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diff --git a/3073.txt b/3073.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..af05ff7 --- /dev/null +++ b/3073.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6332 @@ + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Pioneers of the Old Southwest, by +Constance Lindsay Skinner + +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.org + +Title: Pioneers of the Old Southwest + A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground + +Author: Constance Lindsay Skinner + +Release Date: February 21, 2009 [EBook #3073] +Last Updated: July 25, 2015 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: windows-1252 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST +*** + +Produced by The James J. Kelly Library of St. Gregory's University, Alev +Akman, Doris Ringbloom, David Widger, and Robert J. Homa + +Pioneers of the Old Southwest + +By Constance Lindsay Skinner + +A Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground + +Volume 18 of the Chronicles of America Series + +Allen Johnson, Editor Assistant Editors Gerhard R. Lomer Charles W. +Jefferys + +_Textbook Edition_ + +New Haven: Yale University Press Toronto: Glasgow, Brook & Co. London: +Humphrey Milford Oxford University Press + +Copyright, 1919 by Yale University Press Printed in the U.S.A. + +vii + +Acknowledgment + +This narrative is founded largely on original sources--on the writings +and journals of pioneers and contemporary observers, such as Doddridge +and Adair, and on the public documents of the period as printed in +the Colonial Records and in the American Archives. But the author is, +nevertheless, greatly indebted to the researches of other writers, whose +works are cited in the Bibliographical Note. The author's thanks are +due, also, to Dr. Archibald Henderson, of the University of North +Carolina, for his kindness in reading the proofs of this book for +comparison with his own extended collection of unpublished manuscripts +relating to the period. + +C. L. S. + +April, 1919. + +ix + +Contents + + Chapter I. The Tread Of Pioneers 1 + Chapter II. Folkways 31 + Chapter III. The Trader 52 + Chapter IV. The Passing Of The French Peril 75 + Chapter V. Boone, The Wanderer 90 + Chapter VI. The Fight For Kentucky 104 + Chapter VII. The Dark And Bloody Ground 129 + Chapter VIII. Tennessee 157 + Chapter IX. King's Mountain 195 + Chapter X. Sevier, The Statemaker 266 + Chapter XI. Boone's Last Days 272 + Bibliographical Note 287 + +1 + +PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST + + + + +Chapter I + +The Tread Of Pioneers + +The Ulster Presbyterians, or Scotch-Irish, to whom history has ascribed +the dominant rôle among the pioneer folk of the Old Southwest, began +their migrations to America in the latter years of the seventeenth +century. It is not known with certainty precisely when or where the +first immigrants of their race arrived in this country, but soon after +1680 they were to be found in several of the colonies. It was not long, +indeed, before they were entering in numbers at the port of Philadelphia +and were making Pennsylvania the chief center of their activities in the +New World. By 1726 they had established settlements in several counties +behind Philadelphia. Ten years later they had begun their great trek +southward through 2 the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and on to the +Yadkin Valley of North Carolina. There they met others of their own +race--bold men like themselves, hungry after land--who were coming in +through Charleston and pushing their way up the rivers from the seacoast +to the Back Country, in search of homes. + +These Ulstermen did not come to the New World as novices in the shaping +of society; they had already made history. Their ostensible object +in America was to obtain land, but, like most external aims, it was +secondary to a deeper purpose. What had sent the Ulstermen to America +was a passion for a whole freedom. They were lusty men, shrewd and +courageous, zealous to the death for an ideal and withal so practical to +the moment in business that it soon came to be commonly reported of +them that they kept the Sabbath and everything else they could lay +their hands on, though it is but fair to them to add that this phrase is +current wherever Scots dwell. They had contested in Parliament and with +arms for their own form of worship and for their civil rights. They +were already frontiersmen, trained in the hardihood and craft of border +warfare through years of guerrilla fighting with the Irish Celts. They +had pitted and proved 3 their strength against a wilderness; they had +reclaimed the North of Ireland from desolation. For the time, many of +them were educated men; under the regulations of the Presbyterian Church +every child was taught to read at an early age, since no person could be +admitted to the privileges of the Church who did not both understand and +approve the Presbyterian constitution and discipline. They were brought +up on the Bible and on the writings of their famous pastors, one of +whom, as early as 1650, had given utterance to the democratic doctrine +that "men are called to the magistracy by the suffrage of the people +whom they govern, and for men to assume unto themselves power is mere +tyranny and unjust usurpation." In subscribing to this doctrine and +in resisting to the hilt all efforts of successive English kings to +interfere in the election of their pastors, the Scots of Ulster had +already declared for democracy. + +It was shortly after James VI of Scotland became James I of England +and while the English were founding Jamestown that the Scots had first +occupied Ulster; but the true origin of the Ulster Plantation lies +further back, in the reign of Henry VIII, in the days of the English +Reformation. In Henry's Irish realm the Reformation, though 4 proclaimed +by royal authority, had never been accomplished; and Henry's more famous +daughter, Elizabeth, had conceived the plan, later to be carried out by +James, of planting colonies of Protestants in Ireland to promote loyalty +in that rebellious land. Six counties, comprising half a million acres, +formed the Ulster Plantation. The great majority of the colonists +sent thither by James were Scotch Lowlanders, but among them were many +English and a smaller number of Highlanders. These three peoples from +the island of Britain brought forth, through intermarriage, the Ulster +Scots. + +The reign of Charles I had inaugurated for the Ulstermen an era of +persecution. Charles practically suppressed the Presbyterian religion +in Ireland. His son, Charles II, struck at Ireland in 1666 through its +cattle trade, by prohibiting the exportation of beef to England and +Scotland. The Navigation Acts, excluding Ireland from direct trade with +the colonies, ruined Irish commerce, while Corporation Acts and Test +Acts requiring conformity with the practices of the Church of England +bore heavily on the Ulster Presbyterians. + +It was largely by refugees from religious persecution that America in +the beginning was colonized. But religious persecution was only one of +the 5 influences which shaped the course and formed the character of the +Ulster Scots. In Ulster, whither they had originally been transplanted +by James to found a loyal province in the midst of the King's enemies, +they had done their work too well and had waxed too powerful for the +comfort of later monarchs. The first attacks upon them struck at their +religion; but the subsequent legislative acts which successively ruined +the woolen trade, barred nonconformists from public office, stifled +Irish commerce, pronounced non-Episcopal marriages irregular, and +instituted heavy taxation and high rentals for the land their fathers +had made productive--these were blows dealt chiefly for the political +and commercial ends of favored classes in England. + +These attacks, aimed through his religious conscience at the sources of +his livelihood, made the Ulster Scot perforce what he was--a zealot as +a citizen and a zealot as a merchant no less than as a Presbyterian. +Thanks to his persecutors, he made a religion of everything he undertook +and regarded his civil rights as divine rights. Thus out of persecution +emerged a type of man who was high-principled and narrow, strong and +violent, as tenacious of his own rights as he was blind often to the +rights of others, acquisitive yet self-sacrificing, 6 but most of all +fearless, confident of his own power, determined to have and to hold. + +Twenty thousand Ulstermen, it is estimated, left Ireland for America +in the first three decades of the eighteenth century. More than six +thousand of them are known to have entered Pennsylvania in 1729 alone, +and twenty years later they numbered one-quarter of that colony's +population. During the five years preceding the Revolutionary War more +than thirty thousand Ulstermen crossed the ocean and arrived in America +just in time and in just the right frame of mind to return King George's +compliment in kind, by helping to deprive him of his American estates, +a domain very much larger than the acres of Ulster. They fully justified +the fears of the good bishop who wrote Lord Dartmouth, Secretary for the +Colonies, that he trembled for the peace of the King's overseas realm, +since these thousands of phanatical and hungry Republicans had sailed +for America. + +The Ulstermen who entered by Charleston were known to the inhabitants +of the tidewater regions as the Scotch-Irish. Those who came from the +north, lured southward by the offer of cheap lands, were called the +Pennsylvania Irish. Both were, however, of the same race--a race twice 7 +expatriated, first from Scotland and then from Ireland, and stripped of +all that it had won throughout more than a century of persecution. To +these exiles the Back Country of North Carolina, with its cheap and even +free tracts lying far from the seat of government, must have seemed not +only the Land of Promise but the Land of Last Chance. Here they must +strike their roots into the sod with such interlocking strength that no +cataclysm of tyranny should ever dislodge them--or they must accept the +fate dealt out to them by their former persecutors and become a tribe +of nomads and serfs. But to these Ulster immigrants such a choice was no +choice at all. They knew themselves strong men, who had made the most of +opportunity despite almost superhuman obstacles. The drumming of +their feet along the banks of the Shenandoah, or up the rivers from +Charleston, and on through the broad sweep of the Yadkin Valley, was a +conquering people's challenge to the Wilderness which lay sleeping like +an unready sentinel at the gates of their Future. + +It is maintained still by many, however often disputed, that the +Ulstermen were the first to declare for American Independence, as in the +Old Country they were the first to demand the separation of 8 Church and +State. A Declaration of Independence is said to have been drawn up and +signed in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, on May 20, 1775.¹ However +that may be, it is certain that these Mecklenburg Protestants had +received special schooling in the doctrine of independence. They had in +their midst for eight years (1758-66) the Reverend Alexander Craighead, +a Presbyterian minister who, for his republican doctrines expressed in +a pamphlet, had been disowned by the Pennsylvania Synod acting on the +Governor's protest, and so persecuted in Virginia that he had at last +fled to the North Carolina Back Country. There, during the remaining +years of his life, as the sole preacher and teacher in the settlements +between the Yadkin and the Catawba rivers he found willing soil in which +to sow the seeds of Liberty. + +¹ See Hoyt, _The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence_; and _American +Archives,_ Fourth Series. vol. II, p. 855. + +There was another branch of the Scottish race which helped to people +the Back Country. The Highlanders, whose loyalty to their oath made them +fight on the King's side in the Revolutionary War, have been somewhat +overlooked in history. Tradition, handed down among the transplanted 9 +clans--who, for the most part, spoke only Gaelic for a generation and +wrote nothing--and latterly recorded by one or two of their descendants, +supplies us with all we are now able to learn of the early coming of the +Gaels to Carolina. It would seem that their first immigration to America +in small bands took place after the suppression of the Jacobite rising +in 1715--when Highlanders fled in numbers also to France--for by 1729 +there was a settlement of them on the Cape Fear River. We know, too, +that in 1748 it was charged against Gabriel Johnston, Governor of North +Carolina from 1734 to 1752, that he had shown no joy over the King's +glorious victory of Culloden and that he had appointed one William +McGregor, who had been in the Rebellion in the year 1715 a Justice of +the Peace during the last Rebellion [1745] and was not himself without +suspicion of disaffection to His Majesty's Government. It is indeed +possible that Gabriel Johnston, formerly a professor at St. Andrew's +University, had himself not always been a stranger to the kilt. He +induced large numbers of Highlanders to come to America and probably +influenced the second George to moderate his treatment of the vanquished +Gaels in the Old Country and permit their emigration to the New World. + +10 In contrast with the Ulstermen, whose secular ideals were dictated +by the forms of their Church, these Scots adhered still to the tribal +or clan system, although they, too, in the majority, were Presbyterians, +with a minority of Roman Catholics and Episcopalians. In the Scotch +Highlands they had occupied small holdings on the land under the sway of +their chief, or Head of the Clan, to whom they were bound by blood and +fealty but to whom they paid no rentals. The position of the Head of the +Clan was hereditary, but no heir was bold enough to step forward into +that position until he had performed some deed of worth. They were +principally herders, their chief stock being the famous small black +cattle of the Highlands. Their wars with each other were cattle raids. +Only in war, however, did the Gael lay hands on his neighbor's goods. +There were no highwaymen and housebreakers in the Highlands. No Highland +mansion, cot, or barn was ever locked. Theft and the breaking of an +oath, sins against man's honor, were held in such abhorrence that no +one guilty of them could remain among his clansmen in the beloved glens. +These Highlanders were a race of tall, robust men, who lived simply and +frugally and slept on the heath among their flocks in all weathers, +with no 11 other covering from rain and snow than their plaidies. It +is reported of the Laird of Keppoch, who was leading his clan to war in +winter time, that his men were divided as to the propriety of following +him further because he rolled a snowball to rest his head upon when he +lay down. Now we despair of victory, they said, since our leader has +become so effeminate he cannot sleep without a pillow!¹ + +¹ MacLean, _An Historical Account of the Settlement of Scotch +Highlanders in America._ The King's glorious victory of Culloden was +followed by a policy of extermination carried on by the orders and under +the personal direction of the Duke of Cumberland. When King George at +last restrained his son from his orgy of blood, he offered the Gaels +their lives and exile to America on condition of their taking the full +oath of allegiance. The majority accepted his terms, for not only were +their lives forfeit but their crops and cattle had been destroyed and +the holdings on which their ancestors had lived for many centuries taken +from them. The descriptions of the scenes attending their leave-taking +of the hills and glens they loved with such passionate fervor are among +the most pathetic in history. Strong men who had met the ravage of a +brutal sword without weakening 12 abandoned themselves to the agony of +sorrow. They kissed the walls of their houses. They flung themselves on +the ground and embraced the sod upon which they had walked in freedom. +They called their broken farewells to the peaks and lochs of the land +they were never again to see; and, as they turned their backs and filed +down through the passes, their pipers played the dirge for the dead. + +Such was the character, such the deep feeling, of the race which entered +North Carolina from the coast and pushed up into the wilderness about +the headwaters of Cape Fear River. Tradition indicates that these +hillsmen sought the interior because the grass and pea vine which +overgrew the inner country stretching towards the mountains provided +excellent fodder for the cattle which some of the chiefs are said to +have brought with them. These Gaelic herders, perhaps in negligible +numbers, were in the Yadkin Valley before 1730, possibly even ten years +earlier. In 1739 Neil MacNeill of Kintyre brought over a shipload of +Gaels to rejoin his kinsman, Hector MacNeill, called Bluff Hector from +his residence near the bluffs at Cross Creek, now Fayetteville. Some +of these immigrants went on to the Yadkin, we are told, to unite with +others of their clan who had been for some time in 13 that district. The +exact time of the first Highlander on the Yadkin cannot be ascertained, +as there were no court records and the offices of the land companies +were not then open for the sale of these remote regions. But by 1753 +there were not less than four thousand Gaels in Cumberland County, +where they occupied the chief magisterial posts; and they were already +spreading over the lands now comprised within Moore, Anson, Richmond, +Robeson, Bladen, and Sampson counties. In these counties Gaelic was as +commonly heard as English. + +In the years immediately preceding the Revolution and even in 1776 +itself they came in increasing numbers. They knew nothing of the +smoldering fire just about to break into flames in the country of their +choice, but the Royal Governor, Josiah Martin, knew that Highland arms +would soon be needed by His Majesty. He knew something of Highland +honor, too; for he would not let the Gaels proceed after their landing +until they had bound themselves by oath to support the Government +of King George. So it was that the unfortunate Highlanders found +themselves, according to their strict code of honor, forced to wield +arms against the very Americans who had received and 14 befriended +them--and for the crowned brother of a prince whose name is execrated to +this day in Highland song and story! + +They were led by Allan MacDonald of Kingsborough; and tradition gives us +a stirring picture of Allan's wife--the famous Flora MacDonald, who +in Scotland had protected the Young Pretender in his flight--making an +impassioned address in Gaelic to the Highland soldiers and urging them +on to die for honor's sake. When this Highland force was conquered by +the Americans, the large majority willingly bound themselves not to +fight further against the American cause and were set at liberty. +Many of them felt that, by offering their lives to the swords of the +Americans, they had canceled their obligation to King George and were +now free to draw their swords again and, this time, in accordance with +their sympathies; so they went over to the American side and fought +gallantly for independence. + +Although the brave glory of this pioneer age shines so brightly on the +Lion Rampant of Caledonia, not to Scots alone does that whole glory +belong. The second largest racial stream which flowed into the Back +Country of Virginia and 15 North Carolina was German. Most of +these Germans went down from Pennsylvania and were generally called +Pennsylvania Dutch, an incorrect rendering of _Pennsylvänische +Deutsche_. The upper Shenandoah Valley was settled almost entirely +by Germans. They were members of the Lutheran, German Reformed, and +Moravian churches. The cause which sent vast numbers of this sturdy +people across the ocean, during the first years of the eighteenth +century, was religious persecution. By statute and by sword the Roman +Catholic powers of Austria sought to wipe out the Salzburg Lutherans and +the Moravian followers of John Huss. In that region of the Rhine country +known in those days as the German Palatinate, now a part of Bavaria, +Protestants were being massacred by the troops of Louis of France, +then engaged in the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-13) and in the +zealous effort to extirpate heretics from the soil of Europe. In 1708, +by proclamation, Good Queen Anne offered protection to the persecuted +Palatines and invited them to her dominions. Twelve thousand of them +went to England, where they were warmly received by the English. But +it was no slight task to settle twelve thousand immigrants of an +alien speech in 16 England and enable them to become independent and +self-supporting. A better solution of their problem lay in the Western +World. The Germans needed homes and the Queen's overseas dominions +needed colonists. They were settled at first along the Hudson, and +eventually many of them took up lands in the fertile valley of the +Mohawk. + +For fifty years or more German and Austrian Protestants poured into +America. In Pennsylvania their influx averaged about fifteen hundred a +year, and that colony became the distributing center for the German race +in America. By 1727, Adam Müller and his little company had established +the first white settlement in the Valley of Virginia. In 1732 Joist +Heydt went south from York, Pennsylvania, and settled on the Opequan +Creek at or near the site of the present city of Winchester. + +The life of Count Zinzendorf, called the Apostle, one of the leaders +of the Moravian immigrants, glows like a star out of those dark and +troublous times. Of high birth and gentle nurture, he forsook whatever +of ease his station promised him and fitted himself for evangelical +work. In 1741 he visited the Wyoming Valley to bring his religion to the +Delawares and Shawanoes. He was not of those picturesque Captains of the +Lord who 17 bore their muskets on their shoulders when they went +forth to preach. Armored only with the shield of faith, the helmet +of salvation, and the sword of the spirit, his feet shod with the +preparation of the gospel of peace, he went out into the country of +these bloodthirsty tribes and told them that he had come to them in +their darkness to teach the love of the Christ which lighteth the world. +The Indians received him suspiciously. One day while he sat in his tent +writing, some Delawares drew near to slay him and were about to strike +when they saw two deadly snakes crawl in from the opposite side of the +tent, move directly towards the Apostle, and pass harmlessly over his +body. Thereafter they regarded him as under spiritual protection. Indeed +so widespread was his good fame among the tribes that for some years all +Moravian settlements along the borders were unmolested. Painted savages +passed through on their way to war with enemy bands or to raid the +border, but for the sake of one consecrated spirit, whom they had seen +death avoid, they spared the lives and goods of his fellow believers. +When Zinzendorf departed a year later, his mantle fell on David +Zeisberger, who lived the love he taught for over fifty years and +converted many savages. 18 Zeisberger was taken before the Governor +and army heads at Philadelphia, who had only too good reason to be +suspicious of priestly counsels in the tents of Shem: but he was able to +impress white men no less than simple savages with the nobility of the +doctrine he had learned from the Apostle. + +In 1751 the Moravian Brotherhood purchased one hundred thousand acres in +North Carolina from Lord Granville. Bishop Spangenburg was commissioned +to survey this large acreage, which was situated in the present county +of Forsyth east of the Yadkin, and which is historically listed as the +Wachovia Tract. In 1753, twelve Brethren left the Moravian settlements +of Bethlehem and Nazareth, in Pennsylvania, and journeyed southward to +begin the founding of a colony on their new land. Brother Adam Grube, +one of the twelve, kept a diary of the events of this expedition.¹ + +¹ This diary is printed in full in _Travels in the American Colonies_ +edited by N. D. Mereness. Honor to whom honor is due. We have paid +it, in some measure, to the primitive Gaels of the Highlands for their +warrior strength and their fealty, and to the enlightened Scots of +Ulster for their enterprise and for their sacrifice unto blood that free +conscience and just laws might promote the 19 progress and safeguard +the intercourse of their kind. Now let us take up for a moment Brother +Grube's _Journal_ even as we welcome, perhaps the more gratefully, the +mild light of evening after the flooding sun, or as our hearts, when too +strongly stirred by the deeds of men, turn for rest to the serene faith +and the naïve speech of little children. + +The twelve, we learn, were under the leadership of one of their number, +Brother Gottlob. Their earliest alarms on the march were not caused, +as we might expect, by anticipations of the painted Cherokee, but by +encounters with the strenuous Irish. One of these came and laid himself +to sleep beside the Brethren's camp fire on their first night out, after +they had sung their evening hymn and eleven had stretched themselves on +the earth for slumber, while Brother Gottlob, their leader, hanging his +hammock between two trees, ascended--not only in spirit--a little higher +than his charges, and rested well in it. Though the alarming Irishman +did not disturb them, the Brethren's doubts of that race continued, for +Brother Grube wrote on the 14th of October: About four in the morning we +set up our tent, going four miles beyond Carl Isles [Carlisle, seventeen +miles southwest of Harrisburg] so as not to be too near the 20 Irish +Presbyterians. After breakfast the Brethren shaved and then we rested +under our tent.… People who were staying at the Tavern came to see what +kind of folk we were.… Br Gottlob held the evening service and then we +lay down around our cheerful fire, and Br Gottlob in his hammock. +Two other jottings give us a racial kaleidoscope of the settlers and +wayfarers of that time. On one day the Brethren bought some hay from a +Swiss, later some kraut from a German which tasted very good to us; and +presently an Englishman came by and drank a cup of tea with us and was +very grateful for it. Frequently the little band paused while some of +the Brethren went off to the farms along the route to help cut hay. +These kindly acts were usually repaid with gifts of food or produce. + +One day while on the march they halted at a tavern and farm in +Shenandoah Valley kept by a man whose name Brother Grube wrote down as +Severe. Since we know that Brother Grube's spelling of names other than +German requires editing, we venture to hazard a guess that the name he +attempted to set down as it sounded to him was Sevier. And we wonder if, +in his brief sojourn, he saw a lad of eight years, slim, tall, and 21 +blond, with daring and mischievous blue eyes, and a certain curve of the +lips that threatened havoc in the hearts of both sexes when he should be +a man and reach out with swift hands and reckless will for his desires. +If he saw this lad, he beheld John Sevier, later to become one of the +most picturesque and beloved heroes of the Old Southwest. + +Hardships abounded on the Brethren's journey, but faith and the +Christian's joy, which no man taketh from him, met and surmounted them. +Three and a half miles beyond, the road forked.… We took the right hand +road but found no water for ten miles. It grew late and we had to drive +five miles into the night to find a stoppingplace. Two of the Brethren +went ahead to seek out the road through the darkened wilderness. There +were rough hills in the way; and, the horses being exhausted, Brethren +had to help push. But, in due season, Br Nathanael held evening prayer +and then we slept in the care of Jesus, with Brother Gottlob as usual +in his hammock. Three days later the record runs: Toward evening we +saw Jeams River, the road to it ran down so very steep a hill that we +fastened a small tree to the back of our wagon, locked the wheels, and +the Brethren held back by the tree with all their 22 might. Even then +the wagon went down so fast that most of the Brethren lost their +footing and rolled and tumbled pell-mell. But Faith makes little of +such mishaps: No harm was done and we thanked the Lord that he had so +graciously protected us, for it looked dangerous and we thought at times +that it could not possibly be done without accident but we got down +safely… we were all very tired and sleepy and let the angels be our +guard during the night. Rains fell in torrents, making streams almost +impassable and drenching the little band to the skin. The hammock was +empty one night, for they had to spend the dark hours trench-digging +about their tent to keep it from being washed away. Two days later +(the 10th of November) the weather cleared and we spent most of the day +drying our blankets and mending and darning our stockings. They also +bought supplies from settlers who, as Brother Grube observed without +irony, are glad we have to remain here so long and that it means money +for them. In the afternoon we held a little Lovefeast and rested our +souls in the loving sacrifice of Jesus, wishing for beloved Brethren in +Bethlehem and that they and we might live ever close to Him.… + +Nov. 16. We rose early to ford the river. The bank was so steep that +we hung a tree behind the wagon, 23 fastening it in such a way that we +could quickly release it when the wagon reached the water. The current +was very swift and the lead horses were carried down a bit with it. The +water just missed running into the wagon but we came safely to the other +bank, which however we could not climb but had to take half the things +out of the wagon, tie ropes to the axle on which we could pull, help our +horses which were quite stiff, and so we brought our ark again to dry +land. + +On the evening of the 17th of November the twelve arrived safely on +their land on the Etkin (Yadkin), having been six weeks on the march. +They found with joy that, as ever, the Lord had provided for them. This +time the gift was a deserted cabin, large enough that we could all +lie down around the walls. We at once made preparation for a little +Lovefeast and rejoiced heartily with one another. + +In the deserted log cabin, which, to their faith, seemed as one of +those mansions not built with hands and descended miraculously from the +heavens, they held their Lovefeast, while wolves padded and howled about +the walls; and in that Pentacostal hour the tongue of fire descended +upon Brother Gottlob, so that he made a new song unto the Lord. Who +shall venture to say it is not better worth preserving than many a +classic? + +24 + + We hold arrival Lovefeast here + In Carolina land, + A company of Brethren true, + A little Pilgrim-Band, + Called by the Lord to be of those + Who through the whole world go, + To bear Him witness everywhere + And nought but Jesus know. + +Then, we are told, the Brethren lay down to rest and Br Gottlob hung his +hammock above our heads--as was most fitting on this of all nights; for +is not the Poet's place always just a little nearer to the stars? + +The pioneers did not always travel in groups. There were families who +set off alone. One of these now claims our attention, for there was a +lad in this family whose name and deeds were to sound like a ballad +of romance from out the dusty pages of history. This family's name was +Boone. + +Neither Scots nor Germans can claim Daniel Boone; he was in blood a +blend of English and Welsh; in character wholly English. His grandfather +George Boone was born in 1666 in the hamlet of Stoak, near Exeter in +Devonshire. George Boone was a weaver by trade and a Quaker by religion. +In England in his time the Quakers were 25 oppressed, and George +Boone therefore sought information of William Penn, his coreligionist, +regarding the colony which Penn had established in America. In 1712 he +sent his three elder children, George, Sarah, and Squire, to spy out +the land. Sarah and Squire remained in Pennsylvania, while their brother +returned to England with glowing reports. On August 17, 1717, George +Boone, his wife, and the rest of his children journeyed to Bristol and +sailed for Philadelphia, arriving there on the 10th of October. The +Boones went first to Abingdon, the Quaker farmers' community. Later +they moved to the northwestern frontier hamlet of North Wales, a Welsh +community which, a few years previously, had turned Quaker. Sarah Boone +married a German named Jacob Stover, who had settled in Oley Township, +Berks County. In 1718 George Boone took up four hundred acres in Oley, +or, to be exact, in the subdivision later called Exeter, and there +he lived in his log cabin until 1744, when he died at the age of +seventy-eight. He left eight children, fifty-two grandchildren, and ten +great-grandchildren, seventy descendants in all--English, German, Welsh, +and Scotch-Irish blended into one family of Americans.¹ + +¹ R. G. Thwaites, _Daniel Boone_, p. 5. 26 Among the Welsh Quakers was a +family of Morgans. In 1720 Squire Boone married Sarah Morgan. Ten +years later he obtained 250 acres in Oley on Owatin Creek, eight miles +southeast of the present city of Reading; and here, in 1734, Daniel +Boone was born, the fourth son and sixth child of Squire and Sarah +Morgan Boone. Daniel Boone therefore was a son of the frontier. In his +childhood he became familiar with hunters and with Indians, for even +the red men came often in friendly fashion to his grandfather's house. +Squire Boone enlarged his farm by thrift. He continued at his trade of +weaving and kept five or six looms going, making homespun cloth for the +market and his neighbors. + +Daniel's father owned grazing grounds several miles north of the +homestead and each season he sent his stock to the range. Sarah Boone +and her little Daniel drove the cows. From early spring till late +autumn, mother and son lived in a rustic cabin alone on the frontier. A +rude dairy house stood over a cool spring, and here Sarah Boone made her +butter and cheese. Daniel, aged ten at this time, watched the herds; at +sunset he drove them to the cabin for milking, and locked them in the +cowpens at night. + +27 He was not allowed firearms at that age, so he shaped for himself a +weapon that served him well. This was a slender smoothly shaved sapling +with a small bunch of gnarled roots at one end. So expert was he in the +launching of this primitive spear that he easily brought down birds and +small game. When he reached his twelfth year, his father bought him a +rifle; and he soon became a crack shot. A year later we find him setting +off on the autumn hunt--after driving the cattle in for the winter--with +all the keenness and courage of a man twice his thirteen years. His +rifle enabled him to return with meat for the family and skins to be +traded in Philadelphia. When he was fourteen his brother Sam married +Sarah Day, an intelligent young Quakeress who took a special interest in +her young brother-in-law and taught him the rudiments of three R's. + +The Boones were prosperous and happy in Oley and it may be wondered why +they left their farms and their looms, both of which were profitable, +and set their faces towards the Unknown. It is recorded that, though +the Boones were Quakers, they were of a high mettle and were not +infrequently dealt with by the Meeting. Two of Squire Boone's children +married worldlings--non-Quakers--and 28 were in consequence disowned by +the Society. In defiance of his sect, which strove to make him sever all +connection with his unruly offspring, Squire Boone refused to shut his +doors on the son and the daughter who had scandalized local Quakerdom. +The Society of Friends thereupon expelled him. This occurred apparently +during the winter of 1748-49. In the spring of 1750 we see the whole +Boone family (save two sons) with their wives and children, their +household goods and their stock, on the great highway, bound for a land +where the hot heart and the belligerent spirit shall not be held amiss. + +Southward through the Shenandoah goes the Boone caravan. The women and +children usually sit in the wagons. The men march ahead or alongside, +keeping a keen eye open for Indian or other enemy in the wild, their +rifles under arm or over the shoulder. Squire Boone, who has done with +Quakerdom and is leading all that he holds dear out to larger horizons, +is ahead of the line, as we picture him, ready to meet first whatever +danger may assail his tribe. He is a strong wiry man of rather small +stature, with ruddy complexion, red hair, and gray eyes. Somewhere in +the line, together, we think, are the mother and son who have 29 herded +cattle and companioned each other through long months in the cabin on +the frontier. We do not think of this woman as riding in the wagon, +though she may have done so, but prefer to picture her, with her tall +robust body, her black hair, and her black eyes--with the sudden Welsh +snap in them--walking as sturdily as any of her sons. + +If Daniel be beside her, what does she see when she looks at him? A +lad well set up but not overtall for his sixteen years, perhaps--for +eye-witnesses differ in their estimates of Daniel Boone's height--or +possibly taller than he looks, because his figure has the forest +hunter's natural slant forward and the droop of the neck of one who +must watch his path sometimes in order to tread silently. It is Squire +Boone's blood which shows in his ruddy face--which would be fair but for +its tan--and in the English cut of feature, the straw-colored eyebrows, +and the blue eyes. But his Welsh mother's legacy is seen in the black +hair that hangs long and loose in the hunter's fashion to his shoulders. +We can think of Daniel Boone only as exhilarated by this plunge into the +Wild. He sees ahead--the days of his great explorations and warfare, the +discovery of Kentucky? Not at all. This is a boy of sixteen in love with +his rifle. He looks ahead to 30 vistas of forest filled with deer and +to skies clouded with flocks of wild turkeys. In that dream there is +happiness enough for Daniel Boone. Indeed, for himself, even in later +life, he asked little, if any more. He trudges on blithely, whistling. + +31 + + + + +Chapter II + +Folkways + +These migrations into the inland valleys of the Old South mark the first +great westward thrust of the American frontier. Thus the beginnings of +the westward movement disclose to us a feature characteristic also of +the later migrations which flung the frontier over the Appalachians, +across the Mississippi, and finally to the shores of the Pacific. The +pioneers, instead of moving westward by slow degrees, subduing the +wilderness as they went, overleaped great spaces and planted themselves +beyond, out of contact with the life they had left behind. Thus +separated by hundreds of miles of intervening wilderness from the +more civilized communities, the conquerors of the first American West, +prototypes of the conquerors of succeeding Wests, inevitably struck +out their own ways of life and developed their own customs. It would +be difficult, indeed, to find anywhere a more 32 remarkable contrast +in contemporary folkways than that presented by the two great community +groups of the South--the inland or piedmont settlements, called the Back +Country, and the lowland towns and plantations along the seaboard. + +The older society of the seaboard towns, as events were soon to prove, +was not less independent in its ideals than the frontier society of the +Back Country; but it was aristocratic in tone and