinguished for mentality and diplomatic skill, +a pioneer of Tennessee and Kentucky, Judge Richard Henderson's +brother, Colonel Samuel Henderson. Despite Sevier's disavowal of +any further intention to establish a new state, the governor gave +Colonel Henderson elaborate written instructions, the purport of +which was to learn all that he could about the political +complexion of the Tennessee frontiersmen, the sense of the +people, and the agitation for a separate commonwealth. Moreover, +in the hope of placating the leading chieftains of the Cherokees, +who had bitterly protested against the continued aggressions and +encroachments upon their lands by the lawless borderers, he +instructed Colonel Henderson also to learn the temper and +dispositions of the Indians, and to investigate the case of +Colonel James Hubbardt who was charged with the murder of Untoola +of Settiquo, a chief of the Cherokees. + +When Colonel Henderson arrived at Jonesborough, he found the +third Franklin legislature in session, and to this body he +presented Governor Martin's letter of February 27, 1785. In +response to the governor's request for an "account of the late +proceedings of the people in the western country," an extended +reply was drafted by the new legislature; and this letter, +conveyed to Governor Martin by Colonel Henderson, in setting +forth in detail the reasons for the secession, made the following +significant statement: "We humbly thank North Carolina for every +sentiment of regard she has for us, but are sorry to observe, +that as it is founded upon principles of interest, as is aparent +from the tenor of your letter, we are doubtful, when the cause +ceases which is the basis of that affection, we shall lose your +esteem." At the same time (March 22nd), Sevier, who had just been +chosen Governor of the State of Franklin, transmitted to Governor +Martin by Colonel Henderson a long letter, not hitherto published +in any history of the period, in which he outspokenly says: + +"It gives me great pain to think there should arise any Disputes +between us and North Carolina, & I flatter myself when North +Carolina states the matter in a fair light she will be fully +convinced that necessity and self preservation have Compelled Us +to the measures we Have taken, and could the people have +discovered that No. Carolina would Have protected and Govern'd +them, They would have remained where they were; but they +perceived a neglect and Coolness, and the Language of Many of +your most leading members Convinced them they were Altogether +Disregarded." + +Following the issuance of vigorous manifestos by Martin (April +25th) and Sevier (May 15th), the burden of the problem fell upon +Richard Caswell, who in June succeeded Martin as Governor of +North Carolina. + +Meantime the legislature of the over-mountain men had given the +name of Franklin to the new state, although for some time it +continued to be called by many Frankland, and its adherents +Franks. The legislature had also established an academy named +after Governor Martin, and had appointed (March 12th) William +Cocke as a delegate to the Continental Congress, urging its +acceptance of the cession. In the Memorial from the Franklin +legislature to the Continental Congress, dealing in some detail +with North Carolina's failure to send the Cherokees some goods +promised them for lands acquired by treaty, it is alleged: + +"She [North Carolina] immediately stoped the goods she had +promised to give the Indians for the said land which so +exasperated them that they begun to commit hostalities on our +frontiers in this situation we were induced to a declaration of +Independence not doubting we should be excused by Congress . . . +as North Carolina seemed quite regardless of our interest and the +Indians daily murdering our friends and relations without +distinction of age or sex." + +Sympathizing with the precarious situation of the settlers, as +well as desiring the cession, Congress urged North Carolina to +amend the repealing act and execute a conveyance of the western +territory to the Union. + +Among the noteworthy features of the Franklin movement was the +constitution prepared by a committee, headed by the Reverend +Samuel Houston of Washington County, and presented at the meeting +of the Franklin legislature, Greeneville, November 14, 1785. This +eccentric constitution was based in considerable part upon the +North Carolina model; but it was "rejected in the lump" and the +constitution of North Carolina, almost unchanged, was adopted. +Under this Houston constitution, the name "Frankland" was chosen +for the new state. The legislature was to consist of but a single +house. In a section excluding from the legislature "ministers of +the gospel, attorneys at law, and doctors of physics," those were +declared ineligible for office who were of immoral character or +guilty of "such flagrant enormities as drunkenness, gaming, +profane swearing, lewdness, Sabbath-breaking and