feeling. Its leaders +were the landed gentry--men of elegance, and not far behind their +European contemporaries in the culture of the day. They were rich, +without effort, both from their plantations, where black slaves and +indentured servants labored, and from their coastwise and overseas +trade. Their battles with forest and red man were long past. They had +leisure for diversions such as the chase, the breeding and racing +of thoroughbred horses, the dance, high play with dice and card, +cockfighting, the gallantry of love, and the skill of the rapier. Law +and politics drew their soberer minds. + +Very different were the conditions which confronted the pioneers in the +first American West. There every jewel of promise was ringed round with +hostility. The cheap land the pioneer had purchased at a nominal price, +or the free land 33 he had taken by tomahawk claim--that is by +cutting his name into the bark of a deadened tree, usually beside a +spring--supported a forest of tall trunks and interlacing leafage. The +long grass and weeds which covered the ground in a wealth of natural +pasturage harbored the poisonous copperhead and the rattlesnake and, +being shaded by the overhead foliage, they held the heavy dews and bred +swarms of mosquitoes, gnats, and big flies which tortured both men and +cattle. To protect the cattle and horses from the attacks of these +pests the settlers were obliged to build large "smudges"--fires of green +timber--against the wind. The animals soon learned to back up into the +dense smoke and to move from one grazing spot to another as the wind +changed. But useful as were the green timber fires that rolled their +smoke on the wind to save the stock, they were at the same time a menace +to the pioneer, for they proclaimed to roving bands of Cherokees that +a further encroachment on their territory had been made by their most +hated enemies--the men who felled the hunter's forest. Many an outpost +pioneer who had made the long hard journey by sea and land from the old +world of persecution to this new country of freedom, dropped from the +34 red man's shot ere he had hewn the threshold of his home, leaving his +wife and children to the unrecorded mercy of his slayer. + +Those more fortunate pioneers who settled in groups won the first heat +in the battle with the wilderness through massed effort under wariness. +They made their clearings in the forest, built their cabins and +stockades, and planted their cornfields, while lookouts kept watch and +rifles were stacked within easy reach. Every special task, such as a +raising, as cabin building was called, was undertaken by the community +chiefly because the Indian danger necessitated swift building and made +group action imperative. But the stanch heart is ever the glad heart. +Nothing in this frontier history impresses us more than the joy of the +pioneer at his labors. His determined optimism turned danger's dictation +into an occasion for jollity. On the appointed day for the raising, the +neighbors would come, riding or afoot, to the newcomer's holding--the +men with their rifles and axes, the women with their pots and kettles. +Every child toddled along, too, helping to carry the wooden dishes +and spoons. These free givers of labor had something of the Oriental's +notion of the sacred ratification of friendship by a feast. + +35 The usual dimensions of a cabin were sixteen by twenty feet. The +timber for the building, having been already cut, lay at hand--logs of +hickory, oak, young pine, walnut, or persimmon. To make the foundations, +the men seized four of the thickest logs, laid them in place, and +notched and grooved and hammered them into as close a clinch as if they +had grown so. The wood must grip by its own substance alone to hold up +the pioneer's dwelling, for there was not an iron nail to be had in +the whole of the Back Country. Logs laid upon the foundation logs and +notched into each other at the four corners formed the walls; and, +when these stood at seven feet, the builders laid parallel timbers and +puncheons to make both flooring and ceiling. The ridgepole of the roof +was supported by two crotched trees and the roofing was made of logs and +wooden slabs. The crevices of the walls were packed close with red clay +and moss. Lastly, spaces for a door and windows were cut out. The +door was made thick and heavy to withstand the Indian's rush. And the +windowpanes? They were of paper treated with hog's fat or bear's grease. + +When the sun stood overhead, the women would give the welcome call of +Dinner! Their morning had not been less busy than the men's. They 36 had +baked corn cakes on hot stones, roasted bear or pork, or broiled venison +steaks; and--above all and first of all--they had concocted the great +stew pie without which a raising could hardly take place. This was a +disputatious mixture of deer, hog, and bear--animals which, in life, +would surely have companioned each other as ill! It was made in +sufficient quantity to last over for supper when the day's labor was +done. At supper the men took their ease on the ground, but with their +rifles always in reach. If the cabin just raised by their efforts stood +in the Yadkin, within sight of the great mountains the pioneers were +one day to cross, perhaps a sudden bird note warning from the lookout, +hidden in the brush, would bring the builders with a leap to their feet. +It might be only a hunting band of friendly Catawbas that passed, or +a lone Cherokee who knew that this was not his hour. If the latter, we +can, in imagination, see him look once at the new house on his hunting +pasture, slacken rein for a moment in front of the group of families, +lift his hand in sign of peace, and silently go his way hillward. As +he vanishes into the shadows, the crimson sun, sinking into the unknown +wilderness beyond the mountains, pours its last glow on the roof of the +cabin and on the 37 group near its walls. With unfelt fingers, subtly, +it puts the red touch of the West in the faces of the men--who have just +declared, through the building of a cabin, that here is Journey's End +and their abiding place. + +There were community holidays among these pioneers as well as labor +days, especially in the fruit season; and there were flower-picking +excursions in the warm spring days. Early in April the service berry +bush gleamed starrily along the watercourses, its hardy white blooms +defying winter's lingering look. This bush--or tree, indeed, since it +is not afraid to rear its slender trunk as high as cherry or crab +apple--might well be considered emblematic of the frontier spirit in +those regions where the white silence covers the earth for several +months and shuts the lonely homesteader in upon himself. From the +pioneer time of the Old Southwest to the last frontier of the Far North +today, the service berry is cherished alike by white men and Indians; +and the red men have woven about it some of their prettiest legends. +When June had ripened the tree's blue-black berries, the Back Country +folk went out in parties to gather them. Though the service berry was a +38 food staple on the frontier and its gathering a matter of household +economy, the folk made their berry-picking jaunt a gala occasion. The +women and children with pots and baskets--the young girls vying with +each other, under the eyes of the youths, as to who could strip boughs +the fastest--plucked gayly while the men, rifles in hand, kept guard. +For these happy summer days were also the red man's scalping days and, +at any moment, the chatter of the picnickers might be interrupted by the +chilling war whoop. When that sound was heard, the berry pickers raced +for the fort. The wild fruits--strawberries, service berries, cherries, +plums, crab apples--were, however, too necessary a part of the pioneer's +meager diet to be left unplucked out of fear of an Indian attack. +Another day would see the same group out again. The children would keep +closer to their mothers, no doubt; and the laughter of the young girls +would be more subdued, even if their coquetry lacked nothing of its +former effectiveness. Early marriages were the rule in the Back Country +and betrothals were frequently plighted at these berry pickings. + +As we consider the descriptions of the frontiersman left for us by +travelers of his own day, we are not more interested in his battles with +wilderness 39 and Indian than in the visible effects of both wilderness +and Indian upon him. His countenance and bearing still show the +European, but the European greatly altered by savage contact. The red +peril, indeed, influenced every side of frontier life. The bands of +women and children at the harvestings, the log rollings, and the house +raisings, were not there merely to lighten the men's work by their +laughter and love-making. It was not safe for them to remain in the +cabins, for, to the Indian, the cabin thus boldly thrust upon his +immemorial hunting grounds was only a secondary evil; the greater evil +was the white man's family, bespeaking the increase of the dreaded +palefaces. The Indian peril trained the pioneers to alertness, shaped +them as warriors and hunters, suggested the fashion of their dress, knit +their families into clans and the clans into a tribe wherein all were of +one spirit in the protection of each and all and a unit of hate against +their common enemy. + +Too often the fields which the pioneer planted with corn were harvested +by the Indian with fire. The hardest privations suffered by farmers and +stock were due to the settlers having to flee to the forts, leaving to +Indian devastation the crops on which their sustenance mainly depended. +Sometimes, 40 fortunately, the warning came in time for the frontiersman +to collect his goods and chattels in his wagon and to round up his live +stock and drive them safely into the common fortified enclosure. At +others, the tap of the express--as the herald of Indian danger was +called--at night on the windowpane and the low word whispered hastily, +ere the express ran on to the next abode, meant that the Indians had +surprised the outlying cabins of the settlement. + +The forts were built as centrally as possible in the scattered +settlements. They consisted of cabins, blockhouses, and stockades. +A range of cabins often formed one side of a fort. The walls on the +outside were ten or twelve feet high with roofs sloping inward. The +blockhouses built at the angles of the fort projected two feet or so +beyond the outer walls of the cabins and stockades, and were fitted with +portholes for the watchers and the marksmen. The entrance to the fort +was a large folding gate of thick slabs. It was always on the side +nearest the spring. The whole structure of the fort was bullet-proof +and was erected without an iron nail or spike. In the border wars these +forts withstood all attacks. The savages, having proved that they could +not storm them, generally 41 laid siege and waited for thirst to compel +a sortie. But the crafty besieger was as often outwitted by the equally +cunning defender. Some daring soul, with silent feet and perhaps with +naked body painted in Indian fashion, would drop from the wall under +cover of the night, pass among the foemen to the spring, and return to +the fort with water. + +Into the pioneer's phrase-making the Indian influence penetrated so that +he named seasons for his foe. So thoroughly has the term Indian Summer, +now to us redolent of charm, become disassociated from its origins that +it gives us a shock to be reminded that to these Back Country folk the +balmy days following on the cold snap meant the season when the red +men would come back for a last murderous raid on the settlements before +winter should seal up the land. The Powwowing Days were the mellow days +in the latter part of February, when the red men in council made their +medicine and learned of their redder gods whether or no they should take +the warpath when the sap pulsed the trees into leaf. Even the children +at their play acknowledged the red-skinned schoolmaster, for their chief +games were a training in his woodcraft and in the use of 42 his weapons. +Tomahawk-throwing was a favorite sport because of its gruesome practical +purposes. The boys must learn to gauge the tomahawk's revolutions by the +distance of the throw so as to bury the blade in its objective. Swift +running and high jumping through the brush and fallen timber were sports +that taught agility in escape. The boys learned to shoot accurately the +long rifles of their time, with a log or a forked stick for a rest, and +a moss pad under the barrel to keep it from jerking and spoiling the +aim. They wrestled with each other, mastered the tricks of throwing an +opponent, and learned the scalp hold instead of the toe hold. It was +part of their education to imitate the noises of every bird and beast of +the forest. So they learned to lure the turkey within range, or by the +bleat of a fawn to bring her dam to the rifle. A well-simulated wolf's +howl would call forth a response and so inform the lone hunter of the +vicinity of the pack. This forest speech was not only the language of +diplomacy in the hunting season; it was the borderer's secret code in +war. Stray Indians put themselves in touch again with the band by turkey +calls in the daytime and by owl or wolf notes at night. The frontiersmen +used the same means to trick the Indian band into 43 betraying the place +of its ambuscade, or to lure the strays, unwitting, within reach of the +knife. + +In that age, before the forests had given place to farms and cities and +when the sun had but slight acquaintance with the sod, the summers were +cool and the winters long and cold in the Back Country. Sometimes in +September severe frosts destroyed the corn. The first light powdering +called hunting snows fell in October, and then the men of the Back +Country set out on the chase. Their object was meat--buffalo, deer, +elk, bear--for the winter larder, and skins to send out in the spring +by pack-horses to the coast in trade for iron, steel, and salt. The +rainfall in North Carolina was much heavier than in Virginia and, from +autumn into early winter, the Yadkin forests were sheeted with rain; but +wet weather, so far from deterring the hunter, aided him to the kill. +In blowing rain, he knew he would find the deer herding in the sheltered +places on the hillsides. In windless rain, he knew that his quarry +ranged the open woods and the high places. The fair play of the pioneer +held it a great disgrace to kill a deer in winter when the heavy frost +had crusted the deep snow. On the crust men and wolves could travel +with ease, but the deer's sharp hoofs pierced through and 44 made him +defenseless. Wolves and dogs destroyed great quantities of deer +caught in this way; and men who shot deer under these conditions were +considered no huntsmen. There was, indeed, a practical side to this +chivalry of the chase, for meat and pelt were both poor at this season; +but the true hunter also obeyed the finer tenet of his code, for he +would go to the rescue of deer caught in the crusts--and he killed many +a wolf sliding over the ice to an easy meal. + +The community moral code of the frontier was brief and rigorous. What +it lacked of the whereas and inasmuch of legal ink it made up in sound +hickory. In fact, when we review the activities of this solid yet +elastic wood in the moral, social, and economic phases of Back Country +life, we are moved to wonder if the pioneers would have been the +same race of men had they been nurtured beneath a less strenuous and +adaptable vegetation! The hickory gave the frontiersman wood for all +implements and furnishings where the demand was equally for lightness, +strength, and elasticity. It provided his straight logs for building, +his block mortars--hollowed by fire and stone--for corn-grinding, his +solid plain furniture, his axles, rifle butts, ax handles, and so forth. +It supplied 45 his magic wand for the searching out of iniquity in the +junior members of his household, and his most cogent argument, as a +citizen, in convincing the slothful, the blasphemous, or the dishonest +adult whose errors disturbed communal harmony. Its nuts fed his hogs. +Before he raised stock, the unripe hickory nuts, crushed for their white +liquid, supplied him with butter for his corn bread and helped out his +store of bear's fat. Both the name and the knowledge of the uses of this +tree came to the earliest pioneers through contact with the red man, +whose hunting bow and fishing spear and the hobbles for his horses were +fashioned of the pohickory tree. The Indian women first made pohickory +butter, and the wise old men of the Cherokee towns, so we are told, +first applied the pohickory rod to the vanity of youth! + +A glance at the interior of a log cabin in the Back Country of Virginia +or North Carolina would show, in primitive design, what is, perhaps, +after all the perfect home--a place where the personal life and the work +life are united and where nothing futile finds space. Every object in +the cabin was practical and had been made by hand on the spot to answer +a need. Besides the chairs hewn from hickory blocks, there were others +made of slabs 46 set on three legs. A large slab or two with four legs +served as a movable table; the permanent table was built against the +wall, its outer edge held up by two sticks. The low bed was built into +the wall in the same way and softened for slumber by a mattress of pine +needles, chaff, or dried moss. In the best light from the greased paper +windowpanes stood the spinning wheel and loom, on which the housewife +made cloth for the family's garments. Over the fireplace or beside the +doorway, and suspended usually on stags' antlers, hung the firearms and +the yellow powderhorns, the latter often carved in Indian fashion with +scenes of the hunt or war. On a shelf or on pegs were the wooden spoons, +plates, bowls, and noggins. Also near the fireplace, which was made of +large flat stones with a mud-plastered log chimney, stood the grinding +block for making hominy. If it were an evening in early spring, the men +of the household would be tanning and dressing deerskins to be sent out +with the trade caravan, while the women sewed, made moccasins or mended +them, in the light of pine knots or candles of bear's grease. The larger +children might be weaving cradles for the babies, Indian fashion, out of +hickory twigs; and there would surely be a sound of whetting steel, for +scalping 47 knives and tomahawks must be kept keen-tempered now that the +days have come when the red gods whisper their chant of war through the +young leafage. + +The Back Country folk, as they came from several countries, generally +settled in national groups, each preserving its own speech and its +own religion, each approaching frontier life through its own native +temperament. And the frontier met each and all alike, with the same need +and the same menace, and molded them after one general pattern. If the +cabin stood in a typical Virginian settlement where the folk were of +English stock, it may be that the dulcimer and some old love song of +the homeland enlivened the work--or perhaps chairs were pushed back and +young people danced the country dances of the homeland and the Virginia +Reel, for these Virginian English were merry folk, and their religion +did not frown upon the dance. In a cabin on the Shenandoah or the upper +Yadkin the German tongue clicked away over the evening dish of kraut or +sounded more sedately in a Lutheran hymn; while from some herder's hut +on the lower Yadkin the wild note of the bagpipes or of the ancient +four-stringed harp mingled with the Gaelic speech. + +48 Among the homes in the Shenandoah where old England's ways prevailed, +none was gayer than the tavern kept by the man whom the good Moravian +Brother called Severe. There perhaps the feasting celebrated the +nuptials of John Sevier, who was barely past his seventeenth birthday +when he took to himself a wife. Or perhaps the dancing, in moccasined +feet on the puncheon flooring, was a ceremonial to usher into Back +Country life the new municipality John had just organized, for John at +nineteen had taken his earliest step towards his larger career, which we +shall follow later on, as the architect of the first little governments +beyond the mountains. + +In the Boone home on the Yadkin, we may guess that the talk was solely +of the hunt, unless young Daniel had already become possessed of his +first compass and was studying its ways. On such an evening, while the +red afterglow lingered, he might be mending a passing trader's firearms +by the fires of the primitive forge his father had set up near the +trading path running from Hillsborough to the Catawba towns. It was said +by the local nimrods that none could doctor a sick rifle better than +young Daniel Boone, already the master huntsman of them all. And perhaps +some trader's tale, told 49 when the caravan halted for the night, +kindled the youth's first desire to penetrate the mountain-guarded +wilderness, for the tales of these Romanies of commerce were as the very +badge of their free-masonry, and entry money at the doors of strangers. + +Out on the border's edge, heedless of the shadow of the mountains +looming between the newly built cabin and that western land where they +and their kind were to write the fame of the Ulster Scot in a shining +script that time cannot dull, there might sit a group of stern-faced +men, all deep in discussion of some point of spiritual doctrine or of +the temporal rights of men. Yet, in every cabin, whatever the national +differences, the setting was the same. The spirit of the frontier was +modeling out of old clay a new Adam to answer the needs of a new earth. + +It would be far less than just to leave the Back Country folk without +further reference to the devoted labors of their clergy. In the earliest +days the settlers were cut off from their church systems; the pious had +to maintain their piety unaided, except in the rare cases where a pastor +accompanied a group of settlers of his denomination into the wilds. One +of the first ministers who fared into 50 the Back Country to remind the +Ulster Presbyterians of their spiritual duties was the Reverend Hugh +McAden of Philadelphia. He made long itineraries under the greatest +hardships, in constant danger from Indians and wild beasts, carrying +the counsel of godliness to the far scattered flock. Among the Highland +settlements the Reverend James Campbell for thirty years traveled about, +preaching each Sunday at some gathering point a sermon in both English +and Gaelic. A little later, in the Yadkin Valley, after Craighead's +day there arose a small school of Presbyterian ministers whose zeal +and fearlessness in the cause of religion and of just government had an +influence on the frontiersmen that can hardly be overestimated. + +But, in the beginning, the pioneer encountered the savagery of border +life, grappled with it, and reacted to it without guidance from other +mentor than his own instincts. His need was still the primal threefold +need--family, sustenance, and safe sleep when the day's work was done. +We who look back with thoughtful eyes upon the frontiersman--all links +of contact with his racial past severed, at grips with destruction in +the contenting of his needs--see something more, something 51 larger, +than he saw in the log cabin raised by his hands, its structure held +together solely by his close grooving and fitting of its own strength. +Though the walls he built for himself have gone with his own dust back +to the earth, the symbol he erected for us stands. + +52 + + + + +Chapter III + +The Trader + +The trader was the first pathfinder. His caravans began the change +of purpose that was to come to the Indian warrior's route, turning +it slowly into the beaten track of communication and commerce. The +settlers, the rangers, the surveyors, went westward over the trails +which he had blazed for them years before. Their enduring works are +commemorated in the cities and farms which today lie along every ancient +border line; but of their forerunner's hazardous Indian trade nothing +remains. Let us therefore pay a moment's homage here to the trader, who +first--to borrow a phrase from Indian speech--made white for peace the +red trails of war. + +He was the first cattleman of the Old Southwest. Fifty years before +John Findlay¹, one of this class of pioneers, led Daniel Boone through +Cumberland 53 Gap, the trader's bands of horses roamed the western +slopes of the Appalachian Mountains and his cattle grazed among the deer +on the green banks of the old Cherokee (Tennessee) River. He was the +pioneer settler beyond the high hills; for he built, in the center of +the Indian towns, the first white man's cabin--with its larger annex, +the trading house--and dwelt there during the greater part of the year. +He was America's first magnate of international commerce. His furs--for +which he paid in guns, knives, ammunition, vermilion paint, mirrors, +and cloth--lined kings' mantles, and hatted the Lords of Trade as they +strode to their council chamber in London to discuss his business and to +pass those regulations which might have seriously hampered him but for +his resourcefulness in circumventing them! + +¹ The name is spelled in various ways: Findlay, Finlay, Findley. He +was the first frontier warrior, for he either fought off or fell before +small parties of hostile Indians who, in the interest of the Spanish or +French, raided his pack-horse caravans on the march. Often, too, side by +side with the red brothers of his adoption, he fought in the intertribal +wars. His was the first educative and civilizing influence in the Indian +towns. He endeavored to cure the Indians of their favorite midsummer +madness, war, by inducing 54 them to raise stock and poultry and improve +their corn, squash, and pea gardens. It is not necessary to impute to +him philanthropic motives. He was a practical man and he saw that war +hurt his trade: it endangered his summer caravans and hampered the +autumn hunt for deerskins. + +In the earliest days of the eighteenth century, when the colonists of +Virginia and the Carolinas were only a handful, it was the trader who +defeated each successive attempt of French and Spanish agents to weld +the tribes into a confederacy for the annihilation of the English +settlements. The English trader did his share to prevent what is now the +United States from becoming a part of a Latin empire and to save it for +a race having the Anglo-Saxon ideal and speaking the English tongue. + +The colonial records of the period contain items which, taken singly, +make small impression on the casual reader but which, listed together, +throw a strong light on the past and bring that mercenary figure, the +trader, into so bold a relief that the design verges on the heroic. If +we wonder, for instance, why the Scotch Highlanders who settled in the +wilds at the headwaters of the Cape Fear River, about 1729, and were +later followed by Welsh and Huguenots, met with no opposition 55 from +the Indians, the mystery is solved when we discover, almost by accident, +a few printed lines which record that, in 1700, the hostile natives +on the Cape Fear were subdued to the English and brought into friendly +alliance with them by Colonel William Bull, a trader. We read further +and learn that the Spaniards in Florida had long endeavored to unite the +tribes in Spanish and French territory against the English and that the +influence of traders prevented the consummation. The Spaniards, in 1702, +had prepared to invade English territory with nine hundred Indians. The +plot was discovered by Creek Indians and disclosed to their friends, +the traders, who immediately gathered together five hundred warriors, +marched swiftly to meet the invaders, and utterly routed them. Again, +when the Indians, incited by the Spanish at St. Augustine, rose against +the English in 1715, and the Yamasi Massacre occurred in South Carolina, +it was due to the traders that some of the settlements at least were not +wholly unprepared to defend themselves. + +The early English trader was generally an intelligent man; sometimes +educated, nearly always fearless and resourceful. He knew the one sure +basis on which men of alien blood and far separated 56 stages of moral +and intellectual development can meet in understanding--namely, the +truth of the spoken word. He recognized honor as the bond of trade and +the warp and woof of human intercourse. The uncorrupted savage also had +his plain interpretation of the true word in the mouths of men, and +a name for it. He called it the Old Beloved Speech; and he gave his +confidence to the man who spoke this speech even in the close barter for +furs. + +We shall find it worth while to refer to the map of America as it was +in the early days of the colonial fur trade, about the beginning of the +eighteenth century. A narrow strip of loosely strung English settlements +stretched from the north border of New England to the Florida line. +North Florida was Spanish territory. On the far distant southwestern +borders of the English colonies were the southern possessions of France. +The French sphere of influence extended up the Mississippi, and thence +by way of rivers and the Great Lakes to its base in Canada on the +borders of New England and New York. In South Carolina dwelt the Yamasi +tribe of about three thousand warriors, their chief towns only sixty or +eighty miles distant from the Spanish town of St. Augustine. On the 57 +west, about the same distance northeast of New Orleans, in what is now +Alabama and Georgia, lay the Creek nation. There French garrisons held +Mobile and Fort Alabama. The Creeks at this time numbered over four +thousand warriors. The lands of the Choctaws, a tribe of even larger +fighting strength, began two hundred miles north of New Orleans and +extended along the Mississippi. A hundred and sixty miles northeast of +the Choctaw towns were the Chickasaws, the bravest and most successful +warriors of all the tribes south of the Iroquois. The Cherokees, in part +seated within the Carolinas, on the upper courses of the Savannah River, +mustered over six thousand men at arms. East of them were the Catawba +towns. North of them were the Shawanoes and Delawares, in easy +communication with the tribes of Canada. Still farther north, along the +Mohawk and other rivers joining with the Hudson and Lake Ontario stood +the long houses of the fiercest and most warlike of all the savages, the +Iroquois or Six Nations. + +The Indians along the English borders outnumbered the colonists +perhaps ten to one. If the Spanish and the French had succeeded in +the conspiracy to unite on their side all the tribes, a red billow of +tomahawk wielders would have engulfed 58 and extinguished the English +settlements. The French, it is true, made allies of the Shawanoes, the +Delawares, the Choctaws, and a strong faction of the Creeks; and they +finally won over the Cherokees after courting them for more than twenty +years. But the Creeks in part, the powerful Chickasaws, and the Iroquois +Confederacy, or Six Nations, remained loyal to the English. In both +North and South it was the influence of the traders that kept these red +tribes on the English side. The Iroquois were held loyal by Sir William +Johnson and his deputy, George Croghan, the King of Traders. The +Chickasaws followed their best-beloved trader, James Adair; and among +the Creeks another trader, Lachlan McGillivray, wielded a potent +influence. + +Lachlan McGillivray was a Highlander. He landed in Charleston in 1735 at +the age of sixteen and presently joined a trader's caravan as pack-horse +boy. A few years later he married a woman of the Creeks. On many +occasions he defeated French and Spanish plots with the Creeks for the +extermination of the colonists in Georgia and South Carolina. His action +in the final war with the French (1760), when the Indian terror was +raging, is typical. News came that four thousand 59 Creek warriors, +reinforced by French Choctaws, were about to fall on the southern +settlements. At the risk of their lives, McGillivray and another trader +named Galphin hurried from Charleston to their trading house on the +Georgia frontier. Thither they invited several hundred Creek warriors, +feasted and housed them for several days, and finally won them from +their purpose. McGillivray had a brilliant son, Alexander, who about +this time became a chief in his mother's nation--perhaps on this very +occasion, as it was an Indian custom, in making a brotherhood pact, to +send a son to dwell in the brother's house. We shall meet that son +again as the Chief of the Creeks and the terrible scourge of Georgia and +Tennessee in the dark days of the Revolutionary War. + +The bold deeds of the early traders, if all were to be told, would +require a book as long as the huge volume written by James Adair, the +English Chickasaw. Adair was an Englishman who entered the Indian trade +in 1785 and launched upon the long and dangerous trail from Charleston +to the upper towns of the Cherokees, situated in the present Monroe +County, Tennessee. Thus he was one of the earliest pioneers of the Old +Southwest; and he was Tennessee's first author. I 60 am well acquainted, +he says, with near two thousand miles of the American continent--a +statement which gives one some idea of an early trader's enterprise, +hardihood, and peril. Adair's two thousand miles were twisting Indian +trails and paths he slashed out for himself through uninhabited wilds, +for when not engaged in trade, hunting, literature, or war, it pleased +him to make solitary trips of exploration. These seem to have led him +chiefly northward through the Appalachians, of which he must have been +one of the first white explorers. + +A many-sided man was James Adair--cultured, for his style suffers not +by comparison with other writers of his day, no stranger to Latin and +Greek, and not ignorant of Hebrew, which he studied to assist him in +setting forth his ethnological theory that the American Indians were +the descendants of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. Before we dismiss his +theory with a smile, let us remember that he had not at his disposal the +data now available which reveal points of likeness in custom, language +formation, and symbolism among almost all primitive peoples. The +formidable title-page of his book in itself suggests an author keenly +observant, accurate as to detail, and possessed of a 61 versatile and +substantial mind. Most of the pages were written in the towns of the +Chickasaws, with whom he lived as a friend and brother, but from whose +natural jealousy and prying disposition he was obliged to conceal his +papers. Never, he assures us, was a literary work begun and carried on +with more disadvantages! + +Despite these disabilities the author wrote a book of absorbing +interest. His intimate sympathetic pictures of Indian life as it was +before the tribes had been conquered are richly valuable to the lover of +native lore and to the student of the history of white settlement. The +author believes, as he must, in the supremacy of his own race, but he +nevertheless presents the Indians' side of the argument as no man could +who had not made himself one of them. He thereby adds interest to those +fierce struggles which took place along the border; for he shows us the +red warrior not as a mere brute with a tomahawk but as a human creature +with an ideal of his own, albeit an ideal that must give place to a +better. Even in view of the red man's hideous methods of battle +and inhuman treatment of captives, we cannot ponder unmoved Adair's +description of his preparations for war--the fasting, the abstention +from all family 62 intercourse, and the purification rites and prayers +for three days in the house set apart, while the women, who might not +come close to their men in this fateful hour, stood throughout the night +till dawn chanting before the door. Another poetic touch the author +gives us, from the Cherokee--or Cheerake as he spells it--explaining +that the root, chee-ra, means fire. A Cherokee never extinguished fire +save on the occasion of a death, when he thrust a burning torch into the +water and said, _Neetah intahah_--the days appointed him were finished. +The warrior slain in battle was held to have been balanced by death and +it was said of him that he was weighed on the path and made light. Adair +writes that the Cherokees, until corrupted by French agents and by +the later class of traders who poured rum among them like water, were +honest, industrious, and friendly. They were ready to meet the white +man with their customary phrase of good will: I shall firmly shake hands +with your speech. He was intimately associated with this tribe from 1735 +to 1744, when he diverted his activities to the Chickasaws. + +It was from the Cherokees' chief town, Great Telliko, in the +Appalachians, that Adair explored the mountains. He describes the pass +through the 63 chain which was used by the Indians and which, from +his outline of it, was probably the Cumberland Gap. He relates many +incidents of the struggle with the French--manifestations even in this +remote wilderness of the vast conflict that was being waged for the New +World by two imperial nations of the Old. + +Adair undertook, at the solicitation of Governor Glen of South Carolina, +the dangerous task of opening up trade with the Choctaws, a tribe +mustering upwards of five thousand warriors who were wholly in +the French interest. Their country lay in what is now the State of +Mississippi along the great river, some seven hundred miles west and +southwest of Charleston. After passing the friendly Creek towns the +trail led on for 150 miles through what was practically the enemy's +country. Adair, owing to what he likes to term his usual good fortune, +reached the Choctaw country safely and by his adroitness and substantial +presents won the friendship of the influential chief, Red Shoe, whom +he found in a receptive mood, owing to a French agent's breach of +hospitality involving Red Shoe's favorite wife. Adair thus created a +large pro-English faction among the Choctaws, and his success seriously +impaired French prestige with all 64 the southwestern tribes. Several +times French Choctaws bribed to murder him, waylaid Adair on the +trail--twice when he was alone--only to be baffled by the imperturbable +self-possession and alert wit which never failed him in emergencies. + +Winning a Choctaw trade cost Adair, besides attacks on his life, £2200, +for which he was never reimbursed, notwithstanding Governor Glen's +agreement with him. And, on his return to Charleston, while the Governor +was detaining him on one pretext or another, he found that a new +expedition, which the Governor was favoring for reasons of his own, had +set out to capture his Chickasaw trade and gather in the expected great +crop of deerskins and beaver… before I could possibly return to the +Chikkasah Country. Nothing daunted, however, the hardy trader set out +alone. + +In the severity of winter, frost, snow, hail and heavy rains succeed +each other in these climes, so that I partly rode and partly swam to the +Chikkasah country; for not expecting to stay long below [in Charleston] +I took no leathern canoe. Many of the broad, deep creeks… had now +overflowed their banks, ran at a rapid rate and were unpassable to any +but desperate people:… the rivers and swamps were dreadful by rafts of +timber driving down the former and the great fallen trees floating in +the latter.