such like," or +who should deny the existence of God, of heaven, and of hell, the +inspiration of the Scriptures, or the existence of the Trinity. +Full religious liberty and the rights of conscience were +assured--but strict orthodoxy was a condition for eligibility to +office. No one should be chosen to office who was "not a scholar +to do the business." This remarkable document, which provided for +many other curious innovations in government, was the work of +pioneer doctrinaires--Houston, Campbell, Cocke, and Tipton--and +deserves study as a bizarre reflection of the spirit and genius +of the western frontiersmen. + +The liberal policy of Martin, followed by the no less +conciliatory attitude of his successor, Caswell, for the time +proved wholly abortive. However, Martin's appointment of Evan +Shelby in Sevier's place as brigadier, and of Jonathan Tipton as +colonel of his county, produced disaffection among the Franks; +and the influence of Joseph Martin against the new government was +a powerful obstacle to its success. At first the two sets of +military, civil, and judicial officers were able to work amicably +together; and a working-basis drawn up by Shelby and Sevier, +although afterward repudiated by the Franklin legislature, +smoothed over some of the rapidly accumulating difficulties. The +persistent and quiet assertion of authority by North Carolina, +without any overt act of violence against the officers of +Franklin state, revealed great diplomatic skill in Governors +Martin and Caswell. It was doubtless the considerate policy of +the latter, coupled with the defection from Sevier's cause of men +of the stamp of Houston and Tipton, after the blundering and +cavalier rejection of their singular constitution, which +undermined the foundations of Franklin. Sevier himself later +wrote with considerable bitterness: "I have been faithfull, and +my own breast acquits myself that I have acted no part but what +has been Consistent with honor and justice, tempered with +Clemency and mercy. How far our pretended patriots have supported +me as their pretended chiefe magistrate, I leave the world at +large to Judge." Arthur Campbell's plans for the formation of a +greater Franklin, through the union of the people on the western +waters of Virginia with those of North Carolina, came to nought +when Virginia in the autumn of 1785 with stern decisiveness +passed an act making it high treason to erect an independent +government within her limits unless authorized by the assembly. +Sevier, however, became more fixed in his determination to +establish a free state, writing to Governor Caswell: "We shall +continue to act independent and would rather suffer death, in all +its various and frightful shapes, than conform to anything that +is disgraceful." North Carolina, now proceeding with vigor +(November, 1786), fully reassumed its sovereignty and +jurisdiction over the mountain counties, but passed an act of +pardon and oblivion, and in many ways adopted moderate and +conciliatory measures. + +Driven to extremities, Cocke and Sevier in turn appealed for aid +and advice to Benjamin Franklin, in whose honor the new state had +been named. In response to Cocke, Franklin wrote (August 12, +1786): "I think you are perfectly right in resolving to submit +them [the Points in Dispute] to the Decision of Congress and to +abide by their Determination." Franklin's views change in the +interim; for when, almost a year later, Sevier asks him for +counsel, Franklin has come to the conclusion that the wisest move +for Sevier was not to appeal to Congress, but to endeavor to +effect some satisfactory compromise with North Carolina (June 30, +1787): + +"There are only two Things that Humanity induces me to wish you +may succeed in: The Accomodating your Misunderstanding with the +Government of North Carolina, by amicable Means; and the Avoiding +an Indian war, by preventing Encroaching on their Lands . . . . +The Inconvenience to your People attending so remote a Seat of +Government, and the difficulty to that Government in ruling well +so remote a People, would I think be powerful Inducements with +it, to accede to any fair & reasonable Proposition it may receive +from you towards an Accommodation." + +Despite Sevier's frenzied efforts to achieve independence--his +treaty with the Indians, his sensational plan to incorporate the +Cherokees into the new state, his constancy to an ideal of revolt +against others in face of the reality of revolt against himself, +his struggle, equivocal and half-hearted, with the North Carolina +authorities under Tipton--despite all these heroic efforts, the +star of Franklin swiftly declined. The vigorous measures pursued +by General Joseph Martin, and his effective influence focussed +upon a movement already honey-combed with disaffection, finally +turned the scale. To the Franklin leaders he sent the urgent +message: "Nothing will do but a submission to the laws of North +Carolina." Early in