… Being forced to wade deep through cane swamps or woody +thickets, it proved very 65 troublesome to keep my firearms dry on +which, as a second means, my life depended. + +Nevertheless Adair defeated the Governor's attempt to steal his trade, +and later on published the whole story in the Charleston press and sent +in a statement of his claims to the Assembly, with frank observations +on His Excellency himself. We gather that his bold disregard of High +Personages set all Charleston in an uproar! + +Adair is tantalizingly modest about his own deeds. He devotes pages to +prove that an Indian rite agrees with the Book of Leviticus but only a +paragraph to an exploit of courage and endurance such as that ride and +swim for the Indian trade. We have to read between the lines to find the +man; but he well repays the search. Briefly, incidentally, he mentions +that on one trip he was captured by the French, who were so, well +acquainted with the great damages I had done to them and feared others +I might occasion, as to confine me a close prisoner… in the Alebahma +garrison. They were fully resolved to have sent me down to Mobile or New +Orleans as a capital criminal to be hanged… but I doubted not of being +able to extricate myself some way or other. They appointed double +centries over me for some days before I was to be sent down in the +French King's large boat. They were strongly charged against 66 laying +down their weapons or suffering any hostile thing to be in the place +where I was kept, as they deemed me capable of any mischief.… About an +hour before we were to set off by water I escaped from them by land.… +I took through the middle of the low land covered with briers at full +speed. I heard the French clattering on horseback along the path… and +the howling savages pursuing…, but my usual good fortune enabled me to +leave them far enough behind.… + +One feels that a few of the pages given up to Leviticus might well have +been devoted to a detailed account of this escape from double centries +and a fortified garrison, and the plunge through the tangled wilds, by +a man without gun or knife or supplies, and who for days dared not show +himself upon the trail. + +There is too much of my usual good fortune in Adair's narrative; such +luck as his argues for extraordinary resources in the man. Sometimes +we discover only through one phrase on a page that he must himself have +been the hero of an event he relates in the third person. This seems +to be the case in the affair of Priber, which was the worst of those +damages Adair did to the French. Priber was a gentleman of curious and +speculative temper sent by the French in 1736 to Great Telliko to win +the Cherokees to their interest. 67 At this time Adair was trading with +the Cherokees. He relates that Priber, more effectually to answer +the design of his commission… ate, drank, slept, danced, dressed, and +painted himself with the Indians, so that it was not easy to distinguish +him from the natives,--he married also with them, and being endued +with a strong understanding and retentive memory he soon learned their +dialect, and by gradual advances impressed them with a very ill +opinion of the English, representing them as fraudulent, avaritious and +encroaching people; he at the same time inflated the artless savages +with a prodigious high opinion of their own importance in the American +scale of power.… Having thus infected them… he easily formed them into +a nominal republican government--crowned their old Archi-magus +emperor after a pleasing new savage form, and invented a variety of +high-sounding titles for all the members of his imperial majesty's red +court. + +Priber cemented the Cherokee empire by slow but sure degrees to the +very great danger of our southern colonies. His position was that of +Secretary of State and as such, with a studiedly provocative arrogance, +he carried on correspondence with the British authorities. The colonial +Government seems, on this occasion, to have listened to the traders and +to have realized that Priber was a danger, for soldiers were sent to +take him prisoner. The Cherokees, however, 68 had so firmly shaked hands +with their Secretary's admired discourse that they threatened to take +the warpath if their beloved man were annoyed, and the soldiers went +home without him--to the great hurt of English prestige. The Cherokee +empire had now endured for five years and was about to rise into a far +greater state of puissance by the acquisition of the Muskohge, Chocktaw +and the Western Mississippi Indians, when fortunately for the history of +British colonization in America, an accident befell the Secretary. + +It is in connection with this accident that the reader suspects the +modest but resourceful Adair of conniving with Fate. Since the military +had failed and the Government dared not again employ force, other means +must be found; the trader provided them. The Secretary with his Cherokee +bodyguard journeyed south on his mission to the Creeks. Secure, as he +supposed, he lodged overnight in an Indian town. But there a company +of English traders took him into custody, along with his bundle of +manuscripts presumably intended for the French commandant at Fort +Alabama, and handed him over to the Governor of Georgia, who imprisoned +him and kept him out of mischief till he died. + +As a Briton, Adair contributed to Priber's fate; 69 and as such he +approves it. As a scholar with philosophical and ethnological leanings, +however, he deplores it, and hopes that Priber's valuable manuscripts +may escape the despoiling hands of military power. Priber had spent his +leisure in compiling a Cherokee dictionary; Adair's occupation, while +domiciled in his winter house in Great Telliko, was the writing of his +Indian Appendix to the Pentateuch. As became brothers in science, +they had exchanged notes, so we gather from Adair's references to +conversations and correspondence. Adair's difficulties as an author, +however, had been increased by a treacherous lapse from professional +etiquette on the part of the Secretary: He told them [the Indians] +that in the very same manner as he was their great Secretary, I was the +devil's clerk, or an accursed one who marked on paper the bad speech of +the evil ones of darkness. On his own part Adair admits that his object +in this correspondence was to trap the Secretary into something more +serious than literary errata. That is, he admits it by implication; +he says the Secretary feared it. During the years of their duel, Adair +apparently knew that the scholarly compiler of the Cherokee dictionary +was secretly inciting members of this particular Lost Tribe to tomahawk +the discoverer of 70 their biblical origin; and Priber, it would seem, +knew that he knew! + +Adair shows, inferentially, that land encroachment was not the sole +cause of those Indian wars with which we shall deal in a later chapter. +The earliest causes were the instigations of the French and the rewards +which they offered for English scalps. But equally provocative of Indian +rancor were the acts of sometimes merely stupid, sometimes dishonest, +officials; the worst of these, Adair considered, was the cheapening of +the trade through the granting of general licenses. + +Formerly each trader had a license for two [Indian] towns.… At my first +setting out among them, a number of traders… journeyed through our +various nations in different companies and were generally men of worth; +of course they would have a living price for their goods, which they +carried on horseback to the remote Indian countries at very great +expences.… [The Indians] were kept under proper restraint, were easy in +their minds and peaceable on account of the plain, honest lessons daily +inculcated on them… but according to the present unwise plan, two and +even three Arablike peddlars sculk about in one of those villages… who +are generally the dregs and offs-courings of our climes… by inebriating +the Indians with their nominally prohibited and poisoning spirits, they +purchase the necessaries of life at four and five hundred per cent 71 +cheaper than the orderly traders.… Instead of showing good examples +of moral conduct, beside the other part of life, they instruct the +unknowing and imitating savages in many diabolical lessons of obscenity +and blasphemy. + +In these statements, contemporary records bear him out. There is no +sadder reading than the many pleas addressed by the Indian chiefs to +various officials to stop the importation of liquor into their country, +alleging the debauchment of their young men and warning the white man, +with whom they desired to be friends, that in an Indian drink and blood +lust quickly combined. + +Adair's book was published in London in 1775. He wrote it to be read by +Englishmen as well as Americans; and some of his reflections on liberty, +justice, and Anglo-Saxon unity would not sound unworthily today. His +sympathies were with the principles of our Magna Charta Americana; but +he thought the threatened division of the English-speaking peoples +the greatest evil that could befall civilization. His voluminous work +discloses a man not only of wide mental outlook but a practical man +with a sense of commercial values. Yet, instead of making a career for +himself among his own caste, he made his home for over thirty years 72 +in the Chickasaw towns; and it is plain that, with the exception of some +of his older brother traders, he preferred the Chickasaw to any other +society. + +The complete explanation of such men as Adair we need not expect to +find stated anywhere--not even in and between the lines of his book. +The conventionalist would seek it in moral obliquity; the radical, in a +temperament that is irked by the superficialities that comprise so large +a part of conventional standards. The reason for his being what he was +is almost the only thing Adair did not analyze in his book. Perhaps, +to him, it was self evident. We may let it be so to us, and see it most +clearly presented in a picture composed from some of his brief sketches: +A land of grass and green shade inset with bright waters, where deer +and domestic cattle herded together along the banks; a circling group +of houses, their white-clayed walls sparkling under the sun's rays, and, +within and without, the movement of a friendly and sagacious people, who +kindly treated and watchfully guarded their white brother in peace and +war, and who conversed daily with him in the Old Beloved Speech learned +first of Nature. Like towers in cities beyond the common size of those +of the Indians rose the winter and summer houses 73 and the huge trading +house which the tribe had built for their best beloved friend in the +town's center, because there he would be safest from attack. On the +rafters hung the smoked and barbecued delicacies taken in the hunt and +prepared for him by his red servants, who were also his comrades at home +and on the dangerous trail. Beloved old women kept an eye on his small +sons, put to drowse on panther skins so that they might grow up brave +warriors. Nothing was there of artifice or pretense, only the needful +things to make a reasonable life happy. All was as primitive, naive, +and contented as the woman whose outline is given once in a few strokes, +proudly and gayly penciled: I have the pleasure of writing this by the +side of a Chikkasah female, as great a princess as ever lived among the +ancient Peruvians or Mexicans, and she bids me be sure not to mark the +paper wrong after the manner of most of the traders; otherwise it will +spoil the making good bread or homony! + +His final chapter is the last news of James Adair, type of the earliest +trader. Did his bold attacks on corrupt officials and rum peddlers--made +publicly before Assemblies and in print--raise for him a dense cloud of +enmity that dropped oblivion 74 on his memory? Perhaps. But, in truth, +his own book is all the history of him we need. It is the record of a +man. He lived a full life and served his day; and it matters not that +a mist envelops the place where unafraid he met the Last Enemy, was +weighed on the path and made light. + +75 + + + + +Chapter IV + +The Passing Of The French Peril + +The great pile of the Appalachian peaks was not the only barrier which +held back the settler with his plough and his rifle from following the +trader's tinkling caravans into the valleys beyond. Over the hills the +French were lords of the land. The frontiersman had already felt their +enmity through the torch and tomahawk of their savage allies. By his own +strength alone he could not cope with the power entrenched beyond the +hills; so he halted. But that power, by its unachievable desire to be +overlord of two hemispheres, was itself to precipitate events which +would open the westward road. + +The recurring hour in the cycle of history, when the issue of Autocracy +against Democracy cleaves the world, struck for the men of the +eighteenth century as the second half of that century dawned. In our own +day, happily, that issue has been perceived by the rank and file of the +people. In 76 those darker days, as France and England grappled in +that conflict of systems which culminated in the Seven Years' War, the +fundamental principles at stake were clear to only a handful of thinking +men. + +But abstractions, whether clear or obscure, do not cause ambassadors +to demand their passports. The declaration of war awaits the overt act. +Behold, then, how great a matter is kindled by a little fire! The _casus +belli_ between France and England in the Seven Years' War--the war which +humbled France in Europe and lost her India and Canada--had to do with +a small log fort built by a few Virginians in 1754 at the Forks of +the Ohio River and wrested from them in the same year by a company of +Frenchmen from Canada. + +The French claimed the valley of the Ohio as their territory; the +English claimed it as theirs. The dispute was of long standing. +The French claim was based on discovery; the English claim, on the +sea-to-sea charters of Virginia and other colonies and on treaties +with the Six Nations. The French refused to admit the right of the +Six Nations to dispose of the territory. The English were inclined to +maintain the validity of their treaties with the Indians. Especially was +Virginia so 77 inclined, for a large share of the Ohio lay within her +chartered domain. + +The quarrel had entered its acute phase in 1749, when both the rival +claimants took action to assert their sovereignty. The Governor of +Canada sent an envoy, Céloron de Blainville, with soldiers, to take +formal possession of the Ohio for the King of France. In the same year +the English organized in Virginia the Ohio Company for the colonization +of the same country; and summoned Christopher Gist, explorer, trader, +and guide, from his home on the Yadkin and dispatched him to survey the +land. + +Then appeared on the scene that extraordinary man, Robert Dinwiddie, +Lieutenant Governor of Virginia, erstwhile citizen of Glasgow. His +correspondence from Virginia during his seven years' tenure of office +(1751-58) depicts the man with a vividness surpassing paint. He was as +honest as the day--as honest as he was fearless and fussy. But he had +no patience; he wanted things done and done at once, and his way was the +way to do them. People who did not think as he thought didn't think +at all. On this drastic premise he went to work. There was of course +continuous friction between him and the House of Burgesses. 78 Dinwiddie +had all a Scot's native talent for sarcasm. His letters, his addresses, +perhaps in particular his addresses to the House, bristled with +satirical thrusts at his opponents. If he had spelled out in full all +the words he was so eager to write, he would have been obliged to lessen +his output; so he used a shorthand system of his own, peculiar enough to +be remarkable even though abbreviations were the rule in that day. Even +the dignity of Kings he sacrificed to speed, and we find His Majesty +abbreviated to H M'y; yet a smaller luminary known as His Honor fares +better, losing only the last letter--His Hono. Ho. stands for house and +yt for that, what, it, and anything else, as convenient. Many of his +letters wind up with I am ve'y much fatig'd. We know that he must have +been! + +It was a formidable task that confronted Dinwiddie--to possess and +defend the Ohio. Christopher Gist returned in 1751, having surveyed the +valley for the Ohio Company as far as the Scioto and Miami rivers, +and in the following year the survey was ratified by the Indians. +The Company's men were busy blazing trails through the territory and +building fortified posts. But the French dominated the territory. They +had built 79 and occupied with troops Fort Le Bœuf on French Creek, a +stream flowing into the Allegheny. We may imagine Dinwiddie's rage at +this violation of British soil by French soldiers and how he must have +sputtered to the young George Washington, when he summoned that officer +and made him the bearer of a letter to the French commander at Fort Le +Bœuf, to demand that French troops be at once withdrawn from the Ohio. + +Washington made the journey to Fort Le Bœuf in December, 1753, but +the mission of course proved fruitless. Dinwiddie then wrote to London +urging that a force be sent over to help the colonies maintain their +rights and, under orders from the Crown, suggested by himself, he wrote +to the governors of all the other colonies to join with Virginia in +raising troops to settle the ownership of the disputed territory. From +Governor Dobbs of North Carolina he received an immediate response. +By means of logic, sarcasm, and the entire force of his prerogatives, +Dinwiddie secured from his own balking Assembly £10,000 with which +to raise troops. From Maryland he obtained nothing. There were three +prominent Marylanders in the Ohio Company, but--or because of +this--the Maryland Assembly voted down the measure for 80 a military +appropriation. On June 18, 1754, Dinwiddie wrote, with unusually full +spelling for him: + +I am perswaded had His Majesty's Com'ds to the other Colonies been duely +obey'd, and the necessary Assistance given by them, the Fr. wou'd have +long ago have been oblig'd entirely to have evacuated their usurp'd +Possession of the King's Lands, instead of w'ch they are daily becoming +more formidable, whilst every Gov't except No. Caro. has amus'd me with +Expectations that have proved fruitless, and at length refuse to give +any Supply, unless in such a manner as must render it ineffectual. + +This saddened mood with its deliberate penmanship did not last long. +Presently Dinwiddie was making a Round Robin of himself in another +series of letters to Governors, Councilors, and Assemblymen, frantically +beseeching them for H. M'y's hono. and their own, and, if not, for +post'r'ty, to rise against the cruel French whose Indians were harrying +the borders again and Basely, like Virmin, stealing and carrying off the +helpless infant--as nice a simile, by the way, as any Sheridan ever put +into the mouth of Mrs. Malaprop. + +Dinwiddie saw his desires thwarted on every hand by the selfish spirit +of localism and jealousy which was more rife in America in those days +than it is today. Though the phrase capitalistic war 81 had not yet been +coined, the great issues of English civilization on this continent were +befogged, for the majority in the colonies, by the trivial fact that the +shareholders in the Ohio Company stood to win by a vigorous prosecution +of the war and to lose if it were not prosecuted at all. The irascible +Governor, however, proceeded with such men and means as he could obtain. + +And now in the summer of 1754 came the overt act which precipitated the +inevitable war. The key to the valley of the Ohio was the tongue of land +at the Forks, where the Allegheny and the Monongahela join their waters +in the Beautiful River. This site--today Pittsburgh--if occupied and +held by either nation would give that nation the command of the Ohio. +Occupied it was for a brief hour by a small party of Virginians, under +Captain William Trent; but no sooner had they erected on the spot a +crude fort than the French descended upon them. What happened then all +the world knows: how the French built on the captured site their great +Fort Duquesne; how George Washington with an armed force, sent by +Dinwiddie to recapture the place, encountered French and Indians at +Great Meadows and built Fort Necessity, which he was compelled to +surrender; 82 how in the next year (1755) General Braddock arrived from +across the sea and set out to take Fort Duquesne, only to meet on the +way the disaster called Braddock's Defeat; and how, before another year +had passed, the Seven Years' War was raging in Europe, and England was +allied with the enemies of France. + +From the midst of the debacle of Braddock's defeat rises the figure +of the young Washington. Twenty-three he was then, tall and spare and +hardbodied from a life spent largely in the open. When Braddock fell, +this Washington appeared. Reckless of the enemy's bullets, which spanged +about him and pierced his clothes, he dashed up and down the lines in an +effort to rally the panic-stricken redcoats. He was too late to save +the day, but not to save a remnant of the army and bring out his own +Virginians in good order. Whether among the stay-at-homes and voters of +credits there were some who would have ascribed Washington's conduct on +that day to the fact that his brothers were large shareholders in the +Ohio Company and that Fort Duquesne was their personal property or +"private interest," history does not say. We may suppose so. + +North Carolina, the one colony which had not 83 amus'd the Governor of +Virginia with Expectations that proved fruitless, had voted £12,000 +for the war and had raised two companies of troops. One of these, under +Edward Brice Dobbs, son of Governor Dobbs, marched with Braddock; and +in that company as wagoner went Daniel Boone, then in his twenty-second +year. Of Boone's part in Braddock's campaign nothing more is recorded +save that on the march he made friends with John Findlay, the trader, +his future guide into Kentucky; and that, on the day of the defeat, when +his wagons were surrounded, he escaped by slashing the harness, leaping +on the back of one of his horses, and dashing into the forest. + +Meanwhile the southern tribes along the border were comparatively quiet. +That they well knew a colossal struggle between the two white races was +pending and were predisposed to ally themselves with the stronger is +not to be doubted. French influence had long been sifting through the +formidable Cherokee nation, which still, however, held true in the main +to its treaties with the English. It was the policy of the Governors of +Virginia and North Carolina to induce the Cherokees to enter strongly +into the war as allies of the 84 English. Their efforts came to nothing +chiefly because of the purely local and suicidal Indian policy of +Governor Glen of South Carolina. There had been some dispute between +Glen and Dinwiddie as to the right of Virginia to trade with the +Cherokees; and Glen had sent to the tribes letters calculated to sow +distrust of all other aspirants for Indian favor, even promising that +certain settlers in the Back Country of North Carolina should be removed +and their holdings restored to the Indians. These letters caused great +indignation in North Carolina, when they came to light, and had the +worst possible effect upon Indian relations. The Indians now inclined +their ear to the French who, though fewer than the English, were at +least united in purpose. + +Governor Glen took this inauspicious moment to hold high festival with +the Cherokees. It was the last year of his administration and +apparently he hoped to win promotion to some higher post by showing his +achievements for the fur trade and in the matter of new land acquired. +He plied the Cherokees with drink and induced them to make formal +submission and to cede all their lands to the Crown. When the chiefs +recovered their sobriety, they were filled with rage at what had been +done, 85 and they remembered how the French had told them that the +English intended to make slaves of all the Indians and to steal their +lands. The situation was complicated by another incident. Several +Cherokee warriors returning from the Ohio, whither they had gone +to fight for the British, were slain by frontiersmen. The tribe, +in accordance with existing agreements, applied to Virginia for +redress--but received none. + +There was thus plenty of powder for an explosion. Governor Lyttleton, +Glen's successor, at last flung the torch into the magazine. He seized, +as hostages, a number of friendly chiefs who were coming to Charleston +to offer tokens of good will and forced them to march under guard on +a military tour which the Governor was making (1759) with intent to +overawe the savages. When this expedition reached Prince George, on the +upper waters of the Savannah, the Indian hostages were confined within +the fort; and the Governor, satisfied with the result of his maneuver +departed south for Charleston. Then followed a tragedy. Some Indian +friends of the imprisoned chiefs attacked the fort, and the commander, +a popular young officer, was treacherously killed during a parley. The +infuriated frontiersmen within the fort fell upon the 86 hostages and +slew them all--twenty-six chiefs--and the Indian war was on. + +If all were to be told of the struggle which followed in the Back +Country, the story could not be contained in this book. Many brave +and resourceful men went out against the savages. We can afford only a +passing glance at one of them. Hugh Waddell of North Carolina was the +most brilliant of all the frontier fighters in that war. He was a young +Ulsterman from County Down, a born soldier, with a special genius for +fighting Indians, although he did not grow up on the border, for he +arrived in North Carolina in 1753, at the age of nineteen. He was +appointed by Governor Dobbs to command the second company which North +Carolina had raised for the war, a force of 450 rangers to protect the +border counties; and he presently became the most conspicuous military +figure in the colony. As to his personality, we have only a few meager +details, with a portrait that suggests plainly enough those qualities +of boldness and craft which characterized his tactics. Governor Dobbs +appears to have had a special love towards Hugh, whose family he had +known in Ireland, for an undercurrent of almost fatherly pride is to be +found in the old Governor's reports to the Assembly concerning Waddell's +exploits. + +87 The terror raged for nearly three years. Cabins and fields were +burned, and women and children were slaughtered or dragged away +captives. Not only did immigration cease but many hardy settlers fled +from the country. At length, after horrors indescribable and great toll +of life, the Cherokees gave up the struggle. Their towns were invaded +and laid waste by imperial and colonial troops, and they could do +nothing but make peace. In 1761 they signed a treaty with the English to +hold while rivers flow and grasses grow and sun and moon endure. + +In the previous year (1760) the imperial war had run its course in +America. New France lay prostrate, and the English were supreme not only +on the Ohio but on the St. Lawrence and the Great Lakes. Louisbourg, +Quebec, Montreal, Oswego, Niagara, Duquesne, Detroit--all were in +English hands. + +Hugh Waddell and his rangers, besides serving with distinction in the +Indian war, had taken part in the capture of Fort Duquesne. This feat +had been accomplished in 1758 by an expedition under General Forbes. The +troops made a terrible march over a new route, cutting a road as they 88 +went. It was November when they approached their objective. The wastes +of snow and their diminished supplies caused such depression among the +men that the officers called a halt to discuss whether or not to proceed +toward Fort Duquesne, where they believed the French to be concentrated +in force. Extravagant sums in guineas were named as suitable reward for +any man who would stalk and catch a French Indian and learn from him the +real conditions inside the fort. The honor, if not the guineas, fell to +John Rogers, one of Waddell's rangers. From the Indian it was learned +that the French had already gone, leaving behind only a few of their +number. As the English drew near, they found that the garrison had blown +up the magazine, set fire to the fort, and made off. + +Thus, while New France was already tottering, but nearly two years +before the final capitulation at Montreal, the English again became +masters of the Ohio Company's land--masters of the Forks of the Ohio. +This time they were there to stay. Where the walls of Fort Duquesne had +crumbled in the fire Fort Pitt was to rise, proudly bearing the name +of England's Great Commoner who had directed English arms to victory on +three continents. + +With France expelled and the Indians deprived 89 of their white allies, +the westward path lay open to the pioneers, even though the red man +himself would rise again and again in vain endeavor to bar the way. So a +new era begins, the era of exploration for definite purpose, the era +of commonwealth building. In entering on it, we part with the earliest +pioneer--the trader, who first opened the road for both the lone home +seeker and the great land company. He dwindles now to the mere barterer +and so--save for a few chance glimpses--slips out of sight, for his +brave days as Imperial Scout are done. + +90 + + + + +Chapter V + +Boone, The Wanderer + +What thoughts filled Daniel Boone's mind as he was returning from +Braddock's disastrous campaign in 1755 we may only conjecture. Perhaps +he was planning a career of soldiering, for in later years he was to +distinguish himself as a frontier commander in both defense and attack. +Or it may be that his heart was full of the wondrous tales told him +by the trader, John Findlay, of that Hunter's Canaan, Kentucky, where +buffalo and deer roamed in thousands. Perhaps he meant to set out +ere long in search of the great adventure of his dreams, despite the +terrible dangers of trail making across the zones of war into the +unknown. + +However that may be, Boone straightway followed neither of these +possible plans on his return to the Yadkin but halted for a different +adventure. There, a rifle shot's distance from his threshold, was +offered him the oldest and sweetest of all 91 hazards to the daring. He +was twenty-two, strong and comely and a whole man; and therefore he was +in no mind to refuse what life held out to him in the person of Rebecca +Bryan. Rebecca was the daughter of Joseph Bryan, who had come to the +Yadkin from Pennsylvania some time before the Boones; and she was in her +seventeenth year. + +Writers of an earlier and more sentimental period than ours have +endeavored to supply, from the saccharine stores of their fancy, the +romantic episodes connected with Boone's wooing which history has +omitted to record. Hence the tale that the young hunter, walking abroad +in the spring gloaming, saw Mistress Rebecca's large dark eyes shining +in the dusk of the forest, mistook them for a deer's eyes and shot--his +aim on this occasion fortunately being bad! But if Boone's rifle was +missing its mark at ten paces, Cupid's dart was speeding home. So runs +the story concocted a hundred years later by some gentle scribe ignorant +alike of game seasons, the habits of hunters, and the way of a man with +a maid in a primitive world. + +Daniel and Rebecca were married in the spring of 1756. Squire Boone, +in his capacity as justice of the peace, tied the knot; and in a +small cabin built upon his spacious lands the young couple 92 set up +housekeeping. Here Daniel's first two sons were born. In the third +year of his marriage, when the second child was a babe in arms, Daniel +removed with his wife and their young and precious family to Culpeper +County in eastern Virginia, for the border was going through its darkest +days of the French and Indian War. During the next two or three years +we find him in Virginia engaged as a wagoner, hauling tobacco in season; +but back on the border with his rifle, after the harvest, aiding in +defense against the Indians. In 1759 he purchased from his father a +lot on Sugar Tree Creek, a tributary of Dutchman's Creek (Davie County, +North Carolina) and built thereon a cabin for himself. The date when he +brought his wife and children to live in their new abode on the border +is not recorded. It was probably some time after the close of the Indian +War. Of Boone himself during these years we have but scant information. +We hear of him again in Virginia and also as a member of the pack-horse +caravan which brought into the Back Country the various necessaries for +the settlers. We know, too, that in the fall of 1760 he was on a lone +hunting trip in the mountains west of the Yadkin; for until a few years +ago there might be seen, still standing on the banks 93 of Boone's Creek +(a small tributary of the Watauga) in eastern Tennessee, a tree bearing +the legend, D Boon cilled A BAR on this tree 1760. Boone was always fond +of carving his exploits on trees, and his wanderings have been traced +largely by his arboreal publications. In the next year (1761) he went +with Waddell's rangers when they marched with the army to the final +subjugation of the Cherokee. + +That Boone and his family were back on the border in the new cabin +shortly after the end of the war, we gather from the fact that in 1764 +he took his little son James, aged seven, on one of his long hunting +excursions. From this time dates the intimate comradeship of father and +son through all the perils of the wilderness, a comradeship to come +to its tragic end ten years later when, as we shall see, the +seventeen-year-old lad fell under the red man's tomahawk as his father +was leading the first settlers towards Kentucky. In the cold nights +of the open camp, as Daniel and James lay under the frosty stars, the +father kept the boy warm snuggled to his breast under the broad flap +of his hunting shirt. Sometimes the two were away from home for months +together, and Daniel declared little James to be as good a woodsman as +his father. + +94 Meanwhile fascinating accounts of the new land of Florida, ceded +to Britain by the Treaty of Paris in 1763, had leaked into the Back +Country; and in the winter of 1765 Boone set off southward on horseback +with seven companions. Colonel James Grant, with whose army Boone had +fought in 1761, had been appointed Governor of the new colony and was +offering generous inducements to settlers. The party traveled along the +borders of South Carolina and Georgia. No doubt they made the greater +part of their way over the old Traders' Trace, the whitened warpath; and +they suffered severe hardships. Game became scarcer as they proceeded. +Once they were nigh to perishing of starvation and were saved from that +fate only through chance meeting with a band of Indians who, seeing +their plight, made camp and shared their food with them--according to +the Indian code in time of peace. + +Boone's party explored Florida from St. Augustine to Pensacola, and +Daniel became sufficiently enamored of the tropical south to purchase +there land and a house. His wife, however, was unwilling to go to +Florida, and she was not long in convincing the hunter that he would +soon tire of a gameless country. A gameless country! Perhaps 95 this was +the very thought which turned the wanderer's desires again towards the +land of Kentucky.¹ The silencing of the enemy's whisper in the Cherokee +camps had opened the border forests once more to the nomadic rifleman. +Boone was not alone in the desire to seek out what lay beyond. His +brother-in-law, John Stewart, and a nephew by marriage, Benjamin +Cutbirth, or Cutbird, with two other young men, John Baker and James +Ward, in 1766 crossed the Appalachian Mountains, probably by stumbling +upon the Indian trail winding from base to summit and from peak to base +again over this part of the great hill barrier. They eventually reached +the Mississippi River and, having taken a good quantity of peltry on +the way, they launched upon the stream and came in time to New Orleans, +where they made a satisfactory trade of their furs. + +¹ Kentucky, from Ken-ta-ke, an Iroquois word meaning the place of old +fields. Adair calls the territory the old fields. The Indians apparently +used the word old, as we do, in a sense of endearment and possession as +well as relative to age. Boone was fired anew by descriptions of this +successful feat, in which two of his kinsmen had participated. He could +no longer be held back. He must find the magic door that led through +the vast mountain wall into Kentucky--Kentucky, with its green prairies +where the buffalo and deer 96 were as ten thousand thousand cattle +feeding in the wilds, and where the balmy air vibrated with the music of +innumerable wings. + +Accordingly, in the autumn of 1767, Boone began his quest of the +delectable country in the company of his friend, William Hill, who had +been with him in Florida. Autumn was the season of departure on all +forest excursions, because by that time the summer crops had been +gathered in and the day of the deer had come. By hunting, the explorers +must feed themselves on their travels and with deerskins and furs they +must on their return recompense those who had supplied their outfit. +Boone, the incessant but not always lucky wanderer, was in these years +ever in debt for an outfit. + +Boone and Hill made their way over the Blue Ridge and the Alleghanies +and crossed the Holston and Clinch rivers. Then they came upon the west +fork of the Big Sandy and, believing that it would lead them to the +Ohio, they continued for at least a hundred miles to the westward. Here +they found a buffalo trace, one of the many beaten out by the herds in +their passage to the salt springs, and they followed it into what is +now Floyd County in eastern Kentucky. But this was not the prairie land +described by Findlay; it was rough and hilly 97 and so overgrown with +laurel as to be almost impenetrable. They therefore wended their way +back towards the river, doubtless erected the usual hunter's camp of +skins or blankets and branches, and spent the winter in hunting and +trapping. Spring found them returning to their homes on the Yadkin with +a fair winter's haul. + +Such urgent desire as Boone's, however, was not to be defeated. The next +year brought him his great opportunity. John Findlay came to the Yadkin +with a horse pack of needles and linen and peddler's wares to tempt the +slim purses of the Back Country folk. The two erstwhile comrades in +arms were overjoyed to encounter each other again, and Findlay spent the +winter of 1768-69 in Boone's cabin. While the snow lay deep outside and +good-smelling logs crackled on the hearth, they planned an expedition +into Kentucky through the Gap where Virginia, Tennessee, and Kentucky +touch one another, which Findlay felt confident he could find. Findlay +had learned of this route from cross-mountain traders in 1753, when he +had descended the Ohio to the site of Louisville, whence he had gone +with some Shawanoes as a prisoner to their town of Es-kip-pa-ki-thi-ki +or Blue Licks.¹ + +¹ Hanna, _The Wilderness Trail,_ vol. II, pp. 215-16. 