April, 1788, Martin wrote to Governor +Randolph of Virginia: "I returned last evening from Green Co. +Washington destrict, North Carolina, after a tower through that +Co'ntry, and am happy to inform your Excellency that the late +unhappy dispute between the State of North Carolina, and the +pretended State of Franklin is subsided." Ever brave, constant, +and loyal to the interest of the pioneers, Sevier had originally +been drawn into the movement against his best judgment. Caught in +the unique trap, created by the passage of the cession act and +the sudden volte-face of its repeal, he struggled desperately to +extricate himself. Alone of all the leaders, the governor of +ill-starred Franklin remained recalcitrant. + + + +CHAPTER XX. The Lure of Spain--The Haven of Statehood + +The people of this region have come to realize truly upon what +part of the world and upon which nation their future happiness +and security depend, and they immediately infer that their +interest and prosperity depend entirely upon the protection and +liberality of your government.--John Sevier to Don Diego de +Gardoqui, September 12, 1788. + +From the early settlements in the eastern parts of this Continent +to the late & more recent settlements on the Kentucky in the Rest +the same difficulties have constantly occurred which now oppress +you, but by a series of patient sufferings, manly and spirited +exertions and unconquerable perseverance, they have been +altogether or in great measure subdued.--Governor Samuel Johnston +to James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe, January 29, 1788. + + +A strange sham-battle, staged like some scene from opera bouffe, +in the bleak snow-storm of February, 1788, is really the prelude +to a remarkable drama of revolt in which Sevier, Robertson, +Bledsoe, and the Cumberland stalwarts play the leading roles. On +February 27th, incensed beyond measure by the action of Colonel +John Tipton in harboring some of his slaves seized by the sheriff +under an execution issued by one of the North Carolina courts, +Sevier with one hundred and fifty adherents besieged Tipton with +a few of his friends in his home on Sinking Creek. The siege was +raised at daybreak on February 29th by the arrival of +reinforcements under Colonel Maxwell from Sullivan County; and +Sevier, who was unwilling to precipitate a conflict, withdrew his +forces after some desultory firing, in which two men were killed +and several wounded. Soon afterward Sevier sent word to Tipton +that on condition his life be spared he would submit to North +Carolina. On this note of tragi-comedy the State of Franklin +appeared quietly to expire. The usually sanguine Sevier, now +thoroughly chastened, sought shelter in the distant settlements-- +deeply despondent over the humiliating failure of his plans and +the even more depressing defection of his erstwhile friends and +supporters The revolutionary designs and separatist tendencies +which he still harbored were soon to involve him in a secret +conspiracy to give over the State of Franklin into the protection +of a foreign power. + +The fame of Sevier's martial exploits and of his bold stroke for +independence had long since gone abroad, astounding even so +famous an advocate of liberty as Patrick Henry and winning the +sympathy of the Continental Congress. One of the most interested +observers of the progress of affairs in the State of Franklin was +Don Diego de Gardoqui, who had come to America in the spring of +1785, bearing a commission to the American Congress as Spanish +charge d'affaires (Encargados de Negocios) to the United States. +In the course of his negotiations with Jay concerning the right +of navigation of the Mississippi River, which Spain denied to the +Americans, Gardoqui was not long in discovering the violent +resentment of the Western frontiersmen, provoked by Jay's crass +blunder in proposing that the American republic, in return for +reciprocal foreign advantages offered by Spain, should waive for +twenty-five years her right to navigate the Mississippi. The +Cumberland traders had already felt the heavy hand of Spain in +the confiscation of their goods at Natchez; but thus far the +leaders of the Tennessee frontiersmen had prudently restrained +the more turbulent agitators against the Spanish policy, fearing +lest the spirit of retaliation, once aroused, might know no +bounds. Throughout the entire region of the trans-Alleghany, a +feeling of discontent and unrest prevailed--quite as much the +result of dissatisfaction with the central government which +permitted the wholesale restraint of trade, as of resentment +against the domination of Spain. + +No sooner had the shrewd and watchful Gardoqui, who was eager to +utilize the separatist sentiment of the western settlements in +the interest of his country, learned of Sevier's armed +insurrection against the authority of North Carolina than he +despatched an emissary to sound the leading men of Franklin and +the Cumberland settlements in regard to an alliance. This secret +emissary was Dr. James White, who had been appointed by the +United States Government as Superintendent of Indian Affairs for +the Southern Department on November 29, 1786. Reporting as +instructed to Don Estevan Miro, governor of Louisiana, White, the +corrupt tool of Spain, stated concerning his confidential mission +that the leaders of "Frankland" and "Cumberland district" had +"eagerly accepted the conditions" laid down by Gardoqui: to take +the oath of allegiance to Spain, and to renounce all submission +or allegiance whatever to any other sovereign or power. Satisfied +by the secret advices received, the Spanish minister reported to +the home authorities his confident belief that the Tennessee +backwoodsmen, if diplomatically handled, would readily throw in +their lot with Spain. + +After the fiasco of his siege of Tipton's home, Sevier had seized +upon the renewal of hostilities by the Cherokees as a means of +regaining his popularity. This he counted upon doing by rallying +his old comrades-in-arms under his standard and making one of his +meteoric, whirlwind onslaughts upon their ancient Indian foe. The +victory of this erstwhile popular hero, the beloved "Nolichucky +Jack of the Border," over the Indians at a town on the Hiwassee +"so raised him in the esteem of the people on the frontier," +reports Colonel Maxwell, "that the people began [once more] to +flock to his standard." Inspirited by this good turn in his +fortunes, Sevier readily responded to Dr. White's overtures. + +Alarmed early in the year over the unprovoked depredations and +murders by the Indians in several Tennessee counties and on the +Kentucky road, Sevier, Robertson, and Anthony Bledsoe had +persuaded Governor Samuel Johnston of North Carolina to address +Gardoqui and request him to exert his influence to prevent +further acts of savage barbarity. In letters to Governor +Johnston, to Robertson, and to Sevier, all of date April 18th, +Gardoqui expressed himself in general as being "extremely +surprised to know that there is a suspicion that the good +government of Spain is encouraging these acts of barbarity." The +letters to Robertson and Sevier, read between the lines as +suggestive reinforcements of Spain's secret proposals, possess +real significance. The letter to Sevier contains this dexterously +expressed sentiment: "His Majesty is very favorably inclined to +give the inhabitants of that region all the protection that they +ask for and, on my part, I shall take very great pleasure in +contributing to it on this occasion and other occasions." + +This letter, coupled with the confidential proposals of Dr. +White, furnished a convenient opening for correspondence with the +Spaniards; and in July Sevier wrote to Gardoqui indicating his +readiness to accede to their proposals. After secret conferences +with men who had supported him throughout the vicissitudes of his +ill-starred state, Sevier carefully matured his plans. The +remarkable letter of great length which he wrote to Gardoqui on +September 12, 1788, reveals the conspiracy in all its details and +presents in vivid colors the strong separatist sentiment of the +day. Sevier urgently petitions Gardoqui for the loan of a few +thousand pounds, to enable him to "make the most expedient and +necessary preparations for defense"; and offers to repay the loan +within a short time "by sending the products of this region to +the lower ports." Upon the vital matter of "delivering" the State +of Franklin to Spain, he forthrightly says: + +"Since my last of the 18th of July, upon consulting with the +principal men of this country, I have been particularly happy to +find that they are equally disposed and ready as I am to accept +your propositions and guarantees. You may be sure that the +pleasing hopes and ideas which the people of this country hold +with regard to the probability of an alliance with, and +commercial concessions from, you are very ardent, and that we are +unanimously determined on that score. The people of this region +have come to realize truly upon what part of the world and upon +which nation their future happiness and security depend, and they +immediately infer that their interest and prosperity depend +entirely upon the protection and liberality of your government. . +. . Being the first from this side of the Appalachian Mountains +to resort in this way to your protection and liberality, we feel +encouraged to entertain the greatest hope that we shall be +granted all reasonable aid by him who is so amply able to do it, +and to give the protection and help that is asked of him in this +petition. You know our delicate situation and the difficulties in +which we are in respect to our mother State which is making use +of every strategem to impede the development and prosperity of +this country . . . . Before I conclude, it may be necessary to +remind you that there will be no more favorable occasion than