98 On the first +day of May, 1769, Boone and Findlay, accompanied by John Stewart and +three other venturesome spirits, Joseph Holden, James Mooney, and +William Cooley, took horse for the fabled land. Passing through the +Cumberland Gap, they built their first camp in Kentucky on the Red Lick +fork of Station Camp Creek. + +This camp was their base of operations. From it, usually in couples, we +infer, the explorers branched out to hunt and to take their observations +of the country. Here also they prepared the deer and buffalo meat for +the winter, dried or smoked the geese they shot in superabundance, made +the tallow and oil needed to keep their weapons in trim, their leather +soft, and their kits waterproof. Their first ill luck befell them in +December when Boone and Stewart were captured by a band of Shawanoes +who were returning from their autumn hunt on Green River. The Indians +compelled the two white men to show them the location of their camp, +took possession of all it contained in skins and furs and also helped +themselves to the horses. They left the explorers with just enough meat +and ammunition to provide for their journey homeward, and told them to +depart and not to intrude again on the red men's hunting 99 grounds. +Having given this pointed warning, the Shawanoes rode on northward +towards their towns beyond the Ohio. On foot, swiftly and craftily, +Boone and his brother-in-law trailed the band for two days. They came +upon the camp in dead of night, recaptured their horses, and fled. But +this was a game in which the Indians themselves excelled, and at +this date the Shawanoes had an advantage over Boone in their thorough +knowledge of the territory; so that within forty-eight hours the white +men were once more prisoners. After they had amused themselves by making +Boone caper about with a horse bell on his neck, while they jeered +at him in broken English, Steal horse, eh? the Shawanoes turned north +again, this time taking the two unfortunate hunters with them. Boone and +Stewart escaped, one day on the march, by a plunge into the thick tall +canebrake. Though the Indians did not attempt to follow them through the +mazes of the cane, the situation of the two hunters, without weapons +or food, was serious enough. When they found Station Camp deserted and +realized that their four companions had given them up for dead or lost +and had set off on the trail for home, even such intrepid souls as +theirs may have felt fear. They raced on in pursuit and 100 fortunately +fell in not only with their party but with Squire Boone, Daniel's +brother, and Alexander Neely, who had brought in fresh supplies of +rifles, ammunition, flour, and horses. + +After this lucky encounter the group separated. Findlay was ill, and +Holden, Mooney, and Cooley had had their fill of Kentucky; but Squire, +Neely, Stewart, and Daniel were ready for more adventures. Daniel, too, +felt under the positive necessity of putting in another year at hunting +and trapping in order to discharge his debts and provide for his family. +Near the mouth of Red River the new party built their station camp. +Here, in idle hours, Neely read aloud from a copy of _Gulliver's +Travels_ to entertain the hunters while they dressed their deerskins or +tinkered their weapons. In honor of the Lorbrulgrud of the book, though +with a pronunciation all their own, they christened the nearest creek; +and as Lulbegrud Creek it is still known. + +Before the end of the winter the two Boones were alone in the +wilderness. Their brother-in-law, Stewart, had disappeared; and Neely, +discouraged by this tragic event, had returned to the Yadkin. In May, +Squire Boone fared forth, taking with him the season's catch of beaver, +otter, and 101 deerskins to exchange in the North Carolinian trading +houses for more supplies; and Daniel was left solitary in Kentucky. + +Now followed those lonely explorations which gave Daniel Boone his +special fame above all Kentucky's pioneers. He was by no means the first +white man to enter Kentucky; and when he did enter, it was as one of +a party, under another man's guidance--if we except his former +disappointing journey into the laurel thickets of Floyd County. But +these others, barring Stewart, who fell there, turned back when they +met with loss and hardship and measured the certain risks against the +possible gains. Boone, the man of imagination, turned to wild earth +as to his kin. His genius lay in the sense of oneness he felt with his +wilderness environment. An instinct he had which these other men, as +courageous perhaps as he, did not possess. + +Never in all the times when he was alone in the woods and had no other +man's safety or counsel to consider, did he suffer ill fortune. The +nearest approach to trouble that befell him when alone occurred one day +during this summer when some Indians emerged from their green shelter +and found him, off guard for the moment, standing on a cliff gazing +with rapture over the vast rolling 102 stretches of Kentucky. He was +apparently cut off from escape, for the savages were on three sides, +advancing without haste to take him, meanwhile greeting him with mock +amity. Over the cliff leaped Boone and into the outspread arms of a +friendly maple, whose top bloomed green about sixty feet below the +cliff's rim, and left his would-be captors on the height above, grunting +their amazement. + +During this summer Boone journeyed through the valleys of the Kentucky +and the Licking. He followed the buffalo traces to the two Blue Licks +and saw the enormous herds licking up the salt earth, a darkly ruddy +moving mass of beasts whose numbers could not be counted. For many miles +he wound along the Ohio, as far as the Falls. He also found the Big Bone +Lick with its mammoth fossils. + +In July, 1770, Daniel returned to the Red River camp and there met +Squire Boone with another pack of supplies. The two brothers continued +their hunting and exploration together for some months, chiefly in +Jessamine County, where two caves still bear Boone's name. In that +winter they even braved the Green River ground, whence had come the +hunting Shawanoes who had taken Daniel's 103 first fruits a year before. +In the same year (1770) there had come into Kentucky from the Yadkin +another party of hunters, called, from their lengthy sojourn in +the twilight zone, the Long Hunters. One of these, Gasper Mansker, +afterwards related how the Long Hunters were startled one day by hearing +sounds such as no buffalo or turkey ever made, and how Mansker himself +stole silently under cover of the trees towards the place whence the +strange noises came, and descried Daniel Boone prone on his back with a +deerskin under him, his famous tall black hat beside him and his +mouth opened wide in joyous but apparently none too tuneful song. This +incident gives a true character touch. It is not recorded of any of the +men who turned back that they sang alone in the wilderness. + +In March, 1771, the two Boones started homeward, their horses bearing +the rich harvest of furs and deerskins which was to clear Daniel of debt +and to insure the comfort of the family he had not seen for two years. +But again evil fortune met them, this time in the very gates--for in +the Cumberland Gap they were suddenly surrounded by Indians who took +everything from them, leaving them neither guns nor horses. + +104 + + + + +Chapter VI + +The Fight For Kentucky + +When Boone returned home he found the Back Country of North Carolina in +the throes of the Regulation Movement. This movement, which had arisen +first from the colonists' need to police their settlements, had more +recently assumed a political character. The Regulators were now in +conflict with the authorities, because the frontier folk were suffering +through excessive taxes, extortionate fees, dishonest land titles, +and the corruption of the courts. In May, 1771, the conflict lost its +quasi-civil nature. The Regulators resorted to arms and were defeated by +the forces under Governor Tryon in the Battle of the Alamance. + +The Regulation Movement, which we shall follow in more detail further +on, was a culmination of those causes of unrest which turned men +westward. To escape from oppression and to acquire land 105 beyond +the bounds of tyranny became the earnest desire of independent spirits +throughout the Back Country. But there was another and more potent +reason why the country east of the mountains no longer contented Boone. +Hunting and trapping were Boone's chief means of livelihood. In those +days, deerskins sold for a dollar a skin to the traders at the Forks or +in Hillsborough; beaver at about two dollars and a half, and otter +at from three to five dollars. A pack-horse could carry a load of +one hundred dressed deerskins, and, as currency was scarce, a hundred +dollars was wealth. Game was fast disappearing from the Yadkin. To Boone +above all men, then, Kentucky beckoned. When he returned in the spring +of 1771 from his explorations, it was with the resolve to take his +family at once into the great game country and to persuade some of his +friends to join in this hazard of new fortunes. + +The perils of such a venture, only conjectural to us at this distance, +he knew well; but in him there was nothing that shrank from danger, +though he did not court it after the rash manner of many of his +compeers. Neither reckless nor riotous, Boone was never found among +those who opposed violence to authority, even unjust authority; nor +was 106 he ever guilty of the savagery which characterized much of the +retaliatory warfare of that period when frenzied white men bettered the +red man's instruction. In him, courage was illumined with tenderness and +made equable by self-control. Yet, though he was no fiery zealot like +the Ulstermen who were to follow him along the path he had made and +who loved and revered him perhaps because he was so different from +themselves, Boone nevertheless had his own religion. It was a simple +faith best summed up perhaps by himself in his old age when he said that +he had been only an instrument in the hand of God to open the wilderness +to settlement. + +Two years passed before Boone could muster a company of colonists for +the dangerous and delectable land. The dishonesty practiced by Lord +Granville's agents in the matter of deeds had made it difficult for +Daniel and his friends to dispose of their acreage. When at last in +the spring of 1773 the Wanderer was prepared to depart, he was again +delayed; this time by the arrival of a little son to whom was given the +name of John. By September, however, even this latest addition to the +party was ready for travel; and that month saw the Boones with a small +caravan of families journeying towards Powell's Valley, whence the 107 +Warrior's Path took its way through Cumberland Gap. At this point on the +march they were to be joined by William Russell, a famous pioneer, from +the Clinch River, with his family and a few neighbors, and by some +of Rebecca Boone's kinsmen, the Bryans, from the lower Yadkin, with a +company of forty men. + +Of Rebecca Boone history tells us too little--only that she was born a +Bryan, was of low stature and dark eyed, that she bore her husband +ten children, and lived beside him to old age. Except on his hunts and +explorations, she went with him from one cabined home to another, always +deeper into the wilds. There are no portraits of her. We can see her +only as a shadowy figure moving along the wilderness trails beside the +man who accepted his destiny of God to be a way-shower for those of +lesser faith. + +He tires not forever on his leagues of march Because her feet are set +to his footprints, And the gleam of her bare hand slants across his +shoulder. + +Boone halted his company on Walden Mountain over Powell's Valley to +await the Bryan contingent and dispatched two young men under the +leadership of his son James, then in his seventeenth year, 108 to +notify Russell of the party's arrival. As the boys were returning with +Russell's son, also a stripling, two of his slaves, and some white +laborers, they missed the path and went into camp for the night. When +dawn broke, disclosing the sleepers, a small war band of Shawanoes, who +had been spying on Boone and his party, fell upon them and slaughtered +them. Only one of Russell's slaves and a laborer escaped. The tragedy +seems augmented by the fact that the point where the boys lost the +trail and made their night quarters was hardly three miles from the main +camp--to which an hour later came the two survivors with their gloomy +tidings. Terror now took hold of the little band of emigrants, and +there were loud outcries for turning back. The Bryans, who had arrived +meanwhile, also advised retreat, saying that the signs about the scene +of blood indicated an Indian uprising. Daniel carried the scalped body +of his son, the boy-comrade of his happy hunts, to the camp and buried +it there at the beginning of the trail. His voice alone urged that they +go on. + +Fortunately indeed, as events turned out, Boone was overruled, and the +expedition was abandoned. The Bryan party and the others from North +Carolina went back to the Yadkin. Boone himself with 109 his family +accompanied Russell to the Clinch settlement, where he erected a +temporary cabin on the farm of one of the settlers, and then set out +alone on the chase to earn provision for his wife and children through +the winter. + +Those who prophesied an Indian war were not mistaken. When the snowy +hunting season had passed and the Powwowing Days were come, the Indian +war drum rattled in the medicine house from the borders of Pennsylvania +to those of Carolina. The causes of the strife for which the red men +were making ready must be briefly noted to help us form a just opinion +of the deeds that followed. Early writers have usually represented the +frontiersmen as saints in buckskin and the Indians as fiends without +the shadow of a claim on either the land or humanity. Many later writers +have merely reversed the shield. The truth is that the Indians and the +borderers reacted upon each other to the hurt of both. Paradoxically, +they grew like enough to hate one another with a savage hatred--and both +wanted the land. + +Land! Land! was the slogan of all sorts and conditions of men. Tidewater +officials held solemn powwows with the chiefs, gave wampum strings, 110 +and forthwith incorporated.¹ Chiefs blessed their white brothers who had +forever brightened the chain of friendship, departed home, and proceeded +to brighten the blades of their tomahawks and to await, not long, the +opportunity to use them on casual hunters who carried in their kits the +compass, the land-stealer. Usually the surveying hunter was a borderer; +and on him the tomahawk descended with an accelerated gusto. Private +citizens also formed land companies and sent out surveyors, regardless +of treaties. Bold frontiersmen went into No Man's Land and staked out +their claims. In the very year when disaster turned the Boone party +back, James Harrod had entered Kentucky from Pennsylvania and had marked +the site of a settlement. + +¹ The activities of the great land companies are described in Alvord's +exhaustive work, _The Mississippi Valley in British Politics._ Ten years +earlier (1763), the King had issued the famous and much misunderstood +Proclamation restricting his loving subjects from the lands west of +the mountains. The colonists interpreted this document as a tyrannous +curtailment of their liberties for the benefit of the fur trade. We know +now that the portion of this Proclamation relating to western settlement +was a wise provision 111 designed to protect the settlers on the +frontier by allaying the suspicions of the Indians, who viewed with +apprehension the triumphal occupation of that vast territory from Canada +to the Gulf of Mexico by the colonizing English. By seeking to compel +all land purchase to be made through the Crown, it was designed likewise +to protect the Indians from whisky purchase, and to make impossible the +transfer of their lands except with consent of the Indian Council, or +full quota of headmen, whose joint action alone conveyed what the tribes +considered to be legal title. Sales made according to this form, Sir +William Johnson declared to the Lords of Trade, he had never known to +be repudiated by the Indians. This paragraph of the Proclamation was in +substance an embodiment of Johnson's suggestions to the Lords of Trade. +Its purpose was square dealing and pacification; and shrewd men such +as Washington recognized that it was not intended as a final check to +expansion. A temporary expedient to quiet the minds of the Indians, +Washington called it, and then himself went out along the Great Kanawha +and into Kentucky, surveying land. + +It will be asked what had become of the Ohio Company of Virginia and +that fort at the Forks of 112 the Ohio, once a bone of contention +between France and England. Fort Pitt, as it was now called, had fallen +foul of another dispute, this time between Virginia and Pennsylvania. +Virginia claimed that the far western corner of her boundary ascended +just far enough north to take in Fort Pitt. Pennsylvania asserted that +it did nothing of the sort. The Ohio Company had meanwhile been +merged into the Walpole Company. George Croghan, at Fort Pitt, was the +Company's agent and as such was accused by Pennsylvania of favoring +from ulterior motives the claims of Virginia. Hotheads in both +colonies asseverated that the Indians were secretly being stirred up +in connection with the boundary disputes. If it does not very clearly +appear how an Indian rising would have settled the ownership of +Fort Pitt, it is evident enough where the interests of Virginia +and Pennsylvania clashed. Virginia wanted land for settlement and +speculation; Pennsylvania wanted the Indians left in possession for the +benefit of the fur trade. So far from stirring up the Indians, as his +enemies declared, Croghan was as usual giving away all his substance to +keep them quiet.¹ Indeed, 113 during this summer of 1774, eleven hundred +Indians were encamped about Fort Pitt visiting him. + +¹ The suspicion that Croghan and Lord Dunmore, the Governor of Virginia, +were instigating the war appears to have arisen out of the conduct of +Dr. John Connolly, Dunmore's agent and Croghan's nephew. Croghan had +induced the Shawanoes to bring under escort to Fort Pitt certain +English traders resident in the Indian towns. The escort was fired on +by militiamen under command of Connolly, who also issued a proclamation +declaring a state of war to exist. Connolly, however, probably acted on +his own initiative. He was interested in land on his own behalf and was +by no means the only man at that time who was ready to commit outrages +on Indians in order to obtain it. As Croghan lamented, there was too +great a spirit in the frontier people for killing Indians. Two hundred +thousand acres in the West--Kentucky and West Virginia--had been +promised to the colonial officers and soldiers who fought in the Seven +Years' War. But after making the Proclamation the British Government had +delayed issuing the patents. Washington interested himself in trying +to secure them; and Lord Dunmore, who also had caught the land-fever,² +prodded the British authorities but won only rebuke for his inconvenient +activities. Insistent, however, Dunmore sent out parties of surveyors +to fix the bounds of the soldiers' claims. James Harrod, Captain Thomas +Bullitt, Hancock Taylor, and three McAfee brothers entered Kentucky, by +the Ohio, under Dunmore's orders. John Floyd went in by 114 the Kanawha +as Washington's agent. A bird's-eye view of that period would disclose +to us very few indeed of His Majesty's loving subjects who were paying +any attention to his proclamation. Early in 1774, Harrod began +the building of cabins and a fort, and planted corn on the site of +Harrodsburg. Thus to him and not to Boone fell the honor of founding the +first permanent white settlement in Kentucky. + +² See Alvord, _The Mississippi Valley in British Politics,_ vol. II, pp. +191-94. + +When summer came, its thick verdure proffering ambuscade, the air +hung tense along the border. Traders had sent in word that Shawanoes, +Delawares, Mingos, Wyandots, and Cherokees were refusing all other +exchange than rifles, ammunition, knives, and hatchets. White men were +shot down in their fields from ambush. Dead Indians lay among their own +young corn, their scalp locks taken. There were men of both races who +wanted war and meant to have it--and with it the land. + +Lord Dunmore, the Governor, resolved that, if war were inevitable, it +should be fought out in the Indian country. With this intent, he wrote +to Colonel Andrew Lewis of Botetourt County, Commander of the Southwest +Militia, instructing him 115 to raise a respectable body of troops and +join me either at the mouth of the Great Kanawha or Wheeling, or such +other part of the Ohio as may be most convenient for you to meet me. The +Governor himself with a force of twelve hundred proceeded to Fort Pitt, +where Croghan, as we have seen, was extending his hospitality to eleven +hundred warriors from the disaffected tribes. + +On receipt of the Governor's letter, Andrew Lewis sent out expresses to +his brother Colonel Charles Lewis, County Lieutenant of Augusta, and to +Colonel William Preston, County Lieutenant of Fincastle, to raise +men and bring them with all speed to the rendezvous at Camp Union +(Lewisburg) on the Big Levels of the Greenbrier (West Virginia). +Andrew Lewis summoned these officers to an expedition for reducing our +inveterate enemies to reason. Preston called for volunteers to take +advantage of the opportunity we have so long wished for… this useless +People may now at last be Oblidged to abandon their country. These men +were among not only the bravest but the best of their time; but this +was their view of the Indian and his alleged rights. To eliminate this +useless people, inveterate enemies of the white race, was, as they saw +it, a political necessity 116 and a religious duty. And we today who +profit by their deeds dare not condemn them. + +Fervor less solemn was aroused in other quarters by Dunmore's call to +arms. At Wheeling, some eighty or ninety young adventurers, in charge +of Captain Michael Cresap of Maryland, were waiting for the freshets to +sweep them down the Ohio into Kentucky. When the news reached them, they +greeted it with the wild monotone chant and the ceremonies preliminary +to Indian warfare. They planted the war pole, stripped and painted +themselves, and starting the war dance called on Cresap to be their +white leader. The captain, however, declined; but in that wild circling +line was one who was a white leader indeed. He was a sandy-haired boy of +twenty--one of the bold race of English Virginians, rugged and of fiery +countenance, with blue eyes intense of glance and deep set under a high +brow that, while modeled for power, seemed threatened in its promise by +the too sensitive chiseling of his lips. With every nerve straining +for the fray, with thudding of feet and crooning of the blood song, he +wheeled with those other mad spirits round the war pole till the set of +sun closed the rites. That evening two scalps were brought into camp, +so a letter of his reads. 117 Does the bold savage color of this picture +affright us? Would we veil it? Then we should lose something of the true +lineaments of George Rogers Clark, who, within four short years, was to +lead a tiny army of tattered and starving backwoodsmen, ashamed to quail +where he never flinched, through barrens and icy floods to the conquest +of Illinois for the United States. + +Though Cresap had rejected the rôle of white leader, he did not escape +the touch of infamy. Cresap's War was the name the Indians gave to the +bloody encounters between small parties of whites and Indians, which +followed on that war dance and scalping, during the summer months. One +of these encounters must be detailed here because history has assigned +it as the immediate cause of Dunmore's War. + +Greathouse, Sapperton, and King, three traders who had a post on Yellow +Creek, a tributary of the Ohio fifty miles below Pittsburgh, invited +several Indians from across the stream to come and drink with them and +their friends. Among the Indians were two or three men of importance in +the Mingo tribe. There were also some women, one of whom was the Indian +wife of Colonel John Gibson, an educated man who had distinguished +himself as 118 a soldier with Forbes in 1758. That the Indians came in +amity and apprehended no treachery was proved by the presence of the +women. Gibson's wife carried her half-caste baby in her shawl. The +disreputable traders plied their guests with drink to the point of +intoxication and then murdered them. King shot the first man and, when +he fell, cut his throat, saying that he had served many a deer in that +fashion. Gibson's Indian wife fled and was shot down in the clearing. A +man followed to dispatch her and her baby. She held the child up to him +pleading, with her last breath, that he would spare it because it was +not Indian but one of yours. The mother dead, the child was later sent +to Gibson. Twelve Indians in all were killed. + +Meanwhile Croghan had persuaded the Iroquois to peace. With the help of +David Zeisberger, the Moravian missionary, and White Eyes, a Delaware +chief, he and Dunmore had won over the Delaware warriors. In the +Cherokee councils, Oconostota demanded that the treaty of peace +signed in 1761 be kept. The Shawanoes, however, led by Cornstalk, were +implacable; and they had as allies the Ottawas and Mingos, who had +entered the council with them. + +119 A famous chief of the day and one of great influence over the +Indians, and also among the white officials who dealt with Indian +affairs, was Tach-nech-dor-us, or Branching Oak of the Forest, a Mingo +who had taken the name of Logan out of compliment to James Logan of +Pennsylvania. Chief Logan had recently met with so much reproach from +his red brothers for his loyalty to the whites that he had departed +from the Mingo town at Yellow Creek. But, learning that his tribe had +determined to assist the Shawanoes and had already taken some white +scalps, he repaired to the place where the Mingos were holding their +war council to exert his powers for peace. There, in presence of the +warriors, after swaying them from their purpose by those oratorical +gifts which gave him his influence and his renown, he took the war +hatchet that had already killed, and buried it in proof that vengeance +was appeased. Upon this scene there entered a Mingo from Yellow Creek +with the news of the murders committed there by the three traders. The +Indian whose throat had been slit as King had served deer was Logan's +brother. Another man slain was his kinsman. The woman with the baby was +his sister. Logan tore up from the earth the bloody tomahawk and, 120 +raising it above his head, swore that he would not rest till he had +taken ten white lives to pay for each one of his kin. Again the Mingo +warriors declared for war and this time were not dissuaded. But Logan +did not join this red army. He went out alone to wreak his vengeance, +slaying and scalping. + +Meanwhile Dunmore prepared to push the war with the utmost vigor. His +first concern was to recall the surveying parties from Kentucky, and for +so hazardous an errand he needed the services of a man whose endurance, +speed, and woodcraft were equal to those of any Indian scout afoot. +Through Colonel Preston, his orders were conveyed to Daniel Boone, for +Boone's fame had now spread from the border to the tidewater regions. It +was stated that Boone would lose no time, and if they are alive, it is +indisputable but Boone must find them. + +So Boone set out in company with Michael Stoner, another expert +woodsman. His general instructions were to go down the Kentucky River +to Preston's Salt Lick and across country to the Falls of the Ohio, and +thence home by Gaspar's Lick on the Cumberland River. Indian war +parties were moving under cover across the Dark 121 and Bloody Ground +to surround the various groups of surveyors still at large and to +exterminate them. Boone made his journey successfully. He found John +Floyd, who was surveying for Washington; he sped up to where Harrod +and his band were building cabins and sent them out, just in time as it +happened; he reached all the outposts of Thomas Bullitt's party, only +one of whom fell a victim to the foe¹; and, undetected by the Indians, +he brought himself and Stoner home in safety, after covering eight +hundred miles in sixty-one days. + +¹ Hancock Taylor, who delayed in getting out of the country and was cut +off. Harrod and his homesteaders immediately enlisted in the army. +How eager Boone was to go with the forces under Lewis is seen in the +official correspondence relative to Dunmore's War. Floyd wanted Boone's +help in raising a company: Captain Bledsoe says that Boone has more +[influence] than any man now disengaged; and you know what Boone has +done for me… for which reason I love the man. Even the border, it would +seem, had its species of pacifists who were willing to let others take +risks for them, for men hung back from recruiting, and desertions were +the order of the day. Major Arthur Campbell hit upon a solution 122 of +the difficulties in West Fincastle. He was convinced that Boone could +raise a company and hold the men loyal. And Boone did. + +For some reason, however, Daniel's desire to march with the army was +denied. Perhaps it was because just such a man as he--and, indeed, there +was no other--was needed to guard the settlement. Presently he was put +in command of Moore's Fort in Clinch Valley, and his diligence received +official approbation. A little later the inhabitants of the valley sent +out a petition to have Boone made a captain and given supreme command of +the lower forts. The settlers demanded Boone's promotion for their own +security. + +The land it is good, it is just to our mind, Each will have his part if +his Lordship be kind, The Ohio once ours, we'll live at our ease, With a +bottle and glass to drink when we please. + +So sang the army poet, thus giving voice, as bards should ever do, +to the theme nearest the hearts of his hearers--in this case, Land! +Presumably his ditty was composed on the eve of the march from +Lewisburg, for it is found in a soldier's diary. + +On the evening of October 9, 1774, Andrew Lewis with his force of eleven +hundred frontiersmen 123 was encamped on Point Pleasant at the junction +of the Great Kanawha with the Ohio. Dunmore in the meantime had led +his forces into Ohio and had erected Fort Gower at the mouth of the +Hockhocking River, where he waited for word from Andrew Lewis.¹ + +¹ It has been customary to ascribe to Lord Dunmore motives of treachery +in failing to make connections with Lewis; but no real evidence has +been advanced to support any of the charges made against him by +local historians. The charges were, as Theodore Roosevelt says, an +afterthought. Dunmore was a King's man in the Revolution; and yet in +March, 1775, the Convention of the Colony of Virginia, assembled in +opposition to the royal party, resolved: The most cordial thanks of the +people of this colony are a tribute justly due to our worthy Governor, +Lord Dunmore, for his truly noble, wise, and spirited conduct which at +once evinces his Excellency's attention to the true interests of this +colony, and a zeal in the executive department which no dangers can +divert, or difficulties hinder, from achieving the most important +services to the people who have the happiness to live under his +administration. (See _American Archives,_ Fourth Series, vol. II, p. +170.) Similar resolutions were passed by his officers on the march home +from Ohio; at the same time, the officers passed resolutions in sympathy +with the American cause. Yet it was Andrew Lewis who later drove Dunmore +from Virginia. Well might Dunmore exclaim, That it should ever come to +this! The movements of the two armies were being observed by scouts from +the force of red warriors gathered in Ohio under the great leader of the +Shawanoes. Cornstalk purposed to isolate the two armies of his enemy and +to crush them in turn before they could come together. His first move +was to launch an attack on Lewis at Point 124 Pleasant. In the dark +of night, Cornstalk's Indians crossed the Ohio on rafts, intending to +surprise the white man's camp at dawn. They would have succeeded but for +the chance that three or four of the frontiersmen, who had risen before +daybreak to hunt, came upon the Indians creeping towards the camp. Shots +were exchanged. An Indian and a white man dropped. The firing roused +the camp. Three hundred men in two lines under Charles Lewis and William +Fleming sallied forth expecting to engage the vanguard of the enemy but +encountered almost the whole force of from eight hundred to a thousand +Indians before the rest of the army could come into action. Both +officers were wounded, Charles Lewis fatally. The battle, which +continued from dawn until an hour before sunset, was the bloodiest in +Virginia's long series of Indian wars. The frontiersmen fought as such +men ever fought--with the daring, bravery, swiftness of attack, and +skill in taking cover which were the tactics of their day, even as at +a later time many of these same men fought at King's Mountain and +in Illinois the battles that did so much to turn the tide in the +Revolution.² + +² With Andrew Lewis on this day were Isaac Shelby and William Campbell, +the victorious leaders at King's Mountain, James Robertson, the father +of Tennessee, Valentine Sevier, Daniel Morgan, hero of the Cowpens, +Major Arthur Campbell, Benjamin Logan, Anthony Bledsoe, and Simon +Kenton. With Dunmore's force were Adam Stephen, who distinguished +himself at the Brandywine, George Rogers Clark, John Stuart, already +noted through the Cherokee wars, and John Montgomery, later one +of Clark's four captains in Illinois. The two last mentioned were +Highlanders. Clark's Illinois force was largely recruited from the +troops who fought at Point Pleasant. 125 Colonel Preston wrote to +Patrick Henry that the enemy behaved with inconceivable bravery, the +head men walking about in the time of action exhorting their men to lie +close, shoot well, be strong, and fight. The Shawanoes ran up to the +muzzles of the English guns, disputing every foot of ground. Both +sides knew well what they were fighting for--the rich land held in a +semicircle by the Beautiful River. + +Shortly before sundown the Indians, mistaking a flank movement by +Shelby's contingent for the arrival of reinforcements, retreated across +the Ohio. Many of their most noted warriors had fallen and among them +the Shawano chief, Puck-e-shin-wa, father of a famous son, Tecumseh.¹ +Yet they were unwilling to accept defeat. When they heard that Dunmore +was now marching overland to cut them off from their towns, their fury +blazed anew. Shall we first kill all our women and children and then +126 fight till we ourselves are slain? Cornstalk, in irony, demanded of +them; No? Then I will go and make peace. + +¹ Thwaites, _Documentary History of Dunmore's War._ By the treaty +compacted between the chiefs and Lord Dunmore, the Indians gave up all +claim to the lands south of the Ohio, even for hunting, and agreed to +allow boats to pass unmolested. In this treaty the Mingos refused to +join, and a detachment of Dunmore's troops made a punitive expedition +to their towns. Some discord arose between Dunmore and Lewis's frontier +forces because, since the Shawanoes had made peace, the Governor would +not allow the frontiersmen to destroy the Shawano towns. + +Of all the chiefs, Logan alone still held aloof. Major Gibson undertook +to fetch him, but Logan refused to come to the treaty grounds. He sent +by Gibson the short speech which has lived as an example of the best +Indian oratory: + +I appeal to any white man to say if ever he entered Logan's cabin hungry +and he gave him not meat: if ever he came cold and naked and he clothed +him not. During the course of the last long and bloody war, Logan +remained idle in his cabin, an advocate for peace. Such was my love for +the whites that my countrymen pointed as they passed and said, Logan is +the friend of the white men. I had even thought to have lived 127 with +you but for the injuries of one man. Colonel Cresap, the last spring, in +cold blood and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not even +sparing my women and children. There remains not a drop of my blood in +the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have +sought it; I have killed many; I have fully glutted my vengeance: for +my country I rejoice at the beams of peace. But do not harbor a thought +that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on +his heel to save his life. Who is there to mourn for Logan? Not one.¹ + +¹ Some writers have questioned the authenticity of Logan's speech, +inclining to think that Gibson himself composed it, partly because +of the biblical suggestion in the first few lines. That Gibson gave +biblical phraseology to these lines is apparent, though, as Adair +points out there are many examples of similitude in Indian and biblical +expression. But the thought is Indian and relates to the first article +of the Indian's creed, namely, to share his food with the needy. There +remains not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature is +a truly Indian lament. Evidently the final four lines of the speech are +the most literally translated, for they have the form and the primitive +rhythmic beat which a student of Indian poetry quickly recognizes. The +authenticity of the speech, as well as the innocence of Cresap, whom +Logan mistakenly accused, was vouched for by George Rogers Clark in a +letter to Dr. Samuel Brown dated June 17, 1798. See Jefferson papers, +Series 5, quoted by English, _Conquest of the Country Northwest of the +River Ohio,_ vol. II. p. 1029. + +By rivers and trails, in large and small companies, started home the +army that had won the land. The West Fincastle troops, from the lower +settlements of the Clinch and Holston valleys, were to return by the +Kentucky River, while those from 128 the upper valley would take the +shorter way up Sandy Creek. To keep them in provisions during the +journey it was ordered that hunters be sent out along these routes to +kill and barbecue meat and place it on scaffolds at appropriate spots. + +The way home by the Kentucky was a long road for weary and wounded men +with hunger gnawing under their belts. We know who swung out along the +trail to provide for that little band, dressed in deerskins colored +black, and his hair plaited and bobbed up. It was Daniel Boone--now, by +popular demand, Captain Boone--just discharged from Service, since the +valley forts needed him no longer. Once more only a hunter, he went his +way over Walden Mountain--past his son's grave marking the place where +he had been turned back--to serve the men who had opened the gates. + +129 + + + + +Chapter VII + +The Dark And Bloody Ground + +With the coming of spring Daniel Boone's desire, so long cherished and +deferred, to make a way for his neighbors through the wilderness was to +be fulfilled at last. But ere his ax could slash the thickets from the +homeseekers' path, more than two hundred settlers had entered +Kentucky by the northern waterways. Eighty or more of these settled at +Harrodsburg, where Harrod was laying out his town on a generous plan, +with in-lots of half an acre and out-lots of larger size. Among those +associated with Harrod was George Rogers Clark, who had surveyed claims +for himself during the year before the war. + +While over two hundred colonists were picking out home sites wherever +their pleasure or prudence dictated, a gigantic land promotion +scheme--involving the very tracts where they were sowing their first +corn--was being set afoot in North 130 Carolina by a body of men who +figure in the early history of Kentucky as the Transylvania Company. +The leader of this organization was Judge Richard Henderson.