the +present one to put this plan into execution. North Carolina has +rejected the Constitution and moreover it seems to me that a +considerable time will elapse before she becomes a member of the +Union, if that event ever happens." + +Through Miro, Gardoqui was simultaneously conducting a similar +correspondence with General James Wilkinson. The object of the +Spanish conspiracy, matured as the result of this correspondence, +was to seduce Kentucky from her allegiance to the United States. +Despite the superficial similarity between the situation of +Franklin and Kentucky, it would be doing Sevier and his adherents +a capital injustice to place them in the category of the corrupt +Wilkinson and the malodorous Sebastian. Moreover, the +secessionists of Franklin, as indicated in the above letter, had +the excuse of being left virtually without a country. On the +preceding August 1st, North Carolina had rejected the +Constitution of the United States; and the leaders of Franklin, +who were sorely aggrieved by what they regarded as her +indifference and neglect, now felt themselves more than ever out +of the Union and wholly repudiated by the mother state. Again, +Sevier had the embittered feeling resultant from outlawry. +Because of his course in opposing the laws and government of +North Carolina and in the killing of several good citizens, +including the sheriff of Washington County, by his forces at +Sinking Creek, Sevier, through the action of Governor Johnston of +North Carolina, had been attainted of high treason. Under the +heavy burden of this grave charge, he felt his hold upon Franklin +relax. Further, an atrocity committed in the recent campaign +under Sevier's leadership--Kirk's brutal murder of Corn Tassel, a +noble old Indian, and other chieftains, while under the +protection of a flag of truce--had placed a bar sinister across +the fair fame of this stalwart of the border. Utter desperation +thus prompted Sevier's acceptance of Gardoqui's offer of the +protection of Spain. + +John Sevier's son, James, bore the letter of September 12th to +Gardoqui. By a strangely ironic coincidence, on the very day +(October 10, 1788) that Gardoqui wrote to Miro, recommending to +the attention of Spain Dr. White and James Sevier, the emissaries +of Franklin, with their plans and proposals, John Sevier was +arrested by Colonel Tipton at the Widow Brown's in Washington +County, on the charge of high treason. He was handcuffed and +borne off, first to Jonesborough and later to Morganton. But his +old friends and former comrades-in-arms, Charles and Joseph +McDowell, gave bond for his appearance at court; and Morrison, +the sheriff, who also had fought at King's Mountain, knocked the +irons from his wrists and released him on parole. Soon afterward +a number of Sevier's devoted friends, indignant over his arrest, +rode across the mountains to Morganton and silently bore him +away, never to be arrested again. In November an act of pardon +and oblivion with respect to Franklin was passed by the North +Carolina Assembly. Although Sevier was forbidden to hold office +under the state, the passage of this act automatically operated +to clear him of the alleged offense of high treason. With affairs +in Franklin taking this turn, it is little wonder that Gardoqui +and Miro paid no further heed to Sevier's proposal to accept the +protection of Spain. Sevier's continued agitation in behalf of +the independence of Franklin inspired Governor Johnston with the +fear that he would have to be "proceeded against to the last +extremity." But Sevier's opposition finally subsiding, he was +pardoned, given a seat in the North Carolina assembly, and with +extraordinary consideration honored with his former rank of +brigadier-general. + +When Dr. White reported to Miro that the leaders of "Frankland" +had eagerly accepted Gardoqui's conditions for an alliance with +Spain, he categorically added: "With regard to Cumberland +district, what I have said of Frankland applies to it with equal +force and truth." James Robertson and Anthony Bledsoe had but +recently availed themselves of the good offices of Governor +Johnston of North Carolina in the effort to influence Gardoqui to +quiet the Creek Indians. The sagacious and unscrupulous half +breed Alexander McGillivray had placed the Creeks under the +protection of Spain in 1784; and shortly afterward they began to +be regularly supplied with ammunition by the Spanish authorities. +At first Spain pursued the policy of secretly encouraging these +Indians to resist the encroachments of the Americans, while she +remained on outwardly friendly terms with the United States. +During the period of the Spanish conspiracy, however, there is +reason to believe that Miro endeavored to keep the Indians at +peace with the borderers, as a friendly service, intended to pave +the way for the establishment of intimate relations between Spain +and the dwellers in the trans-Alleghany. Yet his efforts cannot +have