¹ Judge +Henderson dreamed a big dream. His castle in the air had imperial +proportions. He resolved, in short, to purchase from the Cherokee +Indians the larger part of Kentucky and to establish there a colony +after the manner and the economic form of the English Lords Proprietors, +whose day in America was so nearly done. Though in the light of history +the plan loses none of its dramatic features, it shows the practical +defects that must surely have prevented its realization. Like many +another Cæsar hungering for empire and staking all to win it, the +prospective lord of Kentucky, as we shall see, had left the human +equation out of his calculations. + +¹ Richard Henderson (1734-1785) was the son of the High Sheriff of +Granville County. At first an assistant to his father, he studied law +and soon achieved a reputation by the brilliance of his mind and the +magnetism of his personality. As presiding Judge at Hillsborough he had +come into conflict with the violent element among the Regulators, who +had driven him from the court and burned his house and barns. For some +time prior to his elevation to the bench, he had been engaged in land +speculations. One of Boone's biographers suggests that Boone may have +been secretly acting as Henderson's agent during his first lonely +explorations of Kentucky. However this may be, it does not appear +that Boone and his Yadkin neighbors were acting with Henderson when +in September, 1773, they made their first attempt to enter Kentucky as +settlers. 131 Richard Henderson had known Daniel Boone on the Yadkin; +and it was Boone's detailed reports of the marvelous richness and beauty +of Kentucky which had inspired him to formulate his gigantic scheme and +had enabled him also to win to his support several men of prominence in +the Back Country. To sound the Cherokees regarding the purchase and to +arrange, if possible, for a conference, Henderson dispatched Boone to +the Indian towns in the early days of 1775. + +Since we have just learned that Dunmore's War compelled the Shawanoes +and their allies to relinquish their right to Kentucky, that, both +before and after that event, government surveyors were in the territory +surveying for the soldiers' claims, and that private individuals had +already laid out town sites and staked holdings, it may be asked what +right of ownership the Cherokees possessed in Kentucky, that Henderson +desired to purchase it of them. The Indian title to Kentucky seems to +have been hardly less vague to the red men than it was to the whites. +Several of the nations had laid claim to the territory. As late as 1753, +it will be remembered, the Shawanoes had occupied a town at Blue Licks, +for John Findlay had been taken there by some of them. But, before +Findlay 132 guided Boone through the Gap in 1769, the Shawanoes had been +driven out by the Iroquois, who claimed suzerainty over them as well +as over the Cherokees. In 1768, the Iroquois had ceded Kentucky to the +British Crown by the treaty of Fort Stanwix; whereupon the Cherokees had +protested so vociferously that the Crown's Indian agent, to quiet them, +had signed a collateral agreement with them. Though claimed by many, +Kentucky was by common consent not inhabited by any of the tribes. +It was the great Middle Ground where the Indians hunted. It was the +Warriors' Path over which they rode from north and south to slaughter +and where many of their fiercest encounters took place. However shadowy +the title which Henderson purposed to buy, there was one all-sufficing +reason why he must come to terms with the Cherokees: their northernmost +towns in Tennessee lay only fifty or sixty miles below Cumberland Gap +and hence commanded the route over which he must lead colonists into his +empire beyond the hills. + +The conference took place early in March, 1775, at the Sycamore +Shoals of the Watauga River. Twelve hundred Indians, led by their town +chiefs--among whom were the old warrior and the old statesman of their +nation, Oconostota and 133 Attakullakulla--came to the treaty grounds +and were received by Henderson and his associates and several hundred +white men who were eager for a chance to settle on new lands. Though +Boone was now on his way into Kentucky for the Transylvania Company, +other border leaders of renown or with their fame still to win were +present, and among them James Robertson, of serious mien, and that blond +gay knight in buckskin, John Sevier. + +It is a dramatic picture we evolve for ourselves from the meager +narratives of this event--a mass of painted Indians moving through the +sycamores by the bright water, to come presently into a tense, immobile +semicircle before the large group of armed frontiersmen seated or +standing about Richard Henderson, the man with the imperial dream, the +ready speaker whose flashing eyes and glowing oratory won the hearts +of all who came under their sway. What though the Cherokee title be a +flimsy one at best and the price offered for it a bagatelle! The spirit +of Forward March! is there in that great canvas framed by forest and +sky. The somber note that tones its lustrous color, as by a sweep of the +brush, is the figure of the Chickamaugan chief, Dragging Canoe, warrior +and seer and hater of white men, who urges his tribesmen against the +sale and, 134 when they will not hearken, springs from their midst into +the clear space before Henderson and his band of pioneers and, pointing +with uplifted arm, warns them that a dark cloud hangs over the land the +white man covets which to the red man has long been a bloody ground.¹ + +¹ This utterance of Dragging Canoe's is generally supposed to be the +origin of the descriptive phrase applied to Kentucky--the Dark and +Bloody Ground. See Roosevelt, _The Winning of the West,_ vol. I, p.229. +The purchase, finally consummated, included the country lying between +the Kentucky and Cumberland Rivers--almost all the present State of +Kentucky, with the adjacent land watered by the Cumberland River and its +tributaries, except certain lands previously leased by the Indians to +the Watauga Colony. The tract comprised about twenty million acres and +extended into Tennessee. + +Daniel Boone's work was to cut out a road for the wagons of the +Transylvania Company's colonists to pass over. This was to be done by +slashing away the briers and underbrush hedging the narrow Warriors' +Path that made a direct northward line from Cumberland Gap to the +Ohio bank, opposite the mouth of the Scioto River. Just prior to the +conference Boone and thirty guns had set forth from the Holston to +prepare the road and to build a fort on whatever site he should select. + +135 By April, Henderson and his first group of tenants were on the +trail. In Powell's Valley they came up with a party of Virginians +Kentucky bound, led by Benjamin Logan; and the two bands joined together +for the march. They had not gone far when they heard disquieting +news. After leaving Martin's Station, at the gates of his new domain, +Henderson received a letter from Boone telling of an attack by Indians, +in which two of his men had been killed, but we stood on the ground +and guarded our baggage till the day and lost nothing.¹ These tidings, +indicating that despite treaties and sales, the savages were again on +the warpath, might well alarm Henderson's colonists. While they halted, +some indecisive, others frankly for retreat, there appeared a company +of men making all haste out of Kentucky because of Indian unrest. Six +of these Henderson persuaded to turn again and go in with him; but +this addition hardly offset the loss of those members of his party who +thought it too perilous to proceed. Henderson's own courage did not +falter. He had staked his all on this stupendous venture and for him +it was forward to wealth and glory or retreat into poverty and eclipse. +Boone, in the heart of the danger, 136 was making the same stand. If we +give way to them [the Indians] now, he wrote, it will ever be the case. + +¹ Bogart, _Daniel Boone and the Hunters of Kentucky, p. 121._ Signs +of discord other than Indian opposition met Henderson as he resolutely +pushed on. His conversations with some of the fugitives from Kentucky +disclosed the first indications of the storm that was to blow away the +empire he was going in to found. He told them that the claims they had +staked in Kentucky would not hold good with the Transylvania Company. +Whereupon James McAfee, who was leading a group of returning men, stated +his opinion that the Transylvania Company's claim would not hold good +with Virginia. After the parley, three of McAfee's brothers turned back +and went with Henderson's party, but whether with intent to join his +colony or to make good their own claims is not apparent. Benjamin Logan +continued amicably with Henderson on the march but did not recognize him +as Lord Proprietor of Kentucky. He left the Transylvania caravan +shortly after entering the territory, branched off in the direction of +Harrodsburg, and founded St. Asaph's Station, in the present Lincoln +County, independently of Henderson though the site lay within +Henderson's purchase. + +137 Notwithstanding delays and apprehensions, Henderson and his +colonists finally reached Boone's Fort, which Daniel and his thirty +guns--lacking two since the Indian encounter--had erected at the mouth +of Otter Creek. + +An attractive buoyancy of temperament is revealed in Henderson's +description in his journal of a giant elm with tall straight trunk and +even foliage that shaded a space of one hundred feet. Instantly he chose +this "divine elm" as the council chamber of Transylvania. Under its +leafage he read the constitution of the new colony. It would be too +great a stretch of fancy to call it a democratic document, for it was +not that, except in deft phrases. Power was certainly declared to be +vested in the people; but the substance of power remained in the hands +of the Proprietors. + +Terms for land grants were generous enough in the beginning, although +Henderson made the fatal mistake of demanding quitrents--one of the +causes of dissatisfaction which had led to the Regulators' rising +in North Carolina. In September he augmented this error by more +than doubling the price of land, adding a fee of eight shillings for +surveying, and reserving to the Proprietors one-half of all gold, +silver, lead, and sulphur found on 138 the land. No land near sulphur +springs or showing evidences of metals was to be granted to settlers. +Moreover, at the Company's store the prices charged for lead were said +to be too high--lead being necessary for hunting, and hunting being the +only means of procuring food--while the wages of labor, as fixed by the +Company, were too low. These terms bore too heavily on poor men who were +risking their lives in the colony. + +Hence newcomers passed by Boonesborough, as the Transylvania settlement +was presently called, and went elsewhere. They settled on Henderson's +land but refused his terms. They joined in their sympathies with James +Harrod, who, having established Harrodsburg in the previous year at the +invitation of Virginia, was not in the humor to acknowledge Henderson's +claim or to pay him tribute. All were willing to combine with the +Transylvania Company for defense, and to enforce law they would unite +in bonds of brotherhood in Kentucky, even as they had been one with each +other on the earlier frontier now left behind them. But they would call +no man master; they had done with feudalism. That Henderson should not +have foreseen this, especially after the upheaval in North Carolina, +proves him, in spite of all his brilliant 139 gifts, to have been a man +out of touch with the spirit of the time. + +The war of the Revolution broke forth and the Indians descended upon the +Kentucky stations. Defense was the one problem in all minds, and defense +required powder and lead in plenty. The Transylvania Company was not +able to provide the means of defense against the hordes of savages whom +Henry Hamilton, the British Governor at Detroit, was sending to make +war on the frontiers. Practical men like Harrod and George Rogers +Clark--who, if not a practical man in his own interests, was a most +practical soldier--saw that unification of interests within the +territory with the backing of either Virginia or Congress was necessary. +Clark personally would have preferred to see the settlers combine as +a freemen's state. It was plain that they would not combine and +stake their lives as a unit to hold Kentucky for the benefit of the +Transylvania Company, whose authority some of the most prominent men in +the territory had refused to recognize. The Proprietary of Transylvania +could continue to exist only to the danger of every life in Kentucky. + +While the Proprietors sent a delegate to the Continental Congress to +win official recognition for 140 Transylvania, eighty-four men at +Harrodsburg drew up a petition addressed to Virginia stating their +doubts of the legality of Henderson's title and requesting Virginia to +assert her authority according to the stipulations of her charter. +That defense was the primary and essential motive of the Harrodsburg +Remonstrance seems plain, for when George Rogers Clark set off on foot +with one companion to lay the document before the Virginian authorities, +he also went to plead for a load of powder. In his account of that +hazardous journey, as a matter of fact, he makes scant reference to +Transylvania, except to say that the greed of the Proprietors would soon +bring the colony to its end, but shows that his mind was seldom off the +powder. It is a detail of history that the Continental Congress refused +to seat the delegate from Transylvania. Henderson himself went to +Virginia to make the fight for his land before the Assembly.¹ + +¹ In 1778 Virginia disallowed Henderson's title but granted him two +hundred thousand acres between the Green and Kentucky rivers for his +trouble and expense in opening up the country. The magnetic center of +Boonesborough's life was the lovable and unassuming Daniel Boone. +Soon after the building of the fort Daniel had brought in his wife and +family. He used often to 141 state with a mild pride that his wife +and daughters were the first white women to stand on the banks of +the Kentucky River. That pride had not been unmixed with anxiety; his +daughter Jemima and two daughters of his friend, Richard Galloway, while +boating on the river had been captured by Shawanoes and carried off. +Boone, accompanied by the girls' lovers and by John Floyd (eager to +repay his debt of life-saving to Boone) had pursued them, tracing the +way the captors had taken by broken twigs and scraps of dress goods +which one of the girls had contrived to leave in their path, had come on +the Indians unawares, killed them, and recovered the three girls unhurt. + +In the summer of 1776, Virginia took official note of Captain Boone of +Boonesborough, for she sent him a small supply of powder. The men of the +little colony, which had begun so pretentiously with its constitution +and assembly, were now obliged to put all other plans aside and to +concentrate on the question of food and defense. There was a dangerous +scarcity of powder and lead. The nearest points at which these +necessaries could be procured were the Watauga and Holston River +settlements, which were themselves none too well stocked. Harrod and +Logan, some time in 1777, 142 reached the Watauga fort with three or +four pack-horses and filled their packs from Sevier's store; but, as +they neared home, they were detected by red scouts and Logan was badly +wounded before he and Harrod were able to drive their precious load +safely through the gates at Harrodsburg. In the autumn of 1777, Clark, +with a boatload of ammunition, reached Maysville on the Ohio, having +successfully run the gauntlet between banks in possession of the foe. He +had wrested the powder and lead from the Virginia Council by threats +to the effect that if Virginia was so willing to lose Kentucky--for of +course a country not worth defending is not worth claiming--he and his +fellows were quite ready to take Kentucky for themselves and to hold it +with their swords against all comers, Virginia included. By even such +cogent reasoning had he convinced the Council--which had tried to hedge +by expressing doubts that Virginia would receive the Kentucky settlers +as citizens of the State--that it would be cheaper to give him the +powder. + +Because so many settlers had fled and the others had come closer +together for their common good, Harrodsburg and Boonesborough were +now the only occupied posts in Kentucky. Other settlements, 143 once +thriving, were abandoned; and, under the terror, the Wild reclaimed +them. In April, 1777, Boonesborough underwent its first siege. Boone, +leading a sortie, was shot and he fell with a shattered ankle. An +Indian rushed upon him and was swinging the tomahawk over him when +Simon Kenton, giant frontiersman and hero of many daring deeds, rushed +forward, shot the Indian, threw Boone across his back, and fought his +way desperately to safety. It was some months ere Boone was his nimble +self again. But though he could not stand up to the guns, he directed +all operations from his cabin. + +The next year Boone was ready for new ventures growing from the +settlers' needs. Salt was necessary to preserve meat through the summer. +Accordingly Boone and twenty-seven men went up to the Blue Licks in +February, 1778, to replenish their supply by the simple process of +boiling the salt water of the Licks till the saline particles adhered to +the kettles. Boone was returning alone, with a pack-horse load of salt +and game, when a blinding snowstorm overtook him and hid from view four +stealthy Shawanoes on his trail. He was seized and carried to a camp of +120 warriors led by the French Canadian, Dequindre, and James and George +Girty, two white renegades. Among the 144 Indians were some of those who +had captured him on his first exploring trip through Kentucky and whom +he had twice given the slip. Their hilarity was unbounded. Boone quickly +learned that this band was on its way to surprise Boonesborough. It was +a season when Indian attacks were not expected; nearly threescore of the +men were at the salt spring and, to make matters worse, the walls of the +new fort where the settlers and their families had gathered were as yet +completed on only three sides. Boonesborough was, in short, well-nigh +defenseless. To turn the Indians from their purpose, Boone conceived the +desperate scheme of offering to lead them to the salt makers' camp with +the assurance that he and his companions were willing to join the tribe. +He understood Indians well enough to feel sure that once possessed of +nearly thirty prisoners, the Shawanoes would not trouble further about +Boonesborough but would hasten to make a triumphal entry into their own +towns. That some, perhaps all, of the white men would assuredly die, +he knew well; but it was the only way to save the women and children in +Boonesborough. In spite of Dequindre and the Girtys, who were leading a +military expedition for the reduction of a fort, the Shawanoes fell in +with the suggestion. When they 145 had taken their prisoners, the more +bloodthirsty warriors in the band wanted to tomahawk them all on the +spot. By his diplomatic discourse, however, Boone dissuaded them, for +the time being at least, and the whole company set off for the towns on +the Little Miami. + +The weather became severe, very little game crossed their route, and for +days they subsisted on slippery elm bark. The lovers of blood did not +hold back their scalping knives and several of the prisoners perished; +but Black Fish, the chief then of most power in Shawanoe councils, +adopted Boone as his son, and gave him the name of Sheltowee, or Big +Turtle. Though watched zealously to prevent escape, Big Turtle was +treated with every consideration and honor; and, as we would say today, +he played the game. He entered into the Indian life with apparent zest, +took part in hunts and sports and the races and shooting matches in +which the Indians delighted, but he was always careful not to outrun or +outshoot his opponents. Black Fish took him to Detroit when some of the +tribe escorted the remainder of the prisoners to the British post. There +he met Governor Hamilton and, in the hope of obtaining his liberty, +he led that dignitary to believe that he 146 and the other people of +Boonesborough were eager to move to Detroit and take refuge under the +British flag.¹ It is said that Boone always carried in a wallet round +his neck the King's commission given him in Dunmore's War; and that +he exhibited it to Hamilton to bear out his story. Hamilton sought to +ransom him from the Indians, but Black Fish would not surrender his +new son. The Governor gave Boone a pony, with saddle and trappings, and +other presents, including trinkets to be used in procuring his needs and +possibly his liberty from the Shawanoes. + +¹ So well did Boone play his part that he aroused suspicion even in +those who knew him best. After his return to Boonesborough his old +friend, Calloway, formally accused him of treachery on two counts: that +Boone had betrayed the salt makers to the Indians and had planned to +betray Boonesborough to the British. Boone was tried and acquitted. His +simple explanation of his acts satisfied the court-martial and made him +a greater hero than ever among the frontier folk. Black Fish then took +his son home to Chillicothe. Here Boone found Delawares and Mingos +assembling with the main body of the Shawanoe warriors. The war belt +was being carried through the Ohio country. Again Boonesborough and +Harrodsburg were to be the first settlements attacked. To escape and +give warning was now the one purpose that obsessed Boone. He redoubled +his efforts to 147 throw the Indians off their guard. He sang and +whistled blithely about the camp at the mouth of the Scioto River, +whither he had accompanied his Indian father to help in the salt +boiling. In short, he seemed so very happy that one day Black Fish took +his eye off him for a few moments to watch the passing of a flock of +turkeys. Big Turtle passed with the flock, leaving no trace. To his +lamenting parent it must have seemed as though he had vanished into the +air. Daniel crossed the Ohio and ran the 160 miles to Boonesborough in +four days, during which time he had only one meal, from a buffalo he +shot at the Blue Licks. When he reached the fort after an absence of +nearly five months, he found that his wife had given him up for dead and +had returned to the Yadkin. + +Boone now began with all speed to direct preparations to withstand a +siege. Owing to the Indian's leisurely system of councils and ceremonies +before taking the warpath, it was not until the first week in September +that Black Fish's painted warriors, with some Frenchmen under Dequindre, +appeared before Boonesborough. Nine days the siege lasted and was the +longest in border history. Dequindre, seeing that the fort might not be +taken, resorted to trickery. He requested Boone 148 and a few of his men +to come out for a parley, saying that his orders from Hamilton were to +protect the lives of the Americans as far as possible. Boone's friend, +Calloway, urged against acceptance of the apparently benign proposal +which was made, so Dequindre averred, for bienfaisance et humanité. But +the words were the words of a white man, and Boone hearkened to them. +With eight of the garrison he went out to the parley. After a long talk +in which good will was expressed on both sides, it was suggested by +Black Fish that they all shake hands and, as there were so many more +Indians than white men, two Indians should, of course, shake hands with +one white man, each grasping one of his hands. The moment that their +hands gripped, the trick was clear, for the Indians exerted their +strength to drag off the white men. Desperate scuffling ensued in +which the whites with difficulty freed themselves and ran for the fort. +Calloway had prepared for emergencies. The pursuing Indians were met +with a deadly fire. After a defeated attempt to mine the fort the enemy +withdrew. + +The successful defense of Boonesborough was an achievement of national +importance, for had Boonesborough fallen, Harrodsburg alone could +149 not have stood. The Indians under the British would have overrun +Kentucky; and George Rogers Clark--whose base for his Illinois +operations was the Kentucky forts--could not have made the campaigns +which wrested the Northwest from the control of Great Britain. + +Again Virginia took official note of Captain Boone when in 1779 the +Legislature established Boonesborough a town for the reception of +traders and appointed Boone himself one of the trustees to attend to the +sale and registration of lots. An odd office that was for Daniel, who +never learned to attend to the registration of his own; he declined it. +His name appears again, however, a little later when Virginia made +the whole of Kentucky one of her counties with the following officers: +Colonel David Robinson, County Lieutenant; George Rogers Clark, Anthony +Bledsoe, and John Bowman, Majors; Daniel Boone, James Harrod, Benjamin +Logan, and John Todd, Captains. + +Boonesborough's successful resistance caused land speculators as well as +prospective settlers to take heart of grace. Parties made their way to +Boonesborough, Harrodsburg, and even to the Falls of the Ohio, where +Clark's fort and blockhouses now 150 stood. In the summer of 1779 Clark +had erected on the Kentucky side of the river a large fort which became +the nucleus of the town of Louisville. Here, while he was eating his +heart out with impatience for money and men to enable him to march to +the attack of Detroit, as he had planned, he amused himself by drawing +up plans for a city. He laid out private sections and public parks and +contemplated the bringing in of families only to inhabit his city, for, +oddly enough, he who never married was going to make short shift of mere +bachelors in his City Beautiful. Between pen scratches, no doubt, he +looked out frequently upon the river to descry if possible a boatload of +ammunition or the banners of the troops he had been promised. + +When neither appeared, he gave up the idea of Detroit and set about +erecting defenses on the southern border, for the Choctaws and +Cherokees, united under a white leader named Colbert, were threatening +Kentucky by way of the Mississippi. He built in 1780 Fort Jefferson in +what is now Ballard County, and had barely completed the new post and +garrisoned it with about thirty men when it was besieged by Colbert and +his savages. The Indians, assaulting by night, were lured into 151 a ++position directly before a cannon which poured lead into a mass of +them. The remainder fled in terror from the vicinity of the fort; but +Colbert succeeded in rallying them and was returning to the attack when +he suddenly encountered Clark with a company of men and was forced to +abandon his enterprise. + +Clark knew that the Ohio Indians would come down on the settlements +again during the summer and that to meet their onslaughts every man in +Kentucky would be required. He learned that there was a new influx of +land seekers over the Wilderness Road and that speculators were doing +a thriving business in Harrodsburg; so, leaving his company to protect +Fort Jefferson, he took two men with him and started across the wilds on +foot for Harrodsburg. To evade the notice of the Indian bands which were +moving about the country the three stripped and painted themselves as +warriors and donned the feathered headdress. So successful was their +disguise that they were fired on by a party of surveyors near the +outskirts of Harrodsburg. + +The records do not state what were the sensations of certain speculators +in a land office in Harrodsburg when a blue-eyed savage in a war 152 +bonnet sprang through the doorway and, with uplifted weapon, declared +the office closed; but we get a hint of the power of Clark's personality +and of his genius for dominating men from the terse report that he +enrolled the speculators. He was informed that another party of men, +more nervous than these, was now on its way out of Kentucky. In haste he +dispatched a dozen frontiersmen to cut the party off at Crab Orchard and +take away the gun of every man who refused to turn back and do his bit +for Kentucky. To Clark a man was a gun, and he meant that every gun +should do its duty. + +The leaders and pioneers of the Dark and Bloody Ground were now +warriors, all under Clark's command, while for two years longer the Red +Terror ranged Kentucky, falling with savage force now here, now there. +In the first battle of 1780, at the Blue Licks, Daniel's brother, Edward +Boone, was killed and scalped. Later on in the war his second son, +Israel, suffered a like fate. The toll of life among the settlers was +heavy. Many of the best-known border leaders were slain. Food and +powder often ran short. Corn might be planted, but whether it would be +harvested or not the planters never knew; and the hunter's rifle shot, +necessary 153 though it was, proved only too often an invitation to the +lurking foe. But sometimes, through all the dangers of forest and trail, +Daniel Boone slipped away silently to Harrodsburg to confer with Clark; +or Clark himself, in the Indian guise that suited the wild man in him +not ill, made his way to and from the garrisons which looked to him for +everything. + +Twice Clark gathered together the guns of Kentucky and, marching north +into the enemy's country, swept down upon the Indian towns of Piqua and +Chillicothe and razed them. In 1782, in the second of these enterprises, +his cousin, Joseph Rogers, who had been taken prisoner and adopted by +the Indians and then wore Indian garb, was shot down by one of Clark's +men. On this expedition Boone and Harrod are said to have accompanied +Clark. + +The ever present terror and horror of those days, especially of the two +years preceding this expedition, are vividly suggested by the quaint +remark of an old woman who had lived through them, as recorded for us by +a traveler. The most beautiful sight she had seen in Kentucky, she said, +was a young man dying a natural death in his bed. Dead but unmarred by +hatchet or scalping knife, he was 154 so rare and comely a picture that +the women of the post sat up all night looking at him. + +But, we ask, what golden emoluments were showered by a grateful country +on the men who thus held the land through those years of want and war, +and saved an empire for the Union? What practical recognition was there +of these brave and unselfish men who daily risked their lives and faced +the stealth and cruelty lurking in the wilderness ways? There is meager +eloquence in the records. Here, for instance, is a letter from George +Rogers Clark to the Governor of Virginia, dated May 27, 1783: + +Sir. Nothing but necessity could induce me to make the following +request to Your Excellency, which is to grant me a small sum of money on +account; as I can assure you, Sir, that I am exceedingly distressed for +the want of necessary clothing etc and don't know any channel through +which I could procure any except of the Executive. The State I believe +will fall considerably in my debt. Any supplies which Your Excellency +favors me with might be deducted out of my accounts.¹ + +¹ _Calendar of Virginia State Papers,_ vol. III, p. 487. Clark had +spent all his own substance and all else he could beg, borrow--or +appropriate--in the conquest of Illinois and the defense of Kentucky. +155 His only reward from Virginia was a grant of land from which he +realized nothing, and dismissal from her service when she needed him no +longer. + +All that Clark had asked for himself was a commission in the Continental +Army. This was denied him, as it appears now, not through his own +errors, which had not at that time taken hold on him, but through the +influence of powerful enemies. It is said that both Spain and England, +seeing a great soldier without service for his sword, made him offers, +which he refused. As long as any acreage remained to him on which to +raise money, he continued to pay the debts he had contracted to finance +his expeditions, and in this course he had the assistance of his +youngest brother, William, to whom he assigned his Indiana grant. + +His health impaired by hardship and exposure and his heart broken by +his country's indifference, Clark sank into alcoholic excesses. In +his sixtieth year, just six years before his death, and when he was a +helpless paralytic, he was granted a pension of four hundred dollars. +There is a ring of bitter irony in the words with which he accepted the +sword sent him by Virginia in his crippled old age: When Virginia needed +a sword I gave her one. He died near Louisville on February 13, 1818. + +156 Kentucky was admitted to the Union in 1792. But even before Kentucky +became a State her affairs, particularly as to land, were arranged, +let us say, on a practical business basis. Then it was discovered that +Daniel Boone had no legal claim to any foot of ground in Kentucky. +Daniel owned nothing but the clothes he wore; and for those--as well as +for much powder, lead, food, and such trifles--he was heavily in debt. + +So, in 1788, Daniel Boone put the list of his debts in his wallet, +gathered his wife and his younger sons about him, and, shouldering his +hunter's rifle, once more turned towards the wilds. The country of the +Great Kanawha in West Virginia was still a wilderness, and a hunter and +trapper might, in some years, earn enough to pay his debts. For others, +now, the paths he had hewn and made safe; for Boone once more the +wilderness road. + +157 + + + + +Chapter VIII + +Tennessee + +Indian law, tradition, and even superstition had shaped the conditions +which the pioneers faced when they crossed the mountains. This savage +inheritance had decreed that Kentucky should be a dark and bloody +ground, fostering no life but that of four-footed beasts, its fertile +sod never to stir with the green push of the corn. And so the white men +who went into Kentucky to build and to plant went as warriors go, and +for every cabin they erected they battled as warriors to hold a fort. In +the first years they planted little corn and reaped less, for it may be +said that their rifles were never out of their hands. We have seen +how stations were built and abandoned until but two stood. Untiring +vigilance and ceaseless warfare were the price paid by the first +Kentuckians ere they turned the Indian's place of desolation and death +into a land productive and a living habitation. + +158 Herein lies the difference, slight apparently, yet significant, +between the first Kentucky and the first Tennessee¹ colonies. Within the +memory of the Indians only one tribe had ever attempted to make their +home in Kentucky--a tribe of the fighting Shawanoes--and they had been +terribly chastised for their temerity. But Tennessee was the home of the +Cherokees, and at Chickasaw Bluffs (Memphis) began the southward trail +to the principal towns of the Chickasaws. By the red man's fiat, then, +human life might abide in Tennessee, though not in Kentucky, and it +followed that in seasons of peace the frontiersmen might settle in +Tennessee. So it was that as early as 1757, before the great Cherokee +war, a company of Virginians under Andrew Lewis had, on an invitation +from the Indians, erected Fort Loudon near Great Telliko, the Cherokees' +principal town, and that, after the treaty of peace in 1761, Waddell and +his rangers of North Carolina had erected a fort on the Holston. + +¹ Tennessee. The name, Ten-as-se, appears on Adair's map as one of the +old Cherokee towns. Apparently neither the meaning nor the reason why +the colonists called both state and river by this name has been handed +down to us. Though Fort Loudon had fallen tragically during the war, +and though Waddell's fort had been 159 abandoned, neither was without +influence in the colonization of Tennessee, for some of the men who +built these forts drifted back a year or two later and set up the first +cabins on the Holston. These earliest settlements, thin and scattered, +did not survive; but in 1768 the same settlers or others of their +kind--discharged militiamen from Back Country regiments--once more made +homes on the Holston. They were joined by a few families from near the +present Raleigh, North Carolina, who had despaired of seeing justice +done to the tenants on the mismanaged estates of Lord Granville. About +the same time there was erected the first cabin on the Watauga River, as +is generally believed, by a man of the name of William Bean (or Been), +hunter and frontier soldier from Pittsylvania County, Virginia. This +man, who had hunted on the Watauga with Daniel Boone in 1760, chose +as the site of his dwelling the place of the old hunting camp near the +mouth of Boone's Creek. He soon began to have neighbors. + +Meanwhile the Regulation Movement stirred the Back Country of both the +Carolinas. In 1768, the year in which William Bean built his cabin on +the bank of the Watauga, 160 five hundred armed Regulators in North +Carolina, aroused by irregularities in the conduct of public office, +gathered to assert their displeasure, but dispersed peaceably on receipt +of word from Governor Tryon that he had ordered the prosecution of any +officer found guilty of extortion. Edmund Fanning, the most hated of +Lord Granville's agents, though convicted, escaped punishment. Enraged +at this miscarriage of justice, the Regulators began a system of +terrorization by taking possession of the court, presided over by +Richard Henderson. The judge himself was obliged to slip out by a +back way to avoid personal injury. The Regulators burned his house and +stable. They meted out mob treatment likewise to William Hooper, later +one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. + +Two elements, with antithetical aims, had been at work in the +Regulation; and the unfortunate failure of justice in the case of +Fanning had given the corrupt element its opportunity to seize control. +In the petitions addressed to Governor Tryon by the leaders of the +movement in its earlier stages the aims of liberty-loving thinkers are +traceable. It is worthy of note that they included in their demands +articles which are now constitutional. They desired that "suffrage be +given by ticket and 161 ballot"; that the mode of taxation be altered, +and each person be taxed in proportion to the profits arising from his +estate; that judges and clerks be given salaries instead of perquisites +and fees. They likewise petitioned for repeal of the act prohibiting +dissenting ministers from celebrating the rites of matrimony. The +establishment of these reforms, the petitioners of the Regulation +concluded, would conciliate their minds to every just measure of +government, and would make the laws what the Constitution ever designed +they should be, their protection and not their bane. Herein clearly +enough we can discern the thought and the phraseology of the Ulster +Presbyterians. + +But a change took place in both leaders and methods. During the +Regulators' career of violence they were under the sway of an agitator +named Hermon Husband. This demagogue was reported to have been expelled +from the Quaker Society for cause; it is on record that he was expelled +from the North Carolina Assembly because a vicious anonymous letter was +traced to him. He deserted his dupes just before the shots cracked at +Alamance Creek and fled from the colony. He was afterwards apprehended +in Pennsylvania for complicity in the Whisky Insurrection. + +162 Four of the leading Presbyterian ministers of the Back Country +issued a letter in condemnation of the Regulators. One of these +ministers was the famous David Caldwell, son-in-law of the Reverend +Alexander Craighead, and a man who knew the difference between liberty +and license and who proved himself the bravest of patriots in the War +of Independence. The records of the time contain sworn testimony +against the Regulators by Waightstill Avery, a signer of the Mecklenburg +Resolves, who later presided honorably over courts in the western +circuit of Tennessee; and there is evidence indicating Jacobite and +French intrigue. That Governor Tryon recognized a hidden hand at work +seems clearly revealed in his proclamation addressed to those whose +understandings have been run away with and whose passions have been led +in captivity by some evil designing men who, actuated by cowardice and +a sense of that Publick Justice which is due to their Crimes, have +obscured themselves from Publick view. What the Assembly thought of the +Regulators was expressed in 1770 in a drastic bill which so shocked +the authorities in England that instructions were sent forbidding any +Governor to approve such a bill in future, declaring it a disgrace to +the British Statute Books. + +163 On May 16, 1771, some two thousand Regulators were precipitated +by Husband into the Battle of Alamance, which took place in a district +settled largely by a rough and ignorant type of Germans, many of whom +Husband had lured to swell his mob. Opposed to him were eleven hundred +of Governor Tryon's troops, officered by such patriots as Griffith +Rutherford, Hugh Waddell, and Francis Nash. During an hour's engagement +about twenty Regulators were killed, while the Governor's troops had +nine killed and sixty-one wounded. Six of the leaders were hanged. The +rest took the oath of allegiance which Tryon administered. + +It has been said about the Regulators that they were not cast down by +their defeat at Alamance but like the mammoth, they shook the bolt from +their brow and crossed the mountains, but such flowery phrases do +not seem to have been inspired by facts. Nor do the records show that +fifteen hundred Regulators arrived at Watauga in 1771, as has also been +stated. Nor are the names of the leaders of the Regulation to be found +in the list of signatures affixed to the one state paper of Watauga +which was preserved and written into historic annals. Nor yet do those +names appear on the roster of the Watauga and Holston men who, 164 +in 1774, fought with Shelby under Andrew Lewis in the Battle of Point +Pleasant. The Boones and the Bryans, the Robertsons, the Seviers, the +Shelbys, the men who opened up the West and shaped the destiny of its +inhabitants, were genuine freemen, with a sense of law and order as +inseparable from liberty. They would follow a Washington but not a +Hermon Husband. + +James Hunter, whose signature leads on all Regulation manifestoes just +prior to the Battle of Alamance, was a sycophant of Husband, to whom he +addressed fulsome letters; and in the real battle for democracy--the +War of Independence--he was a Tory. The Colonial Records show that those +who, like the mammoth, shook from them the ethical restraints which +make man superior to the giant beast, and who later bolted into the +mountains, contributed chiefly the lawlessness that harassed the new +settlements. They were the banditti and, in 1776, the Tories of the +western hills; they pillaged the homes of the men who were fighting for +the democratic ideal. + +It was not the Regulation Movement which turned westward the makers of +the Old Southwest, but the free and enterprising spirit of the age. +165 It was emphatically an age of doers; and if men who felt the +constructive urge in them might not lay hold on conditions where +they were and reshape them, then they must go forward seeking that +environment which would give their genius its opportunity. + +Of such adventurous spirits was James Robertson, a Virginian born of +Ulster Scot parentage, and a resident of (the present) Wake County, +North Carolina, since his boyhood. Robertson was twenty-eight years old +when, in 1770, he rode over the hills to Watauga. We can imagine him as +he was then, for the portrait taken much later in life shows the type +of face that does not change. It is a high type combining the best +qualities of his race. Intelligence, strength of purpose, fortitude, +and moral power are there; they impress us at the first glance. At +twenty-eight he must have been a serious young man, little given to +laughter; indeed, spontaneity is perhaps the only good trait we miss in +studying his face. He was a thinker who had not yet found his purpose--a +thinker in leash, for at this time James Robertson could neither read +nor write. + +At Watauga, Robertson lived for a while in the cabin of a man named +Honeycut. He chose land 166 for himself and, in accordance with the +custom of the time, sealed his right to it by planting corn. He remained +to harvest his first crop and then set off to gather his family and some +of his friends together and escort them to the new country. But on the +way he missed the trail and wandered for a fortnight in the mountains. +The heavy rains ruined his powder so that he could not hunt; for food he +had only berries and nuts. At one place, where steep bluffs opposed him, +he was obliged to abandon his horse and scale the mountain side on foot. +He was in extremity when he chanced upon two huntsmen who gave him food +and set him on the trail. If this experience proves his lack of the +hunter's instinct and the woodsman's resourcefulness which Boone +possessed, it proves also his special qualities of perseverance and +endurance which were to reach their zenith in his successful struggle +to colonize and hold western Tennessee. He returned to Watauga in the +following spring (1771) with his family and a small group of colonists. +Robertson's wife was an educated woman and under her instruction he now +began to study. + +Next year a young Virginian from the Shenandoah Valley rode on down +Holston Valley on a hunting and exploring trip and loitered at +Watauga. 167 Here he found not only a new settlement but an independent +government in the making; and forthwith he determined to have a part +in both. This young Virginian had already shown the inclination of a +political colonist, for in the Shenandoah Valley he had, at the age of +nineteen, laid out the town of New Market (which exists to this day) and +had directed its municipal affairs and invited and fostered its clergy. +This young Virginian--born on September 23, 1745, and so in 1772 +twenty-seven years of age--was John Sevier, that John Sevier whose +monument now towers from its site in Knoxville to testify of both +the wild and the great deeds of old Tennessee's beloved knight. Like +Robertson, Sevier hastened home and removed his whole family, including +his wife and children, his parents and his brothers and sisters, to this +new haven of freedom at Watauga. + +The friendship formed between Robertson and Sevier in these first years +of their work together was never broken, yet two more opposite types +could hardly have been brought together. Robertson was a man of humble +origin, unlettered, not a dour Scot but a solemn one. Sevier was +cavalier as well as frontiersman. On his father's side he was of the +patrician family of Xavier in France. His 168 progenitors, having +become Huguenots, had taken refuge in England, where the name Xavier +was finally changed to Sevier. John Sevier's mother was an Englishwoman. +Some years before his birth his parents had emigrated to the Shenandoah +Valley. Thus it happened that John Sevier, who mingled good English +blood with the blue blood of old France, was born an American and grew +up a frontier hunter and soldier. He stood about five feet nine from his +moccasins to his crown of light brown hair. He was well-proportioned and +as graceful of body as he was hard-muscled and swift. His chin was firm, +his nose of a Roman cast, his mouth well-shaped, its slightly full lips +slanting in a smile that would not be repressed. Under the high, finely +modeled brow, small keen dark blue eyes sparkled with health, with +intelligence, and with the man's joy in life. + +John Sevier indeed cannot be listed as a type; he was individual. There +is no other character like him in border annals. He was cavalier and +prince in his leadership of men; he had their homage. Yet he knew how to +be comrade and brother to the lowliest. He won and held the confidence +and friendship of the serious-minded Robertson no less than the idolatry +of the wildest spirits on the 169 frontier throughout the forty-three +years of the spectacular career which began for him on the day he +brought his tribe to Watauga. In his time he wore the governor's purple; +and a portrait painted of him shows how well this descendant of the +noble Xaviers could fit himself to the dignity and formal habiliments of +state; Yet in the fringed deerskin of frontier garb, he was fleeter on +the warpath than the Indians who fled before him; and he could outride +and outshoot--and, it is said, outswear--the best and the worst of the +men who followed him. Perhaps the lurking smile on John Sevier's face +was a flicker of mirth that there should be found any man, red or +white, with temerity enough to try conclusions with him. None ever did, +successfully. + +The historians of Tennessee state that the Wataugans formed their +government in 1772 and that Sevier was one of its five commissioners. +Yet, as Sevier did not settle in Tennessee before 1773, it is possible +that the Watauga Association was not formed until then. Unhappily the +written constitution of the little commonwealth was not preserved; but +it is known that, following the Ulsterman's ideal, manhood suffrage and +religious independence were two of its provisions. The commissioners +enlisted a militia and they recorded 170 deeds for land, issued marriage +licenses, and tried offenders against the law. They believed themselves +to be within the boundaries of Virginia and therefore adopted the laws +of that State for their guidance. They had numerous offenders to deal +with, for men fleeing from debt or from the consequence of crime sought +the new settlements just across the mountains as a safe and adjacent +harbor. The attempt of these men to pursue their lawlessness in Watauga +was one reason why the Wataugans organized a government. + +When the line was run between Virginia and North Carolina beyond the +mountains, Watauga was discovered to be south of Virginia's limits +and hence on Indian lands. This was in conflict with the King's +Proclamation, and Alexander Cameron, British agent to the Cherokees, +accordingly ordered the encroaching settlers to depart. The Indians, +however, desired them to remain. But since it was illegal to purchase +Indian lands, Robertson negotiated a lease for ten years. In 1775, when +Henderson made his purchase from the Cherokees, at Sycamore Shoals on +the Watauga, Robertson and Sevier, who were present at the sale with +other Watauga commissioners, followed Henderson's example and bought +outright the lands they desired 171 to include in Watauga's domain. In +1776 they petitioned North Carolina for annexation. As they were +already within North Carolina's bounds, it was recognition rather than +annexation which they sought. This petition, which is the only Wataugan +document to survive, is undated but marked as received in August, +1776. It is in Sevier's handwriting and its style suggests that it was +composed by him, for in its manner of expression it has much in common +with many later papers from his pen. That Wataugans were a law-loving +community and had formed their government for the purpose of making law +respected is reiterated throughout the document. As showing the quality +of these first western statemakers, two paragraphs are quoted: + +Finding ourselves on the frontiers, and being apprehensive that for want +of proper legislature we might become a shelter for such as endeavored +to defraud their creditors; considering also the necessity of recording +deeds, wills, and doing other public business; we, by consent of the +people, formed a court for the purposes above mentioned, taking, by +desire of our constituents, the Virginia laws for our guide, so near as +the situation of affairs would permit. This was intended for ourselves, +and was done by consent of every individual. + +The petition goes on to state that, among their measures for upholding +law, the Wataugans had 172 enlisted a company of fine riflemen and put +them under command of Captain James Robertson. + +We… thought proper to station them on our frontiers in defense of the +common cause, at the expense and risque of our own private fortunes, +till farther public orders, which we flatter ourselves will give no +offense.… We pray your mature and deliberate consideration in our +behalf, that you may annex us to your Province (whether as county, +district, or other division) in such manner as may enable us to share in +the glorious cause of Liberty: enforce our laws under authority and in +every respect become the best members of society; and for ourselves +and our constituents we hope we may venture to assure you that we shall +adhere strictly to your determinations, and that nothing will be lacking +or anything neglected that may add weight (in the civil or military +establishments) to the glorious cause in which we are now struggling, or +contribute to the welfare of our own or ages yet to come. + +One hundred and thirteen names are signed to the document. In the +following year (1777) North Carolina erected her overhill territory +into Washington County. The Governor appointed justices of the peace and +militia officers who in the following year organized the new county and +its courts. And so Watauga's independent government, begun in the spirit +of true liberty, came as lawfully to its end. + +173 But for nearly three years before their political status was thus +determined, the Wataugans were sharing in the glorious cause of Liberty +by defending their settlements against Indian attacks. While the +majority of the young Cherokee warriors were among their enemies, their +chief battles were fought with those from the Chickamaugan towns on +the Tennessee River, under the leadership of Dragging Canoe. The +Chickamaugans embraced the more vicious and bloodthirsty Cherokees, with +a mixture of Creeks and bad whites, who, driven from every law-abiding +community, had cast in their lot with this tribe. The exact number of +white thieves and murderers who had found harbor in the Indian towns +during a score or more of years is not known; but the letters of the +Indian agents, preserved in the records, would indicate that there were +a good many of them. They were fit allies for Dragging Canoe; their +hatred of those from whom their own degeneracy had separated them was +not less than his. + +In July, 1776, John Sevier wrote to the Virginia Committee as follows: + +Dear Gentlemen: Isaac Thomas, William Falling, Jaret Williams and one +more have this moment come in by making their escape from the Indians +and say six 174 hundred Indians and whites were to start for this fort +and intend to drive the country up to New River before they return. + +Thus was heralded the beginning of a savage warfare which kept the +borderers engaged for years. + +It has been a tradition of the chroniclers that Isaac Thomas received +a timely warning from Nancy Ward, a half-caste Cherokee prophetess who +often showed her good will towards the whites; and that the Indians +were roused to battle by Alexander Cameron and John Stuart, the British +agents or superintendents among the overhill tribes. There was a letter +bearing Cameron's name stating that fifteen hundred savages from the +Cherokee and Creek nations were to join with British troops landed at +Pensacola in an expedition against the southern frontier colonies. +This letter was brought to Watauga at dead of night by a masked man who +slipped it through a window and rode away. Apparently John Sevier +did not believe the military information contained in the mysterious +missive, for he communicated nothing of it to the Virginia Committee. +In recent years the facts have come to light. This mysterious letter +and others of a similar tenor bearing forged signatures are cited in +a report by the British Agent, John Stuart, to 175 his Government. It +appears that such inflammatory missives had been industriously scattered +through the back settlements of both Carolinas. There are also letters +from Stuart to Lord Dartmouth, dated a year earlier, urging that +something be done immediately to counteract rumors set afloat that the +British were endeavoring to instigate both the Indians and the negroes +to attack the Americans. + +Now it is, of course, an established fact that both the British and the +American armies used Indians in the War of Independence, even as both +together had used them against the French and the Spanish and their +allied Indians. It was inevitable that the Indians should participate +in any severe conflict between the whites. They were a numerous and a +warlike people and, from their point of view, they had more at stake +than the alien whites who were contesting for control of the red man's +continent. Both British and Americans have been blamed for half-hearted +attempts to keep the Indians neutral. The truth is that each side +strove to enlist the Indians--to be used, if needed later, as +warriors. Massacre was no part of this policy, though it may have been +countenanced by individual officers in both camps. But it is obvious 176 +that, once the Indians took the warpath, they were to be restrained by +no power and, no matter under whose nominal command, they would carry on +warfare by their own methods.¹ + +¹ There is little doubt that either side, British or Americans, stood +ready to enlist the Indians. Already before Boston the Americans had +had the help of the Stockbridge tribe. Washington found the service +committed to the practise when he arrived at Cambridge early in July. +Dunmore had taken the initiative in securing such allies, at least +is purpose; but the insurgent Virginians had had of late more direct +contact with the tribes and were now striving to secure them but with +little success. _The Westward Movement,_ by Justin Winsor, p. 87. +General Ethan Allen of Vermont, as his letters show, sent emissaries +into Canada in an endeavor to enlist the French Canadians and the +Canadian Indians against the British in Canada. See _American Archives,_ +Fourth Series, vol. II, p. 714. The British General Gage wrote to Lord +Dartmouth from Boston, June 12, 1775: We need not be tender of calling +on the Savages as the rebels have shown us the example, by bringing as +many Indians down against us as they could collect. _American Archives,_ +Fourth Series, vol. ii, p. 967. In a letter to Lord Germain, dated +August 23, 1776, John Stuart wrote: Although Mr. Cameron was in constant +danger of assassination and the Indians were threatened with invasion +should they dare to protect him, yet he still found means to prevent +their falling on the settlement. See North Carolina _Colonial Records,_ +vol. X, pp. 608 and 763. Proof that the British agents had succeeded +in keeping the Cherokee neutral till the summer of 1776 is found in the +instructions, dated the 7th of July, to Major Winston from President +Rutledge of South Carolina, regarding the Cherokees, that they must be +forced to give up the British agents and instead of remaining in a State +of Neutrality with respect to British Forces they must take part with +us against them. See North Carolina _Colonial Records,_ vol. X, p. 658. +Whatever may have been the case elsewhere, the attacks on the Watauga +and Holston settlements 177 were not instigated by British agents. It +was not Nancy Ward but Henry Stuart, John Stuart's deputy, who sent +Isaac Thomas to warn the settlers. In their efforts to keep the +friendship of the red men, the British and the Americans were providing +them with powder and lead. The Indians had run short of ammunition and, +since hunting was their only means of livelihood, they must shoot or +starve. South Carolina sent the Cherokees a large supply of powder and +lead which was captured en route by Tories. About the same time Henry +Stuart set out from Pensacola with another consignment from the British. +His report to Lord Germain of his arrival in the Chickamaugan towns +and of what took place there just prior to the raids on the Tennessee +settlements is one of the most illuminating as well as one of the most +dramatic papers in the collected records of that time.¹ + +¹ North Carolina _Colonial Records,_ vol. X, pp. 763-785. Stuart's first +act was secretly to send out Thomas, the trader, to warn the settlers +of their peril, for a small war party of braves was even then concluding +the preliminary war ceremonies. The reason for this Indian alarm and +projected excursion was the fact that the settlers had built one fort at +least on the Indian lands. Stuart finally persuaded the 178 Indians +to remain at peace until he could write to the settlers stating the +grievances and asking for negotiations. The letters were to be carried +by Thomas on his return. + +But no sooner was Thomas on his way again with the letters than there +arrived a deputation of warriors from the Northern tribes--from the +Confederate nations, the Mohawks, Ottawas, Nantucas, Shawanoes and +Delawares--fourteen men in all, who entered the council hall of the Old +Beloved Town of Chota with their faces painted black and the war belt +carried before them. They said that they had been seventy days on their +journey. Everywhere along their way they had seen houses and forts +springing up like weeds across the green sod of their hunting lands. +Where once were great herds of deer and buffalo, they had watched +thousands of men at arms preparing for war. So many now were the white +warriors and their women and children that the red men had been obliged +to travel a great way on the other side of the Ohio and to make a detour +of nearly three hundred miles to avoid being seen. Even on this outlying +route they had crossed the fresh tracks of a great body of people with +horses and cattle going still further towards the setting sun. But their +179 cries were not to be in vain; for their fathers, the French had +heard them and had promised to aid them if they would now strike as one +for their lands. + +After this preamble the deputy of the Mohawks rose. He said that some +American people had made war on one of their towns and had seized the +son of their Great Beloved Man, Sir William Johnson, imprisoned him, and +put him to a cruel death; this crime demanded a great vengeance and they +would not cease until they had taken it. One after another the fourteen +delegates rose and made their talks and presented their wampum strings +to Dragging Canoe. The last to speak was a chief of the Shawanoes. He +also declared that their fathers, the French, who had been so long dead, +were alive again, that they had supplied them plentifully with arms and +ammunition and had promised to assist them in driving out the Americans +and in reclaiming their country. Now all the Northern tribes were joined +in one for this great purpose; and they themselves were on their way to +all the Southern tribes and had resolved that, if any tribe refused +to join, they would fall upon and extirpate that tribe, after having +overcome the whites. At the conclusion of his oration the Shawanoe +presented the war belt--nine feet of six-inch wide 180 purple wampum +spattered with vermilion--to Dragging Canoe, who held it extended +between his two hands, in silence, and waited. Presently rose a headman +whose wife had been a member of Sir William Johnson's household. He laid +his hand on the belt and sang the war song. One by one, then, chiefs +and warriors rose, laid hold of the great belt and chanted the war +song. Only the older men, made wise by many defeats, sat still in their +places, mute and dejected. After that day every young fellow's face in +the overhills towns appeared blackened and nothing was now talked of but +war. + +Stuart reports that all the white men in the tribe also laid hands on +the belt. Dragging Canoe then demanded that Cameron and Stuart come +forward and take hold of the war belt--which we refused. Despite the +offense their refusal gave--and it would seem a dangerous time to give +such offense--Cameron delivered a strong talk for peace, warning +the Cherokees of what must surely be the end of the rashness they +contemplated. Stuart informed the chief that if the Indians persisted in +attacking the settlements with out waiting for answers to his letters, +he would not remain with them any longer or bring them any more +ammunition. He went to his house and 181 made ready to leave on the +following day. Early the next morning Dragging Canoe appeared at his +door and told him that the Indians were now very angry about the letters +he had written, which could only have put the settlers on their guard; +and that if any white man attempted to leave the nation they had +determined to follow him but not to bring him back. Dragging Canoe had +painted his face black to carry this message. Thomas now returned with +an answer from the West Fincastle men, which was so unsatisfactory to +the tribe that war ceremonies were immediately begun. Stuart and Cameron +could no longer influence the Indians. All that could now be done was to +give them strict charge not to pass the Boundary Line, not to injure any +of the King's faithful subjects, not to Kill any women and children; and +to threaten to stop all ammunition if they did not obey these orders. + +The major part of the Watauga militia went out to meet the Indians and +defeated a large advance force at Long Island Flats on the Holston. The +Watauga fort, where many of the settlers had taken refuge, contained +forty fighting men under Robertson and Sevier. As Indians usually +retreated and 182 waited for a while after a defeat, those within the +fort took it for granted that no immediate attack was to be expected; +and the women went out at daybreak into the fields to milk the cows. +Suddenly the war whoop shrilled from the edge of the clearing. Red +warriors leaped from the green skirting of the forest. The women ran for +the fort. Quickly the heavy gates swung to and the dropped bar secured +them. Only then did the watchmen discover that one woman had been shut +out. She was a young woman nearing her twenties and, if legend has +reported her truly, Bonnie Kate Sherrill was a beauty. Through a +porthole Sevier saw her running towards the shut gates, dodging and +darting, her brown hair blowing from the wind of her race for life--and +offering far too rich a prize to the yelling fiends who dashed after +her. Sevier coolly shot the foremost of her pursuers, then sprang upon +the wall, caught up Bonnie Kate, and tossed her inside to safety. And +legend says further that when, after Sevier's brief widowerhood, she +became his wife, four years later, Bonnie Kate was wont to say that she +would be willing to run another such race any day to have another such +introduction! + +There were no casualties within the fort and, 183 after three hours, the +foe withdrew, leaving several of their warriors slain. + +In the excursions against the Indians which followed this opening of +hostilities Sevier won his first fame as an Indian fighter--the fame +later crystallized in the phrase thirty-five battles, thirty-five +victories. His method was to take a very small company of the hardiest +and swiftest horsemen--men who could keep their seat and endurance, and +horses that could keep their feet and their speed, on any steep of the +mountains no matter how tangled and rough the going might be--swoop down +upon war camp, or town, and go through it with rifle and hatchet and +fire, then dash homeward at the same pace before the enemy had begun to +consider whether to follow him or not. In all his thirty-five battles it +is said he lost not more than fifty men. + +The Cherokees made peace in 1777, after about a year of almost +continuous warfare, the treaty being concluded on their side by the old +chiefs who had never countenanced the war. Dragging Canoe refused to +take part, but he was rendered innocuous for the time being by the +destruction of several of the Chickamaugan villages. James Robertson +now went to Chota as Indian agent for North Carolina. 184 So fast was +population growing, owing to the opening of a wagon road into Burke +County, North Carolina, that Washington County was divided. John Sevier +became Colonel of Washington and Isaac Shelby Colonel of the newly +erected Sullivan County. Jonesborough, the oldest town in Tennessee, was +laid out as the county seat of Washington; and in the same year (1778) +Sevier moved to the bank of the Nolichucky River, so-called after +the Indian name of this dashing sparkling stream, meaning rapid or +precipitous. Thus the nickname given John Sevier by his devotees had a +dual application. He was well called Nolichucky Jack. + +When Virginia annulled Richard Henderson's immense purchase but allowed +him a large tract on the Cumberland, she by no means discouraged that +intrepid pioneer. Henderson's tenure of Kentucky had been brief, but not +unprofitable in experience. He had learned that colonies must be +treated with less commercial pressure and with more regard to individual +liberty, if they were to be held loyal either to a King beyond the water +or to an uncrowned leader nearer at hand. He had been making his plans +for colonization of that portion of the Transylvania purchase which +lay within the 185 bounds of North Carolina along the Cumberland and +choosing his men to lay the foundations of his projected settlement +in what was then a wholly uninhabited country; and he had decided on +generous terms, such as ten dollars a thousand acres for land, the +certificate of purchase to entitle the holder to further proceedings in +the land office without extra fees. + +To head an enterprise of such danger and hardship Henderson required +a man of more than mere courage; a man of resource, of stability, of +proven powers, one whom other men would follow and obey with confidence. +So it was that James Robertson was chosen to lead the first white +settlers into middle Tennessee. He set out in February, 1779, +accompanied by his brother, Mark Robertson, several other white men, and +a negro, to select a site for settlement and to plant corn. Meanwhile +another small party led by Gaspar Mansker had arrived. As the boundary +line between Virginia and North Carolina had not been run to this point, +Robertson believed that the site he had chosen lay within Virginia +and was in the disposal of General Clark. To protect the settlers, +therefore, he journeyed into the Illinois country to purchase cabin +rights from Clark, but there he was evidently 186 convinced that the +site on the Cumberland would be found to lie within North Carolina. He +returned to Watauga to lead a party of settlers into the new territory, +towards which they set out in October. After crossing the mountain chain +through Cumberland Gap, the party followed Boone's road--the Warriors' +Path--for some distance and then made their own trail southwestward +through the wilderness to the bluffs on the Cumberland, where they built +cabins to house them against one of the coldest winters ever experienced +in that county. So were laid the first foundations of the present city +of Nashville, at first named Nashborough by Robertson.¹ On the way, +Robertson had fallen in with a party of men and families bound for +Kentucky and had persuaded them to accompany his little band to the +Cumberland. Robertson's own wife and children, as well as the families +of his party, had been left to follow in the second expedition, which +was to be made by water under the command of Captain John Donelson. + +¹ In honor of General Francis Nash, of North Carolina, who was mortally +wounded at Germantown, 1777. The little fleet of boats containing the +settlers, their families, and all their household goods, was to start +from Fort Patrick Henry, near Long Island 187 in the Holston River, to +float down into the Tennessee and along the 652 miles of that widely +wandering stream to the Ohio, and then to proceed up the Ohio to the +mouth of the Cumberland and up the Cumberland until Robertson's station +should appear--a journey, as it turned out, of some nine hundred miles +through unknown country and on waters at any rate for the greater part +never before navigated by white men. + +_Journal of a voyage, intended by God's permission, in the good boat +Adventure_ is the title of the log book in which Captain Donelson +entered the events of the four months' journey. Only a few pages endured +to be put into print: but those few tell a tale of hazard and courage +that seems complete. Could a lengthier narrative, even if enriched with +literary art and fancy, bring before us more vividly than do the simple +entries of Donelson's log the spirit of the men and the women who won +the West? If so little personal detail is recorded of the pioneer men of +that day that we must deduce what they were from what they did, what do +we know of their unfailing comrades, the pioneer women? Only that they +were there and that they shared in every test of courage and endurance, +save the march of troops and the hunt. 188 Donelson's _Journal_ +therefore has a special value, because in its terse account of Mrs. +Jennings and Mrs. Peyton it depicts unforgettably the quality of pioneer +womanhood.¹ + +¹ This Journal is printed in Ramsey's _Annals of Tennessee._ _December +22nd, 1779._ Took our departure from the fort and fell down the river to +the mouth of Reedy Creek where we were stopped by the fall of water and +most excessive hard frost. + +Perhaps part of the _Journal_ was lost, or perhaps the excessive hard +frost of that severe winter, when it is said even droves of wild game +perished, prevented the boats from going on, for the next entry is dated +the 27th of February. On this date the _Adventure_ and two other boats +grounded and lay on the shoals all that afternoon and the succeeding +night in much distress. + +_March 2nd._ Rain about half the day.… Mr. Henry's boat being driven on +the point of an island by the force of the current was sunk, the +whole cargo much damaged and the crew's lives much endangered, which +occasioned the whole fleet to put on shore and go to their assistance.… +_Monday 6th._ Got under way before sunrise; the morning proving very +foggy, many of the fleet were much bogged--about 10 o'clock lay by for +them; when 189 collected, proceeded down. Camped on the north shore, +where Captain Hutching's negro man died, being much frosted in his feet +and legs, of which he died. _Tuesday, 7th._ Got under way very +early; the day proving very windy, a S.S.W., and the river being wide +occasioned a high sea, insomuch that some of the smaller crafts were in +danger; therefore came to at the uppermost Chiccamauga town, which was +then evacuated, where we lay by that afternoon and camped that night. +The wife of Ephraim Peyton was here delivered of a child. Mr. Peyton has +gone through by land with Captain Robertson. _Wednesday 8th_… proceed +down to an Indian village which was inhabited… they insisted on us to +come ashore, called us brothers, and showed other signs of friendship.… +And here we must regret the unfortunate death of young Mr. Payne, on +board Captain Blakemore's boat, who was mortally wounded by reason of +the boat running too near the northern shore opposite the town, where +some of the enemy lay concealed; and the more tragical misfortune of +poor Stuart, his family and friends, to the number of twenty-eight +persons. This man had embarked with us for the Western country, but his +family being diseased with the small pox, it was agreed upon between him +and the company that he should keep at some distance in the rear, for +fear of the infection spreading, and he was warned each night when the +encampment should take place by the sound of a horn.… The Indians having +now collected to a considerable number, observing his helpless situation +singled off from the rest of the fleet, intercepted him and killed and +took prisoners the whole crew…; their cries were distinctly heard.… + +190 After describing a running fight with Indians stationed on the +bluffs on both shores where the river narrowed to half its width and +boiled through a canyon, the entry for the day concludes: Jennings's +boat is missing. + +_Friday 10th._ This morning about 4 o'clock we were surprised by +the cries of help poor Jennings at some distance in the rear. He had +discovered us by our fires and came up in the most wretched condition. +He states that as soon as the Indians discovered his situation [his boat +had run on a rock] they turned their whole attention to him and kept +up a most galling fire at his boat. He ordered his wife, a son nearly +grown, a young man who accompanies them and his negro man and woman, to +throw all his goods into the river to lighten their boat for the purpose +of getting her off; himself returning their fire as well as he could, +being a good soldier and an excellent marksman. But before they had +accomplished their object, his son, the young man and the negro, jumped +out of the boat and left.… Mrs. Jennings, however, and the negro woman, +succeeded in unloading the boat, but chiefly by the exertions of Mrs. +Jennings who got out of the boat and shoved her off, but was near +falling a victim to her own intrepidity on account of the boat starting +so suddenly as soon as loosened from the rock. Upon examination he +appears to have made a wonderful escape for his boat is pierced in +numberless places with bullets. It is to be remarked that Mrs. Peyton, +who was the night before delivered of an infant, which was unfortunately +killed upon the hurry and confusion consequent upon such a disaster, +assisted them, 191 being frequently exposed to wet and cold.… Their +clothes were very much cut with bullets, especially Mrs. Jennings's. + +Of the three men who deserted, while the women stood by under fire, +the negro was drowned and Jennings's son and the other young man were +captured by the Chickamaugans. The latter was burned at the stake. Young +Jennings was to have shared the same fate; but a trader in the village, +learning that the boy was known to John Sevier, ransomed him by a large +payment of goods, as a return for an act of kindness Sevier had once +done to him. + +_Sunday 12th_.… After running until about 10 o'clock came in sight of +the Muscle Shoals. Halted on the northern shore at the appearance of the +shoals, in order to search for the signs Captain James Robertson was to +make for us at that place… that it was practicable for us to go across +by land… we can find none--from which we conclude that it would not be +prudent to make the attempt and are determined, knowing ourselves in +such imminent danger, to pursue our journey down the river.… When we +approached them [the Shoals] they had a dreadful appearance.… The +water being high made a terrible roaring, which could be heard at some +distance, among the driftwood heaped frightfully upon the points of the +islands, the current running in every possible direction. Here we did +not know how soon we should be dashed to pieces and all our troubles 192 +ended at once. Our boats frequently dragged on the bottom and appeared +constantly in danger of striking. They warped as much as in a rough +sea. But by the hand of Providence we are now preserved from this +danger also. I know not the length of this wonderful shoal; it had been +represented to me to be twenty-five or thirty miles. If so, we must +have descended very rapidly, as indeed we did, for we passed it in about +three hours. + +On the twentieth the little fleet arrived at the mouth of the Tennessee +and the voyagers landed on the bank of the Ohio. + +Our situation here is truly disagreeable. The river is very high and the +current rapid, our boats not constructed for the purpose of stemming a +rapid stream, our provisions exhausted, the crews almost worn down with +hunger and fatigue, and know not what distance we have to go or what +time it will take us to our place of destination. The scene is rendered +still more melancholy as several boats will not attempt to ascend the +rapid current. Some intend to descend the Mississippi to Natchez; others +are bound for the Illinois--among the rest my son-in-law and daughter. +We now part, perhaps to meet no more, for I am determined to pursue +my course, happen what will. _Tuesday 21st._ Set out and on this day +labored very hard and got but little way.