been very effective; for the Cumberland settlements +continued to suffer from the ravages and depredations of the +Creeks, who remained "totally averse to peace, notwithstanding +they have had no cause of offence"; and Robertson and Bledsoe +reported to Governor Caswell (June 12, 1787): "It is certain, the +Chickasaws inform us, that Spanish traders offer a reward for +scalps of the Americans." The Indian atrocities became so +frequent that Robertson later in the summer headed a party on the +famous Coldwater Expedition, in which he severely chastised the +marauding Indians. Aroused by the loss of a number of chiefs and +warriors at the hands of Robertson's men, and instigated, as was +generally believed, by the Spaniards, the Creeks then prosecuted +their attacks with renewed violence against the Cumberland +settlements. + +Unprotected either by the mother state or by the national +government, unable to secure free passage to the Gulf for their +products, and sorely pressed to defend their homes, now seriously +endangered by the incessant attacks of the Creeks, the Cumberland +leaders decided to make secret overtures to McGillivray, as well +as to communicate to Miro, through Dr. White, their favorable +inclination toward the proposals of the one country which +promised them protection. In a letter which McGillivray wrote to +Miro (transmitted to Madrid, June 15, 1788) in regard to the +visit of Messrs. Hackett and Ewing, two trusty messengers sent by +Robertson and Bledsoe, he reports that the two delegates from the +district of Cumberland had not only submitted to him proposals of +peace but "had added that they would throw themselves into the +arms of His Majesty as subjects, and that Kentucky and Cumberland +are determined to free themselves from their dependence on +Congress, because that body can not protect either their +property, or favor their commerce, and they therefore believe +that they no longer owe obedience to a power which is incapable +of protecting them." Commenting upon McGillivray's communication, +Miro said in his report to Madrid (June 15, 1788): "I consider as +extremely interesting the intelligence conveyed to McGillivray by +the deputies on the fermentation existing in Kentucky, with +regard to a separation from the Union. Concerning the proposition +made to McGillivray by the inhabitants of Cumberland to become +the vassals of His Majesty, I have refrained from returning any +precise answer." + +In his long letter of reply to Robertson and Bledsoe, McGillivray +agreed to make peace between his nation, the Creeks, and the +Cumberland settlers. This letter was most favorably received and +given wide circulation throughout the West. In a most +ingratiating reply, offering McGillivray a fine gun and a lot in +Nashville, Robertson throws out the following broad suggestion, +which he obviously wishes McGillivray to convey to Miro: "In all +probability we cannot long remain in our present state, and if +the British or any commercial nation who may be in possession of +the mouth of the Mississippi would furnish us with trade, and +receive our produce there cannot be a doubt but the people on the +west side of the Appalachian mountains will open their eyes to +their real interest." Robertson actually had the district erected +out of the counties of Davidson, Sumner, and Tennessee given the +name of "Miro" by the Assembly of North Carolina in November, +1788--a significant symbol of the desires of the Cumberland +leaders. In a letter (April 23, 1789), Miro, who had just +received letters from Robertson (January 29th) and Daniel Smith +(March 4th) postmarked "District of Miro," observes: "The bearer, +Fagot, a confidential agent of Gen. Smith, informed me that the +inhabitants of Cumberland, or Miro, would ask North Carolina for +an act of separation the following fall, and that as soon as this +should be obtained other delegates would be sent from Cumberland +to New Orleans, with the object of placing that territory under +the domination of His Majesty. I replied to both in general +terms." + +Robertson, Bledsoe, and Smith were successful in keeping secret +their correspondence with McGillivray and Miro; and few were in +the secret of Sevier's effort to deliver the State of Franklin to +Spain. Joseph Martin was less successful in his negotiations; and +a great sensation was created throughout the Southern colonies +when a private letter from Joseph Martin to McGillivray (November +8, 1788) was intercepted. In this letter Martin said: "I must beg +that you write me by the first opportunity in answer to what I am +now going to say to you . . . . I hope to do honor to any part of +the world I settle in, and am determined to leave the United +States, for reasons that I can assign to you when we meet, but +durst not trust it to paper." The general assembly of Georgia +referred the question of the intercepted letter to the governor +of North Carolina (January 24, 1789); and the result was a +legislative