… Passed the two following days +as the former, suffering much from hunger and fatigue. _Friday 24th._ +About three o'clock came to the mouth of a river which I thought was the +Cumberland. Some of 193 the company declared it could not be--it was +so much smaller than was expected.… We determined however to make the +trial, pushed up some distance and encamped for the night. _Saturday +25th._ Today we are much encouraged; the river grows wider;… we are now +convinced it is the Cumberland.… _Sunday 26th_… procured some buffalo +meat; though poor it was palatable. _Friday 31st_… met with Colonel +Richard Henderson, who is running the line between Virginia and North +Carolina. At this meeting we were much rejoiced. He gave us every +information we wished, and further 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.… _Monday, April 24th_. +This day we arrived at our journey's end at the Big Salt Lick, where we +have the pleasure of finding Captain Robertson and his company. It is a +source of satisfaction to us to be enabled to restore to him and others +their families and friends, who were entrusted to our care, and who, +sometime since, perhaps, despaired of ever meeting again.… + +Past the camps of the Chickamaugans--who were retreating farther and +farther down the twisting flood, seeking a last standing ground in the +giant caves by the Tennessee--these white voyagers had steered their +pirogues. Near Robertson's station, where they landed after having +traversed 194 the triangle of the three great rivers which enclose +the larger part of western Tennessee, stood a crumbling trading house +marking the defeat of a Frenchman who had, one time, sailed in from the +Ohio to establish an outpost of his nation there. At a little distance +were the ruins of a rude fort cast up by the Cherokees in the days when +the redoubtable Chickasaws had driven them from the pleasant shores of +the western waters. Under the towering forest growth lay vast burial +mounds and the sunken foundations of walled towns, telling of a departed +race which had once flashed its rude paddles and had its dream of +permanence along the courses of these great waterways. Now another +tribe had come to dream that dream anew. Already its primitive keels had +traced the opening lines of its history on the face of the immemorial +rivers. + +195 + + + + +Chapter IX + +King's Mountain + +About the time when James Robertson went from Watauga to fling out the +frontier line three hundred miles farther westward, the British took +Savannah. In 1780 they took Charleston and Augusta, and overran Georgia. +Augusta was the point where the old trading path forked north and west, +and it was the key to the Back Country and the overhill domain. In +Georgia and the Back Country of South Carolina there were many Tories +ready to rally to the King's standard whenever a King's officer should +carry it through their midst. A large number of these Tories were +Scotch, chiefly from the Highlands. In fact, as we have seen, Scotch +blood predominated among the racial streams in the Back Country from +Georgia to Pennsylvania. Now, to insure a triumphant march northward for +Cornwallis and his royal troops, these sons of Scotland must be gathered +together, 196 the loyal encouraged and those of rebellious tendencies +converted, and they must be drilled and turned to account. This task, if +it were to be accomplished successfully, must be entrusted to an officer +with positive qualifications, one who would command respect, whose +personal address would attract men and disarm opposition, and especially +one who could go as a Scot among his own clan. Cornwallis found his man +in Major Patrick Ferguson. + +Ferguson was a Highlander, a son of Lord Pitfour of Aberdeen, and +thirty-six years of age. He was of short stature for a Highlander--about +five feet eight--lean and dark, with straight black hair. He had a +serious unhandsome countenance which, at casual glance, might not +arrest attention; but when he spoke he became magnetic, by reason of +the intelligence and innate force that gleamed in his eyes and the +convincing sincerity of his manner. He was admired and respected by his +brother officers and by the commanders under whom he had served, and he +was loved by his men. + +He had seen his first service in the Seven Years' War, having joined +the British army in Flanders at the age of fifteen; and he had early +distinguished himself for courage and coolness. In 1768, as a captain of +infantry, he quelled an insurrection of 197 the natives on the island +of St. Vincent in the West Indies. Later, at Woolwich, he took up the +scientific study of his profession of arms. He not only became a crack +shot, but he invented a new type of rifle which he could load at the +breach without ramrod and so quickly as to fire seven times in a minute. +Generals and statesmen attended his exhibitions of shooting; and even +the King rode over at the head of his guards to watch Ferguson rapidly +loading and firing. + +In America under Cornwallis, Ferguson had the reputation of being the +best shot in the army; and it was soon said that, in his quickness at +loading and firing, he excelled the most expert American frontiersman. +Eyewitnesses have left their testimony that, seeing a bird alight on a +bough or rail, he would drop his bridle rein, draw his pistol, toss it +in the air, catch and aim it as it fell, and shoot the bird's head off. +He was given command of a corps of picked riflemen; and in the Battle of +the Brandywine in 1777 he rendered services which won acclaim from the +whole army. For the honor of that day's service to his King, Ferguson +paid what from him, with his passion for the rifle, must have been +the dearest price that could have been demanded. His right arm was +shattered, and 198 for the remaining three years of his short life +it hung useless at his side. Yet he took up swordplay and attained a +remarkable degree of skill as a left-handed swordsman. + +Such was Ferguson, the soldier. What of the man? For he has been +pictured as a wolf and a fiend and a coward by early chroniclers, who +evidently felt that they were adding to the virtue of those who fought +in defense of liberty by representing all their foes as personally +odious. We can read his quality of manhood in a few lines of the letter +he sent to his kinsman, the noted Dr. Adam Ferguson, about an incident +that occurred at Chads Ford. As he was lying with his men in the woods, +in front of Knyphausen's army, so he relates, he saw two American +officers ride out. He describes their dress minutely. One was in hussar +uniform. The other was in a dark green and blue uniform with a high +cocked hat and was mounted on a bay horse: + +I ordered three good shots to steal near to and fire at them; but the +idea disgusting me, I recalled the order. The hussar in retiring made a +circuit, but the other passed within a hundred yards of us, upon which +I advanced from the wood towards him. Upon my calling he stopped; but +after looking at me he proceeded. I again drew his attention and made +signs to him to stop, 199 levelling my piece at him; but he slowly +cantered away. As I was within that distance, at which, in the quickest +firing, I could have lodged half a dozen balls in or about him before he +was out of my reach, I had only to determine. But it was not pleasant to +fire at the back of an unoffending individual who was acquitting himself +very coolly of his duty--so I let him alone. The day after, I had been +telling this story to some wounded officers, who lay in the same room +with me, when one of the surgeons who had been dressing the wounded +rebel officers came in and told us that they had been informing him that +General Washington was all the morning with the light troops, and only +attended by a French officer in hussar dress, he himself dressed and +mounted in every point as above described. I am not sorry that I did not +know at the time who it was.¹ + +¹ Doubt that the officer in question was Washington was expressed +by James Fenimore Cooper. Cooper stated that Major De Lancey his +father-in-law, was binding Ferguson's arm at the time when the two +officers were seen and Ferguson recalled the order to fire, and that De +Lancey said he believed the officer was Count Pulaski. But, as Ferguson, +according to his own account, leveled his piece at the officer, his arm +evidently was not wounded until later in the day. The probability is +that Ferguson's version, written in a private letter to his relative, is +correct as to the facts, whatever may be conjectured as to the identity +of the officer. See Draper's _King's Mountain and its Heroes,_ pp. +52-54. Ferguson had his code towards the foe's women also. On one +occasion when he was assisting in an action carried out by Hessians +and Dragoons, he learned that some American women had been shamefully +maltreated. He went in a white fury 200 to the colonel in command, and +demanded that the men who had so disgraced their uniforms instantly be +put to death. + +In rallying the loyalists of the Back Country of Georgia and the +Carolinas, Ferguson was very successful. He was presently in command of +a thousand or more men, including small detachments of loyalists from +New York and New Jersey, under American-born officers such as De Peyster +and Allaire. There were good honest men among the loyalists and there +were also rough and vicious men out for spoils--which was true as well +of the Whigs or Patriots from the same counties. Among the rough element +were Tory banditti from the overmountain region. It is to be gathered +from Ferguson's records that he did not think any too highly of some +of his new recruits, but he set to work with all energy to make them +useful. + +The American Patriots hastily prepared to oppose him. Colonel Charles +McDowell of Burke County, North Carolina, with a small force of militia +was just south of the line at a point on the Broad River when he heard +that Ferguson was sweeping on northward. In haste he sent a call for +help across the mountains to Sevier and Shelby. Sevier had his hands +full at Watauga, but he 201 dispatched two hundred of his troops; and +Isaac Shelby, with a similar force from Sullivan County crossed the +mountains to McDowell's assistance. These overmountain men or backwater +men, as they were called east of the hills, were trained in Sevier's +method of Indian warfare--the secret approach through the dark, the +swift dash, and the swifter flight. Fight strong and run away fast was +the Indian motto, as their women had often been heard to call it after +the red men as they ran yelling to fall on the whites. The frontiersmen +had adapted the motto to fit their case, as they had also made their own +the Indian tactics of ambuscade and surprise attacks at dawn. To sleep, +or ride if needs must, by night, and to fight by day and make off, was +to them a reasonable soldier's life. + +But Ferguson was a night marauder. The terror of his name, which grew +among the Whigs of the Back Country until the wildest legends about his +ferocity were current, was due chiefly to a habit he had of pouncing on +his foes in the middle of the night and pulling them out of bed to +give fight or die. It was generally both fight and die, for these +dark adventures of his were particularly successful. Ferguson knew no +neutrals or conscientious 202 objectors; any man who would not carry +arms for the King was a traitor, and his life and goods were forfeit. A +report of his reads: The attack being made at night, no quarter could be +given. Hence his wolfish fame. Werewolf would have been a fit name for +him for, though he was a wolf at night, in the daylight he was a man +and, as we have seen, a chivalrous one. + +In the guerrilla fighting that went on for a brief time between the +overmountain men and various detachments of Ferguson's forces, sometimes +one side, sometimes the other, won the heat. But the field remained +open. Neither side could claim the mastery. In a minor engagement fought +at Musgrove's Mill on the Enoree, Shelby's command came off victor and +was about to pursue the enemy towards Ninety-Six when a messenger from +McDowell galloped madly into camp with word of General Gates's crushing +defeat at Camden. This was a warning for Shelby's guerrillas to flee as +birds to their mountains, or Ferguson would cut them off from the north +and wedge them in between his own force and the victorious Cornwallis. +McDowell's men, also on the run for safety, joined them. For forty-eight +hours without food or rest they rode a race with Ferguson, who kept +hard on 203 their trail until they disappeared into the mystery of the +winding mountain paths they alone knew. + +Ferguson reached the gap where they had swerved into the towering hills +only half an hour after their horses' hoofs had pounded across it. Here +he turned back. His troops were exhausted from the all-night ride and, +in any case, there were not enough of them to enable him to cross the +mountains and give the Watauga men battle on their own ground with a +fair promise of victory. So keeping east of the hills but still close to +them, Ferguson turned into Burke County, North Carolina. He sat him down +in Gilbert Town (present Lincolnton, Lincoln County) at the foot of the +Blue Ridge and indited a letter to the Back Water Men, telling them +that if they did not lay down their arms and return to their rightful +allegiance, he would come over their hills and raze their settlements +and hang their leaders. He paroled a kinsman of Shelby's, whom he had +taken prisoner in the chase, and sent him home with the letter. Then he +set about his usual business of gathering up Tories and making soldiers +of them, and of hunting down rebels. + +One of the rebels was a certain Captain Lytle. When Ferguson drew up at +Lytle's door, Lytle had 204 already made his escape; but Mrs. Lytle was +there. She was a very handsome woman and she had dressed herself in her +best to receive Ferguson, who was reported a gallant as well as a wolf. +After a few spirited passages between the lady in the doorway and the +officer on the white horse before it, the latter advised Mrs. Lytle +to use her influence to bring her husband back to his duty. She became +grave then and answered that her husband would never turn traitor to his +country. Ferguson frowned at the word traitor, but presently he said: +Madam, I admire you as the handsomest woman I have seen in North +Carolina. I even half way admire your zeal in a bad cause. But take +my word for it, the rebellion has had its day and is now virtually put +down. Give my regards to Captain Lytle and tell him to come in. He will +not be asked to compromise his honor. His verbal pledge not again to +take up arms against the King is all that will be asked of him.¹ + +¹ Draper, _King's Mountain and its Heroes,_ pp. 151-53. This was another +phase of the character of the one-armed Highlander whose final challenge +to the back water men was now being considered in every log cabin beyond +the hills. A man who would not shoot an enemy in the back, who was ready +to put 205 the same faith in another soldier's honor which he knew was +due to his own, yet in battle a wolfish fighter who leaped through the +dark to give no quarter and to take none--he was fit challenger to those +other mountaineers who also had a chivalry of their own, albeit they too +were wolves of war. + +When Shelby on the Holston received Ferguson's pungent letter, he flung +himself on his horse and rode posthaste to Watauga to consult with +Sevier. He found the bank of the Nolichucky teeming with merrymakers. +Nolichucky Jack was giving an immense barbecue and a horse race. Without +letting the festival crowd have an inkling of the serious nature of +Shelby's errand, the two men drew apart to confer. It is said to have +been Sevier's idea that they should muster the forces of the western +country and go in search of Ferguson ere the latter should be able +to get sufficient reinforcements to cross the mountains. Sevier, like +Ferguson, always preferred to seek his foe, knowing well the advantage +of the offensive. Messengers were sent to Colonel William Campbell of +the Virginia settlements on the Clinch, asking his aid. Campbell at +first refused, thinking it better to fortify the positions they held +and let Ferguson 206 come and put the mountains between himself and +Cornwallis. On receipt of a second message, however, he concurred. The +call to arms was heard up and down the valleys, and the frontiersmen +poured into Watauga. The overhill men were augmented by McDowell's +troops from Burke County, who had dashed over the mountains a few weeks +before in their escape from Ferguson. + +At daybreak on the 26th of September they mustered at the Sycamore +Shoals on the Watauga, over a thousand strong. It was a different +picture they made from that other great gathering at the same spot when +Henderson had made his purchase in money of the Dark and Bloody Ground, +and Sevier and Robertson had bought for the Wataugans this strip of +Tennessee. There were no Indians in this picture. Dragging Canoe, who +had uttered his bloody prophecy, had by these very men been driven far +south into the caves of the Tennessee River. But the Indian prophecy +still hung over them, and in this day with a heavier menace. Not with +money, now, were they to seal their purchase of the free land by the +western waters. There had been no women in that other picture, only the +white men who were going forward to open the way and the red men who +were 207 retreating. But in this picture there were women--wives and +children, mothers, sisters, and sweethearts. All the women of the +settlement were there at this daybreak muster to cheer on their way the +men who were going out to battle that they might keep the way of liberty +open not for men only but for women and children also. And the battle to +which the men were now going forth must be fought against Back Country +men of their own stripe under a leader who, in other circumstances, +might well have been one of themselves--a primitive spirit of hardy +mountain stock, who, having once taken his stand, would not barter and +would not retreat. + +With the Sword of the Lord and of Gideon! cried their pastor, the +Reverend Samuel Doak, with upraised hands, as the mountaineers swung +into their saddles. And it is said that all the women took up his +words and cried again and again, With the sword of the Lord and of our +Gideons! To the shouts of their women, as bugles on the wind of dawn, +the buckskin-shirted army dashed out upon the mountain trail. + +The warriors' equipment included rifles and ammunition, tomahawks, +knives, shot pouches, a knapsack, and a blanket for each man. Their +uniforms 208 were leggings, breeches, and long loose shirts of gayly +fringed deerskin, or of the linsey-woolsey spun by their women. Their +hunting shirts were bound in at the waist by bright-colored linsey +sashes tied behind in a bow. They wore moccasins for footgear, and on +their heads high fur or deerskin caps trimmed with colored bands of +raveled cloth. Around their necks hung their powder-horns ornamented +with their own rude carvings. + +On the first day they drove along with them a number of beeves but, +finding that the cattle impeded the march, they left them behind on the +mountain side. Their provisions thereafter were wild game and the small +supply each man carried of mixed corn meal and maple sugar. For drink, +they had the hill streams. + +They passed upward between Roan and Yellow mountains to the top of +the range. Here, on the bald summit, where the loose snow lay to their +ankles, they halted for drill and rifle practice. When Sevier called up +his men, he discovered that two were missing. He suspected at once that +they had slipped away to carry warning to Ferguson, for Watauga was +known to be infested with Tories. Two problems now confronted the +mountaineers. They must increase the speed of their march, so 209 that +Ferguson should not have time to get reinforcements from Cornwallis; and +they must make that extra speed by another trail than they had intended +taking so that they themselves could not be intercepted before they had +picked up the Back Country militia under Colonels Cleveland, Hampbright, +Chronicle, and Williams, who were moving to join them. We are not told +who took the lead when they left the known trail, but we may suppose it +was Sevier and his Wataugans, for the making of new warpaths and wild +riding were two of the things which distinguished Nolichucky Jack's +leadership. Down the steep side of the mountain, finding their way as +they plunged, went the overhill men. They crossed the Blue Ridge at +Gillespie's Gap and pushed on to Quaker Meadows, where Colonel Cleveland +with 350 men swung into their column. Along their route, the Back +Country Patriots with their rifles came out from the little hamlets and +the farms and joined them. + +They now had an army of perhaps fifteen hundred men but no commanding +officer. Thus far, on the march, the four colonels had conferred +together and agreed as to procedure; or, in reality, the influence of +Sevier and Shelby, who had planned the enterprise and who seem always to +210 have acted in unison, had swayed the others. It would be, however, +manifestly improper to go into battle without a real general. Something +must be done. McDowell volunteered to carry a letter explaining their +need to General Gates, who had escaped with some of his staff into North +Carolina and was not far off. It then occurred to Sevier and Shelby, +evidently for the first time, that Gates, on receiving such a request, +might well ask why the Governor of North Carolina, as the military head +of the State, had not provided a commander. The truth is that Sevier +and Shelby had been so busy drumming up the militia and planning their +campaign that they had found no time to consult the Governor. Moreover, +the means whereby the expedition had been financed might not have +appealed to the chief executive. After finding it impossible to raise +sufficient funds on his personal credit, Sevier had appropriated the +entry money in the government land office to the business in hand--with +the good will of the entry taker, who was a patriotic man, although, +as he had pointed out, he could not, officially, hand over the money. +Things being as they were, no doubt Nolichucky Jack felt that an +interview with the Governor had better be deferred until after 211 the +capture of Ferguson. Hence the tenor of this communication to General +Gates: + +As we have at this time called out our militia without any orders from +the Executive of our different States and with the view of expelling +the Enemy out of this part of the Country, we think such a body of men +worthy of your attention and would request you to send a General Officer +immediately to take the command.… All our Troops being Militia and but +little acquainted with discipline, we could wish him to be a Gentleman +of address, and able to keep up a proper discipline without disgusting +the soldiery. + +For some unknown reason--unless it might be the wording of this +letter!--no officer was sent in reply. Shelby then suggested that, since +all the officers but Campbell were North Carolinians and, therefore, +no one of them could be promoted without arousing the jealousy of the +others, Campbell, as the only Virginian, was the appropriate choice. +The sweet reasonableness of selecting a commander from such a motive +appealed to all, and Campbell became a general in fact if not in name! +Shelby's principal aim, however, had been to get rid of McDowell, +who, as their senior, would naturally expect to command and whom +he considered too far advanced in life and too inactive for such an +enterprise. At this time McDowell must have 212 been nearly thirty-nine; +and Shelby, who was just thirty, wisely refused to risk the campaign +under a general who was in his dotage! + +News of the frontiersmen's approach, with their augmented force, now +numbering between sixteen and eighteen hundred, had reached Ferguson by +the two Tories who had deserted from Sevier's troops. Ferguson thereupon +had made all haste out of Gilbert Town and was marching southward to get +in touch with Cornwallis. His force was much reduced, as some of his +men were in pursuit of Elijah Clarke towards Augusta and a number of his +other Tories were on furlough. As he passed through the Back Country +he posted a notice calling on the loyalists to join him. If the +overmountain men felt that they were out on a wolf hunt, Ferguson's +proclamation shows what the wolf thought of his hunters. + +To the Inhabitants of North Carolina. + +Gentlemen: Unless you wish to be eat up by an innundation of barbarians, +who have begun by murdering an unarmed son before the aged father, and +afterwards lopped off his arms, and who by their shocking cruelties +and irregularities give the best proof of their cowardice and want of +discipline: I say if you wish to be pinioned, robbed and murdered, +and see your wives and daughters in four days, abused by the dregs of +mankind--in 213 short if you wish to deserve to live and bear the name +of men, grasp your arms in a moment and run to camp. The Back Water men +have crossed the mountains: McDowell, Hampton, Shelby, and Cleveland +are at their head, so that you know what you have to depend upon. If you +choose to be degraded forever and ever by a set of mongrels, say so at +once, and let your women turn their backs upon you, and look out for +real men to protect them. Pat. Ferguson, Major 71st Regiment.¹ + +¹ Draper, _King's Mountain and its Heroes,_ p. 204. Ferguson's force has +been estimated at about eleven hundred men, but it is likely that this +estimate does not take the absentees into consideration. In the diary +of Lieutenant Allaire, one of his officers, the number is given as only +eight hundred. Because of the state of his army, chroniclers have found +Ferguson's movements, after leaving Gilbert Town, difficult to explain. +It has been pointed out that he could easily have escaped, for he had +plenty of time, and Charlotte, Cornwallis's headquarters, was only sixty +miles distant. We have seen something of Ferguson's quality, however, +and we may simply take it that he did not want to escape. He had been +planning to cross the high hills--to him, the Highlander, no barrier +but a challenge--to fight these men. Now that they 214 had taken the +initiative he would not show them his back. He craved the battle. So he +sent out runners to the main army and rode on along the eastern base +of the mountains, seeking a favorable site to go into camp and wait for +Cornwallis's aid. On the 6th of October he reached the southern end of +the King's Mountain ridge, in South Carolina, about half a mile south +of the northern boundary. Here a rocky, semi-isolated spur juts out from +the ridge, its summit--a table-land about six hundred yards long and one +hundred and twenty wide at its northern end--rising not more than sixty +feet above the surrounding country. On the summit Ferguson pitched his +camp. + +The hill was a natural fortress, its sides forested, its bald top +protected by rocks and bowlders. All the approaches led through dense +forest. An enemy force, passing through the immediate, wooded territory, +might easily fail to discover a small army nesting sixty feet above the +shrouding leafage. Word was evidently brought to Ferguson here, telling +him the now augmented number of his foe, for he dispatched another +emissary to Cornwallis with a letter stating the number of his own +troops and urging full and immediate assistance. + +Meanwhile the frontiersmen had halted at the 215 Cowpens. There they +feasted royally off roasted cattle and corn belonging to the loyalist +who owned the Cowpens. It is said that they mowed his fifty acres of +corn in an hour. And here one of their spies, in the assumed rôle of a +Tory, learned Ferguson's plans, his approximate force, his route, and +his system of communication with Cornwallis. The officers now held +council and determined to take a detachment of the hardiest and fleetest +horsemen and sweep down on the enemy before aid could reach him. About +nine o'clock that evening, according to Shelby's report, 910 mounted men +set off at full speed, leaving the main body of horse and foot to follow +after at their best pace. + +Rain poured down on them all that night as they rode. At daybreak they +crossed the Broad at Cherokee Ford and dashed on in the drenching rain +all the forenoon. They kept their firearms and powder dry by wrapping +them in their knapsacks, blankets, and hunting shirts. The downpour +had so churned up the soil that many of the horses mired, but they were +pulled out and whipped forward again. The wild horsemen made no halt +for food or rest. Within two miles of King's Mountain they captured +Ferguson's messenger with the letter that told of his desperate +situation. They asked 216 this man how they should know Ferguson. He +told them that Ferguson was in full uniform but wore a checkered shirt +or dust cloak over it. This was not the only messenger of Ferguson's +who failed to carry through. The men he had sent out previously had been +followed and, to escape capture or death, they had been obliged to lie +in hiding, so that they did not reach Cornwallis until the day of the +battle. + +At three o'clock on the afternoon of the 7th of October, the +overmountain men were in the forest at the base of the hill. The rain +had ceased and the sun was shining. They dismounted and tethered their +steaming horses. Orders were given that every man was to throw the +priming out of his pan, pick his touchhole, prime anew, examine bullets +and see that everything was in readiness for battle. The plan of battle +agreed on was to surround the hill, hold the enemy on the top and, +themselves screened by the trees, keep pouring in their fire. There was +a good chance that most of the answering fire would go over their heads. + +As Shelby's men crossed a gap in the woods, the outposts on the hill +discovered their presence and sounded the alarm. Ferguson sprang to +horse, blowing his silver whistle to call his men to attack. 217 +His riflemen poured fire into Shelby's contingent, but meanwhile the +frontiersmen on the other sides were creeping up, and presently a circle +of fire burst upon the hill. With fixed bayonets, some of Ferguson's men +charged down the face of the slope, against the advancing foe, only +to be shot in the back as they charged. Still time and time again +they charged; the overhill men reeled and retreated; but always their +comrades took toll with their rifles; Ferguson's men, preparing for a +mounted charge, were shot even as they swung to their saddles. Ferguson, +with his customary indifference to danger, rode up and down in front of +his line blowing his whistle to encourage his men. Huzza, brave boys! +The day is our own! Thus he was heard to shout above the triumphant war +whoops of the circling foe, surging higher and higher about the hill. + +But there were others in his band who knew the fight was lost. The +overmountain men saw two white handkerchiefs, affixed to bayonets, +raised above the rocks; and then they saw Ferguson dash by and slash +them down with his sword. Two horses were shot under Ferguson in the +latter part of the action; but he mounted a third and rode again into +the thick of the fray. + +218 Suddenly the cry spread among the attacking troops that the British +officer, Tarleton, had come to Ferguson's rescue; and the mountaineers +began to give way. But it was only the galloping horses of their own +comrades; Tarleton had not come. Nolichucky Jack spurred out in front of +his men and rode along the line. Fired by his courage they sounded the +war whoop again and renewed the attack with fury. + +These are the same yelling devils that were at Musgrove's Mill, said +Captain De Peyster to Ferguson. + +Now Shelby and Sevier, leading his Wataugans, had reached the summit. +The firing circle pressed in. The buckskin-shirted warriors leaped the +rocky barriers, swinging their tomahawks and long knives. Again the +white handkerchiefs fluttered. Ferguson saw that the morale of his +troops was shattered. + +Surrender, De Peyster, his second in command, begged of him. + +Surrender to those damned banditti? Never! + +Ferguson turned his horse's head downhill and charged into the +Wataugans, hacking right and left with his sword till it was broken at +the hilt. A dozen rifles were leveled at him. An iron muzzle pushed at +his breast, but the powder flashed in the 219 pan. He swerved and struck +at the rifleman with his broken hilt. But the other guns aimed at him +spoke; and Ferguson's body jerked from the saddle pierced by eight +bullets. Men seized the bridle of the frenzied horse, plunging on with +his dead master dragging from the stirrup. + +The battle had lasted less than an hour. After Ferguson fell, De Peyster +advanced with a white flag and surrendered his sword to Campbell. Other +white flags waved along the hilltop. But the killing did not yet cease. +It is said that many of the mountaineers did not know the significance +of the white flag. Sevier's sixteen-year-old son, having heard that his +father had fallen, kept on furiously loading and firing until presently +he saw Sevier ride in among the troops and command them to stop shooting +men who had surrendered and thrown down their arms. + +The victors made a bonfire of the enemy's baggage wagons and supplies. +Then they killed some of his beeves and cooked them; they had had +neither food nor sleep for eighteen hours. They dug shallow trenches +for the dead and scattered the loose earth over them. Ferguson's body, +stripped of its uniform and boots and wrapped in a beef hide, was thrown +into one of these ditches by 220 the men detailed to the burial work, +while the officers divided his personal effects among themselves. + +The triumphant army turned homeward as the dusk descended. The uninjured +prisoners and the wounded who were able to walk were marched off +carrying their empty firearms. The badly wounded were left lying where +they had fallen. + +At Bickerstaff's Old Fields in Rutherford County the frontiersmen +halted; and here they selected thirty of their prisoners to be hanged. +They swung them aloft, by torchlight, three at a time, until nine had +gone to their last account. Then Sevier interposed; and, with Shelby's +added authority, saved the other twenty-one. Among those who thus +weighted the gallows tree were some of the Tory brigands from Watauga; +but not all the victims were of this character. Some of the troops would +have wreaked vengeance on the two Tories from Sevier's command who had +betrayed their army plans to Ferguson; but Sevier claimed them as under +his jurisdiction and refused consent. Nolichucky Jack dealt humanely by +his foes. To the coarse and brutish Cleveland, now astride of Ferguson's +horse and wearing his sash, and to the three hundred who followed him, +may no doubt be laid the worst excesses of the battle's afterpiece. + +221 Victors and vanquished drove on in the dark, close to the great +flank of hills. From where King's Mountain, strewn with dead and dying, +reared its black shape like some rudely hewn tomb of a primordial age +when titans strove together, perhaps to the ears of the marching men +came faintly through the night's stillness the howl of a wolf and +the answering chorus of the pack. For the wolves came down to King's +Mountain from all the surrounding hills, following the scent of blood, +and made their lair where the Werewolf had fallen. The scene of the +mountaineers' victory, which marked the turn of the tide for the +Revolution, became for years the chief resort of wolf hunters from both +the Carolinas. + +The importance of the overmountain men's victory lay in what it achieved +for the cause of Independence. King's Mountain was the prelude to +Cornwallis's defeat. It heartened the Southern Patriots, until then cast +down by Gates's disaster. To the British the death of Ferguson was an +irreparable loss because of its depressing effect on the Back Country +Tories. King's Mountain, indeed, broke the Tory spirit. Seven days after +the battle General Nathanael Greene succeeded to the command of the +Southern Patriot army which Gates had led to defeat. Greene's genius +met the rising tide of the Patriots' courage and hope and took it at +the flood. His strategy, in dividing his army and thereby compelling the +division of Cornwallis's force, led to Daniel Morgan's victory at +the Cowpens, in the Back Country of South Carolina, on January 17, +1781--another frontiersmen's triumph. Though the British won the next +engagement between Greene and Cornwallis--the battle of Guilford Court +House in the North Carolina Back Country, on the 15th of March--Greene +made them pay so dearly for their victory that Tarleton called it +the pledge of ultimate defeat; and, three days later, Cornwallis was +retreating towards Wilmington. In a sense, then, King's Mountain was the +pivot of the war's revolving stage, which swung the British from their +succession of victories towards the surrender at Yorktown. + +Shelby, Campbell, and Cleveland escorted the prisoners to Virginia. +Sevier, with his men, rode home to Watauga. When the prisoners had been +delivered to the authorities in Virginia, the Holston men also turned +homeward through the hills. Their route lay down through the Clinch and +Holston valleys to the settlement at the base of the mountains. Sevier +and his Wataugans had gone by Gillespie's Gap, over the pathway that +hung like a narrow ribbon about the breast of Roan Mountain, lifting its +crest in dignified isolation sixty-three hundred feet above the levels. +The Unakas was the name the Cherokees had given to those white men who +first invaded their hills; and the Unakas is the name that white men at +last gave to the mountain. + +Great companies of men were to come over the mountain paths on their way +to the Mississippi country and beyond; and with them, as we know, were +to go many of these mountain men, to pass away with their customs in the +transformations that come with progress. But there were others who +clung to these hills. They were of several stocks--English, Scotch, +Highlanders, Ulstermen, who mingled by marriage and sometimes took their +mates from among the handsome maids of the Cherokees. They spread from +the Unakas of Tennessee into the Cumberland Mountains of Kentucky; and +they have remained to this day what they were then, a primitive folk +of strong and fiery men and brave women living as their forefathers of +Watauga and Holston lived. In the log cabins in those mountains today +are heard the same ballads, sung still to the dulcimer, that entertained +the earliest settlers. The women still turn the old-fashioned spinning +wheels. The code of the men is still the code learned perhaps from +the Gaels--the code of the oath and the feud and the open door to the +stranger. Or were these, the ethical tenets of almost all uncorrupted +primitive tribes, transmitted from the Indian strain and association? +Their young people marry at boy and girl ages, as the pioneers did, and +their wedding festivities are the same as those which made rejoicing at +the first marriage in Watauga. Their common speech today contains words +that have been obsolete in England for a hundred years. + +Thrice have the mountain men come down again from their fastnesses to +war for America since the day of King's Mountain and thrice they +have acquitted themselves so that their deeds are noted in history. A +souvenir of their part in the War of 1812 at the Battle of the Thames is +kept in one of the favorite names for