investigation into Martin's conduct. Eleven months +later, the North Carolina assembly exonerated him. From the +correspondence of Joseph Martin and Patrick Henry, it would +appear that Martin, on Henry's advice, had acted as a spy upon +the Spaniards, in order to discover the views of McGillivray, to +protect the exposed white settlements from the Indians, and to +fathom the designs of the Spaniards against the United States. + +The sensational disclosures of Martin's intercepted letter had no +deterrent effect upon James Robertson in the attempted execution +of his plan for detaching the Cumberland settlements from North +Carolina. History has taken no account of the fact that Robertson +and the inhabitants now deliberately endeavored to secure an act +of separation from North Carolina. In the event of success, the +next move planned by the Cumberland leaders, as we have already +seen, was to send delegates to New Orleans for the purpose of +placing the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain. + +A hitherto unknown letter, from Robertson to (Miro), dated +Nashville, September 2, 1789, proves that a convention of the +people was actually held--the first overt step looking to an +alliance with Spain. In this letter Robertson says: + +"I must beg your Excellency's permission to take this early +opportunity of thanking you for the honor you did me in writing +by Mr. White. + +"I still hope that your Government, and these Settlements, are +destined to be mutually friendly and usefull, the people here are +impressed with the necessity of it. + +"We have just held a Convention; which has agreed that our +members shall insist on being Seperated from North Carolina. + +"Unprotected, we are to be obedient to the new Congress of the +United States; but we cannot but wish for a more interesting +Connection. + +"The United States afford us no protection. The district of Miro +is daily plundered and the inhabitants murdered by the Creeks, +and Cherokees, unprovoked. + +"For my own part, I conceive highly of the advantages of your +Government." + +A serious obstacle to the execution of the plans of Robertson and +the other leaders of the Cumberland settlements was the prompt +action of North Carolina. In actual conformity with the wishes of +the Western people, as set forth in the petition of Robertson and +Hayes, their representatives, made two years earlier, the +legislature of North Carolina in December passed the second act +of cession, by which the Western territory of North Carolina was +ceded to the United States. Instead of securing an act of +separation from North Carolina as the preparatory step to forming +what Robertson calls "a more interesting connection" with Spain, +Robertson and his associates now found themselves and the +transmontane region which they represented flung bodily into the +arms of the United States. Despite the unequivocal offer of the +calculating and desperate Sevier to "deliver" Franklin to Spain, +and the ingenious efforts of Robertson and his associates to +place the Cumberland region under the domination of Spain, the +Spanish court by its temporizing policy of evasion and indecision +definitely relinquished the ready opportunities thereby afforded, +of utilizing the powerful separatist tendencies of Tennessee for +the purpose of adding the empire upon the Western waters to the +Spanish domain in America. + +The year 1790 marks the end of an era the heroic age of the +pioneers of the Old Southwest. Following the acceptance of North +Carolina's deed of cession of her Western lands to the Union +(April 2, 1790) the Southwest Territory was erected on May 26th; +and William Blount, a North Carolina gentleman of eminence and +distinction, was appointed on June 8th to the post of governor of +the territory. Two years later (June 1, 1792) Kentucky was +admitted into the Union. + +It is a remarkable and inspiring circumstance, in testimony of +the martial instincts and unwavering loyalty of the transmontane +people, that the two men to whom the Western country in great +measure owed its preservation, the inciting and flaming spirits +of the King's Mountain campaign, were the unopposed first choice +of the people as leaders in the trying experiment of +Statehood--John Sevier of Tennessee and Isaac Shelby of Kentucky. +Had Franklin possessed the patient will of Kentucky, she might +well have preceded that region into the Union. It was not, +however, until June 1, 1796, that Tennessee, after a romantic and +arduous struggle, finally passed through the wide-flung portals +into the domain of national statehood. + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's etext, The Conquest of the Old Southwest: +The Romantic Story of the Early Pioneers into Virginia, The Carolinas, +Tennessee, and Kentucky 1740-1790, by Archibald Henderson + diff --git a/old/cnqsw10.zip b/old/cnqsw10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..aa6a97a --- /dev/null +++ b/old/cnqsw10.zip |