mountain girls--Lake Erie. In +the Civil War many volunteers from the free, non-slaveholding mountain +regions of Kentucky and Tennessee joined the Union Army, and it is said +that they exceeded all others in stature and physical development. And +in our own day their sons again came down from the mountains to carry +the torch of Liberty overseas, and to show the white stars in their flag +side by side with the ancient cross in the flag of England against which +their forefathers fought. + +226 + + + + +Chapter X + +Sevier, The Statemaker + +After King's Mountain, Sevier reached home just in time to fend off a +Cherokee attack on Watauga. Again warning had come to the settlements +that the Indians were about to descend upon them. Sevier set out at once +to meet the red invaders. Learning from his scouts that the Indians were +near he went into ambush with his troops disposed in the figure of a +half-moon, the favorite Indian formation. He then sent out a small body +of men to fire on the Indians and make a scampering retreat, to lure the +enemy on. The maneuver was so well planned and the ground so well chosen +that the Indian war party would probably have been annihilated but for +the delay of an officer at one horn of the half-moon in bringing his +troops into play. Through the gap thus made the Indians escaped, with a +loss of seventeen of their number. The delinquent officer was Jonathan +Tipton, younger brother 227 of Colonel John Tipton, of whom we shall +hear later. It is possible that from this event dates the Tiptons' feud +with Sevier, which supplies one of the breeziest pages in the story of +early Tennessee. + +Not content with putting the marauders to flight, Sevier pressed on +after them, burned several of the upper towns, and took prisoner a +number of women and children, thus putting the red warriors to the depth +of shame, for the Indians never deserted their women in battle. The +chiefs at once sued for peace. But they had made peace often before. +Sevier drove down upon the Hiwassee towns, meanwhile proclaiming that +those among the tribe who were friendly might send their families to the +white settlement, where they would be fed and cared for until a sound +peace should be assured. He also threatened to continue to make war +until his enemies were wiped out, their town sites a heap of blackened +ruins, and their whole country in possession of the whites, unless they +bound themselves to an enduring peace. + +Having compelled the submission of the Otari and Hiwassee towns, yet +finding that depredations still continued, Sevier determined to invade +the group of towns hidden in the mountain fastnesses near the headwaters +of the Little Tennessee where, 228 deeming themselves inaccessible +except by their own trail, the Cherokees freely plotted mischief and +sent out raiding parties. These hill towns lay in the high gorges of +the Great Smoky Mountains, 150 miles distant. No one in Watauga had ever +been in them except Thomas, the trader, who, however, had reached +them from the eastern side of the mountains. With no knowledge of the +Indians' path and without a guide, yet nothing daunted, Sevier, late in +the summer of 1781 headed his force into the mountains. So steep were +some of the slopes they scaled that the men were obliged to dismount and +help their horses up. Unexpectedly to themselves perhaps, as well as +to the Indians, they descended one morning on a group of villages and +destroyed them. Before the fleeing savages could rally, the mountaineers +had plunged up the steeps again. Sevier then turned southward into +Georgia and inflicted a severe castigation on the tribes along the Coosa +River. + +When, after thirty days of warfare and mad riding, Sevier arrived at his +Bonnie Kate's door on the Nolichucky, he found a messenger from General +Greene calling on him for immediate assistance to cut off Cornwallis +from his expected retreat through North Carolina. Again he set out, 229 +and with two hundred men crossed the mountains and made all speed to +Charlotte, in Mecklenburg County, where he learned that Cornwallis had +surrendered at Yorktown on October 19, 1781. Under Greene's orders he +turned south to the Santee to assist a fellow scion of the Huguenots, +General Francis Marion, in the pursuit of Stuart's Britishers. Having +driven Stuart into Charleston, Sevier and his active Wataugans returned +home, now perhaps looking forward to a rest, which they had surely +earned. Once more, however, they were hailed with alarming news. +Dragging Canoe had come to life again and was emerging from the caves of +the Tennessee with a substantial force of Chickamaugan warriors. Again +the Wataugans, augmented by a detachment from Sullivan County, galloped +forth, met the red warriors, chastised them heavily, put them to rout, +burned their dwellings and provender, and drove them back into their +hiding places. For some time after this, the Indians dipped not into +the black paint pots of war but were content to streak their humbled +countenances with the vermilion of beauty and innocence. + +It should be chronicled that Sevier, assisted possibly by other +Wataugans, eventually returned 226 to the State of North Carolina the +money which he had forcibly borrowed to finance the King's Mountain +expedition; and that neither he nor Shelby received any pay for their +services, nor asked it. Before Shelby left the Holston in 1782 and moved +to Kentucky, of which State he was to become the first Governor, the +Assembly of North Carolina passed a resolution of gratitude to the +overmountain men in general, and to Sevier and Shelby in particular, +for their very generous and patriotic services with which the General +Assembly of this State are feelingly impressed. The resolution concluded +by urging the recipients of the Assembly's acknowledgments to continue +in their noble course. In view of what followed, this resolution is +interesting! + +For some time the overhill pioneers had been growing dissatisfied with +the treatment they were receiving from the State, which on the plea +of poverty had refused to establish a Superior Court for them and to +appoint a prosecutor. As a result, crime was on the increase, and +the law-abiding were deprived of the proper legal means to check the +lawless. In 1784 when the western soldiers' claims began to reach the +Assembly, there to be scrutinized by unkindly eyes, the dissatisfaction +increased. 231 The breasts of the mountain men--the men who had made +that spectacular ride to bring Ferguson to his end--were kindled with +hot indignation when they heard that they had been publicly assailed +as grasping persons who seized on every pretense to fabricate demands +against the Government. Nor were those fiery breasts cooled by further +plaints to the effect that the "industry and property" of those east of +the hills were becoming the funds appropriated to discharge the debts of +the Westerners. They might with justice have asked what the industry and +property of the Easterners were worth on that day when the overhill men +drilled in the snows on the high peak of Yellow Mountain and looked down +on Burke County overrun by Ferguson's Tories, and beyond, to Charlotte, +where lay Cornwallis. + +The North Carolina Assembly did not confine itself to impolite remarks. +It proceeded to get rid of what it deemed western rapacity by ceding the +whole overmountain territory to the United States, with the proviso that +Congress must accept the gift within twelve months. And after passing +the Cession Act, North Carolina closed the land office in the undesired +domain and nullified all entries made after May 25, 1784. The Cession +Act also enabled 232 the State to evade its obligations to the Cherokees +in the matter of an expensive consignment of goods to pay for new lands. + +This clever stroke of the Assembly's brought about immediate +consequences in the region beyond the hills. The Cherokees, who knew +nothing about the Assembly's system of political economy but who found +their own provokingly upset by the non-arrival of the promised goods, +began again to darken the mixture in their paint pots; and they dug up +the war hatchet, never indeed so deeply patted down under the dust that +it could not be unearthed by a stub of the toe. Needless to say, it was +not the thrifty and distant Easterners who felt their anger, but the +nearby settlements. + +As for the white overhill dwellers, the last straw had been laid on +their backs; and it felt like a hickory log. No sooner had the Assembly +adjourned than the men of Washington, Sullivan, and Greene counties, +which comprised the settled portion of what is now east Tennessee, +elected delegates to convene for the purpose of discussing the formation +of a new State. They could assert that they were not acting illegally, +for in her first constitution North Carolina had made provision for a +State beyond the mountains. And necessity 233 compelled them to take +steps for their protection. Some of them, and Sevier was of the number, +doubted if Congress would accept the costly gift; and the majority +realized that during the twelve months which were allowed for the +decision they would have no protection from either North Carolina or +Congress and would not be able to command their own resources. + +In August, 1784, the delegates met at Jonesborough and passed +preliminary resolutions, and then adjourned to meet later in the year. +The news was soon disseminated through North Carolina and the Assembly +convened in October and hastily repealed the Cession Act, voted to +establish the District of Washington out of the four counties, and sent +word of the altered policy to Sevier, with a commission for himself as +Brigadier General. From the steps of the improvised convention hall, +before which the delegates had gathered, Sevier read the Assembly's +message and advised his neighbors to proceed no further, since North +Carolina had of her own accord redressed all their grievances. But for +once Nolichucky Jack's followers refused to follow. The adventure too +greatly appealed. Obliged to choose between North Carolina and his own +people, Sevier's hesitation 234 was short. The State of Frankland, or +Land of the Free, was formed; and Nolichucky Jack was elevated to the +office of Governor--with a yearly salary of two hundred mink skins. + +Perhaps John Tipton had hoped to head the new State, for he had been one +of its prime movers and was a delegate to this convention. But when the +man whom he hated--apparently for no reason except that other men loved +him--assented to the people's will and was appointed to the highest +post within their gift, Tipton withdrew, disavowing all connection with +Frankland and affirming his loyalty to North Carolina. From this time +on, the feud was an open one. + +That brief and now forgotten State, Frankland, the Land of the Free, +which bequeathed its name as an appellation for America, was founded as +Watauga had been founded--to meet the practical needs and aspirations +of its people. It will be remembered that one of the things written by +Sevier into the only Watauga document extant was that they desired to +become in every way the best members of society. Frankland's aims, +as recorded, included the intent to improve agriculture, perfect +manufacturing, encourage literature and every thing truly laudable. + +235 The constitution of Frankland, agreed to on the 14th of November, +1785, appeals to us today rather by its spirit than by its practical +provisions. This State shall be called the Commonwealth of Frankland and +shall be governed by a General Assembly of the representatives of +the freemen of the same, a Governor and Council, and proper courts of +justice.… The supreme legislative power shall be vested in a single +House of Representatives of the freemen of the commonwealth of +Frankland. The House of Representatives of the freemen of the State +shall consist of persons most noted for wisdom and virtue. + +In these exalted desires of the primitive men who held by their rifles +and hatchets the land by the western waters, we see the influence of the +Reverend Samuel Doak, their pastor, who founded the first church and the +first school beyond the great hills. Early in the life of Watauga he had +come thither from Princeton, a zealous and broadminded young man, and +a sturdy one, too, for he came on foot driving before him a mule +laden with books. Legend credits another minister, the Reverend Samuel +Houston, with suggesting the name of Frankland, after he had opened +the Convention with prayer. It is not surprising to learn that this +glorified 236 constitution was presently put aside in favor of one +modeled on that of North Carolina. + +Sevier persuaded the more radical members of the community to abandon +their extreme views and to adopt the laws of North Carolina. However +lawless his acts as Governor of a bolting colony may appear, Sevier was +essentially a constructive force. His purposes were right, and small +motives are not discernible in his record. He might reasonably urge that +the Franklanders had only followed the example of North Carolina and the +other American States in seceding from the parent body, and for similar +causes, for the State's system of taxation had long borne heavily on the +overhill men. + +The whole transmontane populace welcomed Frankland with enthusiasm. +Major Arthur Campbell, of the Virginian settlements, on the Holston, +was eager to join. Sevier and his Assembly took the necessary steps +to receive the overhill Virginians, provided that the transfer of +allegiance could be made with Virginia's consent. Meanwhile he replied +in a dignified manner to the pained and menacing expostulations of North +Carolina's Governor. North Carolina was bidden to remember the epithets +her assemblymen had hurled at the Westerners, which they themselves had +by 237 no means forgotten. And was it any wonder that they now doubted +the love the parent State professed to feel for them? As for the puerile +threat of blood, had their quality really so soon become obliterated +from the memory of North Carolina? At this sort of writing, Sevier, who +always pulsed hot with emotion and who had a pretty knack in turning a +phrase, was more than a match for the Governor of North Carolina, whose +prerogatives he had usurped. + +The overmountain men no longer needed to complain bitterly of the lack +of legal machinery to keep them the best members of society. They +now had courts to spare. Frankland had its courts, its judges, its +legislative body, its land office--in fact, a full governmental +equipment. North Carolina also performed all the natural functions of +political organism, within the western territory. Sevier appointed one +David Campbell a judge. Campbell held court in Jonesborough. Ten miles +away, in Buffalo, Colonel John Tipton presided for North Carolina. It +happened frequently that officers and attendants of the rival law courts +met, as they pursued their duties, and whenever they met they fought. +The post of sheriff--or sheriffs, for of course there were two--was +filled by the 238 biggest and heaviest man and the hardest hitter in the +ranks of the warring factions. A favorite game was raiding each other's +courts and carrying off the records. Frankland sent William Cocke, later +the first senator from Tennessee, to Congress with a memorial, asking +Congress to accept the territory North Carolina had offered and to +receive it into the Union as a separate State. Congress ignored the +plea. It began to appear that North Carolina would be victor in the end; +and so there were defections among the Franklanders. Sevier wrote +to Benjamin Franklin asking his aid in establishing the status of +Frankland; and, with a graceful flourish of his ready pen, changed the +new State's name to Franklin by way of reinforcing his arguments. But +the old philosopher, more expert than Sevier in diplomatic calligraphy, +only acknowledged the compliment and advised the State of Franklin to +make peace with North Carolina. + +Sevier then appealed for aid and recognition to the Governor of Georgia, +who had previously appointed him Brigadier General of militia. But +the Governor of Georgia also avoided giving the recognition requested, +though he earnestly besought Sevier to come down and settle the Creeks +for him. There were others who sent pleas to Sevier, the 239 warrior, to +save them from the savages. One of the writers who addressed him did +not fear to say Your Excellency, nor to accord Nolichucky Jack the whole +dignity of the purple in appealing to him as the only man possessing the +will and the power to prevent the isolated settlements on the Cumberland +from being wiped out. That writer was his old friend, James Robertson. + +In 1787, while Sevier was on the frontier of Greene County, defending +it from Indians, the legal forces of North Carolina swooped down on his +estate and took possession of his negroes. It was Tipton who represented +the law; and Tipton carried off the Governor's slaves to his own estate. +When Nolichucky Jack came home and found that his enemy had stripped +him, he was in a towering rage. With a body of his troops and one small +cannon, he marched to Tipton's house and besieged it, threatening a +bombardment. He did not, however, fire into the dwelling, though he +placed some shots about it and in the extreme corners. This _opéra +bouffe_ siege endured for several days, until Tipton was reinforced +by some of his own clique. Then Tipton sallied forth and attacked the +besiegers, who hastily scattered rather than engage in a sanguinary +fight with their neighbors. Tipton 240 captured Sevier's two elder sons +and was only strained from hanging them on being informed that two of +his own sons were at that moment in Sevier's hands. + +In March, 1788, the State of Franklin went into eclipse. Sevier was +overthrown by the authorities of North Carolina. Most of the officials +who had served under him were soothed by being reappointed to their old +positions. Tipton's star was now in the ascendant, for his enemy was +to be made the vicarious sacrifice for the sins of all whom he had led +astray. Presently David Campbell, still graciously permitted to preside +over the Superior Court, received from the Governor of North Carolina +the following letter: + +Sir: It has been represented to the Executive that John Sevier, who +style's himself Captain-General of the State of Franklin, has been +guilty of high treason in levying troops to oppose the laws and +government of the State.… You will issue your warrant to apprehend the +said John Sevier, and in case he cannot be sufficiently secured for +trial in the District of Washington, order him to be committed to the +public gaol. + +The judge's authority was to be exercised after he had examined the +affidavits of credible persons. Campbell's judicial opinion seems to +have been that any affidavit against the said John 241 Sevier could not +be made by a credible person. He refused to issue the warrant. Tipton's +friend, Spencer, who had been North Carolina's judge of the Superior +Court in the West and who was sharing that honor now with Campbell, +issued the warrant and sent Tipton to make the arrest. + +Sevier was at the Widow Brown's inn with some of his men when Tipton at +last came up with him. It was early morning. Tipton and his posse were +about to enter when the portly and dauntless widow, surmising their +errand, drew her chair into the doorway, plumped herself down in it, and +refused to budge for all the writs in North Carolina. Tipton blustered +and the widow rocked. The altercation awakened Sevier. He dressed +hurriedly and came down. As soon as he presented himself on the porch, +Tipton thrust his pistol against his body, evidently with intent to fire +if Sevier made signs of resistance. Sevier's furious followers were not +disposed to let him be taken without a fight, but he admonished them to +respect the law, and requested that they would inform Bonnie Kate of his +predicament. Then, debonair as ever, with perhaps a tinge of contempt at +the corners of his mouth, he held out his wrists for the manacles which +Tipton insisted on fastening upon them. + +242 It was not likely that any jail in the western country could hold +Nolichucky Jack overnight. Tipton feared a riot; and it was decided to +send the prisoner for incarceration and trial to Morgantown in North +Carolina, just over the hills. + +Tipton did not accompany the guards he sent with Sevier. It was stated +and commonly believed that he had given instructions of which the +honorable men among his friends were ignorant. When the party entered +the mountains, two of the guards were to lag behind with the prisoner, +till the others were out of sight on the twisting trail. Then one of the +two was to kill Sevier and assert that he had done it because Sevier +had attempted to escape. It fell out almost as planned, except that the +other guard warned Sevier of the fate in store for him and gave him +a chance to flee. In plunging down the mountain, Sevier's horse was +entangled in a thicket. The would-be murderer overtook him and fired; +but here again fate had interposed for her favorite. The ball had +dropped out of the assassin's pistol. So Sevier reached Morgantown +in safety and was deposited in care of the sheriff, who was doubtless +cautioned to take a good look at the prisoner and know him for a +dangerous and a daring man. + +243 There is a story to the effect that, when Sevier was arraigned in +the courthouse at Morgantown and presently dashed through the door and +away on a racer that had been brought up by some of his friends, among +those who witnessed the proceedings was a young Ulster Scot named Andrew +Jackson; and that on this occasion these two men, later to become foes, +first saw each other. Jackson may have been in Morgantown at the +time, though this is disputed; but the rest of the tale is pure legend +invented by some one whose love of the spectacular led him far from the +facts. The facts are less theatrical but much more dramatic. Sevier +was not arraigned at all, for no court was sitting in Morgantown at the +time.¹ The sheriff to whom he was delivered did not need to look twice +at him to know him for a daring man. He had served with him at King's +Mountain. He struck off his handcuffs and set him at liberty at once. +Perhaps he also notified General Charles McDowell at his home in Quaker +Meadows of the presence of a distinguished guest in Burke County, for +McDowell and his brother Joseph, another officer of militia, quickly +appeared and went on Sevier's bond. Nolichucky Jack was 244 presently +holding a court of his own in the tavern, with North Carolina's men at +arms--as many as were within call--drinking his health. So his sons and +a company of his Wataugans found him, when they rode into Morgantown to +give evidence in his behalf--with their rifles. Since none now disputed +the way with him, Sevier turned homeward with his cavalcade, McDowell +and his men accompanying him as far as the pass in the hills. + +¹ Statement by John Sevier, Junior, in the Draper MSS., quoted by +Turner, _Life of General John Sevier,_ p. 182. No further attempt +was made to try John Sevier for treason, either west or east of the +mountains. In November, however, the Assembly passed the Pardon Act, and +thereby granted absolution to every one who had been associated with +the State of Franklin, except John Sevier. In a clause said to have been +introduced by Tipton, now a senator, or suggested by him, John Sevier +was debarred forever from the enjoyment of any office of profit or honor +or trust in the State of North Carolina. + +The overhill men in Greene County took due note of the Assembly's fiat +and at the next election sent Sevier to the North Carolina Senate. +Nolichucky Jack, whose demeanor was never so decorous as when the +ill-considered actions of those in authority had made him appear to have +circumvented the law, considerately waited outside until 245 the House +had lifted the ban--which it did perforce and by a large majority, +despite Tipton's opposition--and then took his seat on the senatorial +bench beside his enemy. The records show that he was reinstated as +Brigadier General of the Western Counties and also appointed at the head +of the Committee on Indian Affairs. + +Not only in the region about Watauga did the pioneers of Tennessee +endure the throes of danger and strife during these years. The little +settlements on the Cumberland, which were scattered over a short +distance of about twenty-five or thirty miles and had a frontier line +of two hundred miles, were terribly afflicted. Their nearest white +neighbors among the Kentucky settlers were one hundred and fifty miles +away; and through the cruelest years these could render no aid--could +not, indeed, hold their own stations. The Kentuckians, as we have +seen, were bottled up in Harrodsburg and Boonesborough; and, while the +northern Indians led by Girty and Dequindre darkened the Bloody Ground +anew, the Cumberlanders were making a desperate stand against the +Chickasaws and the Creeks. So terrible was their situation that panic +took hold on them, and they would have 246 fled but for the influence of +Robertson. He may have put the question to them in the biblical words, +Whither shall I flee? For they were surrounded, and those who did +attempt to escape were weighed on the path and made light. Robertson +knew that their only chance of survival was to stand their ground. The +greater risks he was willing to take in person, for it was he who made +trips to Boonesborough and Harrodsburg for a share of the powder and +lead which John Sevier was sending into Kentucky from time to time. In +the stress of conflict Robertson bore his full share of grief, for his +two elder sons and his brother fell. He himself was often near to death. +One day he was cut off in the fields and was shot in the foot as he ran, +yet he managed to reach shelter. There is a story that, in an attack +during one of his absences, the Indians forced the outer gate of the +fort and Mrs. Robertson went out of her cabin, firing, and let loose a +band of the savage dogs which the settlers kept for their protection, +and so drove out the invaders. + +The Chickasaws were loyal to the treaty they had made with the British +in the early days of James Adair's association with them. They were +friends to England's friends and foes to her foes. 247 While they +resented the new settlements made on land they considered theirs, +they signed a peace with Robertson at the conclusion of the War of +Independence. They kept their word with him as they had kept it with the +British. Furthermore, their chief, Opimingo or the Mountain Leader, gave +Robertson his assistance against the Creeks and the Choctaws and, in so +far as he understood its workings, informed him of the new Spanish and +French conspiracy, which we now come to consider. So once again the +Chickasaws were servants of destiny to the English-speaking race, for +again they drove the wedge of their honor into an Indian solidarity +welded with European gold. + +Since it was generally believed at that date that the tribes were +instigated to war by the British and supplied by them with their +ammunition, savage inroads were expected to cease with the signing of +peace. But Indian warfare not only continued; it increased. In the last +two years of the Revolution, when the British were driven from the +Back Country of the Carolinas and could no longer reach the tribes with +consignments of firearms and powder, it should have been evident that +the Indians had other sources of supply and other allies, for they +lacked nothing which could aid 248 them in their efforts to exterminate +the settlers of Tennessee. + +Neither France nor Spain wished to see an English-speaking republic +based on ideals of democracy successfully established in America. Though +in the Revolutionary War, France was a close ally of the Americans and +Spain something more than a nominal one, the secret diplomacy of the +courts of the Bourbon cousins ill matched with their open professions. +Both cousins hated England. The American colonies, smarting under +injustice, had offered a field for their revenge. But hatred of England +was not the only reason why activities had been set afoot to increase +the discord which should finally separate the colonies from Great +Britain and leave the destiny of the colonies to be decided by the House +of Bourbon. Spain saw in the Americans, with their English modes of +thought, a menace to her authority in her own colonies on both the +northern and southern continents. This menace would not be stilled but +augmented if the colonies should be established as a republic. Such an +example might be too readily followed. Though France had, by a secret +treaty in 1762, made over to Spain the province of Louisiana, she was +not unmindful of the Bourbon motto, He who attacks 249 the Crown of one +attacks the other. And she saw her chance to deal a crippling blow at +England's prestige and commerce. + +In 1764, the French Minister, Choiseul, had sent a secret agent, named +Pontleroy, to America to assist in making trouble and to watch for any +signs that might be turned to the advantage of _les duex couronnes_. +Evidently Pontleroy's reports were encouraging for, in 1768, Johann +Kalb--the same Kalb who fell at Camden in 1780--arrived in Philadelphia +to enlarge the good work. He was not only, like several of the foreign +officers in the War of Independence, a spy for his Government, but he +was also the special emissary of one Comte de Broglie who, after the +colonies had broken with the mother country, was to put himself at the +head of American affairs. This Broglie had been for years one of +Louis XV's chief agents in subterranean diplomacy, and it is not to be +supposed that he was going to attempt the stupendous task of controlling +America's destiny without substantial backing. Spain had been advised +meanwhile to rule her new Louisiana territory with great liberality--in +fact, to let it shine as a republic before the yearning eyes of the +oppressed Americans, so that the English colonists would arise and +cast off 250 their fetters. Once the colonies had freed themselves from +England's protecting arm, it would be a simple matter for the Bourbons +to gather them in like so many little lost chicks from a rainy yard. The +intrigants of autocratic systems have never been able to understand that +the urge of the spirit of independence in men is not primarily to break +shackles but to stand alone and that the breaking of bonds is incidental +to the true demonstration of freedom. The Bourbons and their agents were +no more nor less blind to the great principle stirring the hearts of men +in their day than were the Prussianized hosts over a hundred years later +who, having themselves no acquaintance with the law of liberty, could +not foresee that half a world would rise in arms to maintain that law. + +When the War of Independence had ended, the French Minister, Vergennes, +and the Spanish Minister, Floridablanca, secretly worked in unison to +prevent England's recognition of the new republic; and Floridablanca in +1782 even offered to assist England if she would make further efforts +to subdue her rebel subjects. Both Latin powers had their own axes +to grind, and America was to tend the grindstone. France looked for +recovery of her old prestige in Europe and expected to supersede 251 +England in commerce. She would do this, in the beginning, chiefly +through control of America and of America's commerce. Vergennes +therefore sought not only to dictate the final terms of peace but also +to say what the American commissioners should and should not demand. +Of the latter gentlemen he said that they possessed _caractères +peu maniables!_ In writing to Luzerne, the French Ambassador in +Philadelphia, on October 14, 1782, Vergennes said: it behooves us +to leave them [the American commissioners] to their illusions, to do +everything that can make them fancy that we share them, and undertake +only to defeat any attempts to which those illusions might carry them +if our coöperation is required. Among these illusions were America's +desires in regard to the fisheries and to the western territory. +Concerning the West, Vergennes had written to Luzerne, as early as July +18, 1780: At the moment when the revolution broke out, the limits of the +Thirteen States did not reach the River [Mississippi] and it would be +absurd for them to claim the rights of England, a power whose rule they +had abjured. By the secret treaty with Spain, furthermore, France had +agreed to continue the war until Gibraltar should be taken, and--if the +British 252 should be driven from Newfoundland--to share the fisheries +only with Spain, and to support Spain in demanding that the Thirteen +States renounce all territory west of the Alleghanies. The American +States must by no means achieve a genuine independence but must feel the +need of sureties, allies, and protection.¹ + +¹ See John Jay, _On the Peace Negotiations of 1782-1783 as Illustrated +by the Secret Correspondence of France and England,_ New York, 1888. +So intent was Vergennes on these aims that he sent a secret emissary to +England to further them there. This act of his perhaps gave the first +inkling to the English statesmen² that American and French desires +were not identical and hastened England's recognition of American +independence and her agreement to American demands in regard to the +western territory. When, to his amazement, Vergennes learned that +England had acceded to all America's demands, he said that England had +bought the peace rather than made it. The policy of Vergennes in regard +to America was not unjustly pronounced by a later French statesman a +vile speculation + +² Your Lordship was well founded in your suspicion that the granting +of independence to America as a previous measure is a point which the +French have by no means at heart and perhaps are entirely averse from. +Letter from Fitzherbert to Grantham, September 3, 1782. 253 Through +England's unexpected action, then, the Bourbon cousins had forever +lost their opportunity to dominate the young but spent and war-weakened +Republic, or to use America as a catspaw to snatch English commerce for +France. It was plain, too, that any frank move of the sort would +range the English alongside of their American kinsmen. Since American +Independence was an accomplished fact and therefore could no longer be +prevented, the present object of the Bourbon cousins was to restrict +it. The Appalachian Mountains should be the western limits of the new +nation. Therefore the settlements in Kentucky and Tennessee must be +broken up, or the settlers must be induced to secede from the Union +and raise the Spanish banner. The latter alternative was held to be +preferable. To bring it about the same methods were to be continued +which had been used prior to and during the war--namely, the use of +_agents provocateurs_ to corrupt the ignorant and incite the lawless, +the instigation of Indian massacres to daunt the brave, and the +distribution of gold to buy the avaricious. + +As her final and supreme means of coercion, Spain refused to America the +right of navigation on the Mississippi and so deprived the Westerners +254 of a market for their produce. The Northern States, having no +immediate use for the Mississippi, were willing to placate Spain by +acknowledging her monopoly of the great waterway. But Virginia and +North Carolina were determined that America should not, by congressional +enactment, surrender her natural right; and they cited the proposed +legislation as their reason for refusing to ratify the Constitution. The +act which abandons it [the right of navigation] is an act of separation +between the eastern and western country, Jefferson realized at last. +An act of separation--that point had long been very clear to the Latin +sachems of the Mississippi Valley! + +Bounded as they were on one side by the precipitous mountains and on the +other by the southward flow of the Mississippi and its tributary, the +Ohio, the trappers and growers of corn in Kentucky and western Tennessee +regarded New Orleans as their logical market, as the wide waters were +their natural route. If market and route were to be closed to them, +their commercial advancement was something less than a dream. + +In 1785, Don Estevan Miró, a gentleman of artful and winning address, +became Governor of Louisiana and fountainhead of the propaganda. 255 He +wrote benign and brotherly epistles to James Robertson of the Cumberland +and to His Excellency of Franklin, suggesting that to be of service +to them was his dearest aim in life; and at the same time he kept the +southern Indians continually on the warpath. When Robertson wrote to +him of the Creek and Cherokee depredations, with a hint that the Spanish +might have some responsibility in the matter, Miró replied by offering +the Cumberlander a safe home on Spanish territory with freedom of +religion and no taxes. He disclaimed stirring up the Indians. He had, +in fact, advised Mr. McGillivray, chief of the Creeks, to make peace. +He would try again what he could do with Mr. McGillivray. As to the +Cherokees, they resided in a very distant territory and he was not +acquainted with them; he might have added that he did not need to be: +his friend McGillivray was the potent personality among the Southern +tribes. + +In Alexander McGillivray, Miró found a weapon fashioned to his hand. If +the Creek chieftain's figure might stand as the symbol of treachery, it +is none the less one of the most picturesque and pathetic in our early +annals. McGillivray, it will be remembered, was the son of Adair's +friend Lachlan McGillivray, the trader, and a Creek woman whose 256 sire +had been a French officer. A brilliant and beautiful youth, he had given +his father a pride in him which is generally denied to the fathers of +sons with Indian blood in them. The Highland trader had spared nothing +in his son's education and had placed him, after his school days, in the +business office of the large trading establishment of which he himself +was a member. At about the age of seventeen Alexander had become a +chieftain in his mother's nation; and doubtless it is he who appears +shortly afterwards in the Colonial Records as the White Leader whose +influence is seen to have been at work for friendship between the +colonists and the tribes. When the Revolutionary War broke out, Lachlan +McGillivray, like many of the old traders who had served British +interests so long and so faithfully, held to the British cause. Georgia +confiscated all his property and Lachlan fled to Scotland. For this, his +son hated the people of Georgia with a perfect hatred. He remembered how +often his father's courage alone had stood between those same people and +the warlike Creeks. He could recall the few days in 1760 when Lachlan +and his fellow trader, Galphin, at the risk of their lives had braved +the Creek warriors--already painted for war and on the march--and so +had 257 saved the settlements of the Back Country from extermination. +He looked upon the men of Georgia as an Indian regards those who forget +either a blood gift or a blood vengeance. And he embraced the whole +American nation in his hatred for their sakes. + +In 1776 Alexander McGillivray was in his early thirties--the exact date +of his birth is uncertain.¹ He had, we are told, the tall, sturdy, but +spare physique of the Gael, with a countenance of Indian color though +not of Indian cast. His overhanging brows made more striking his very +large and luminous dark eyes. He bore himself with great dignity; his +voice was soft, his manner gentle. He might have been supposed to be +some Latin courtier but for the barbaric display of his dress and his +ornaments. He possessed extraordinary personal magnetism, and his power +extended beyond the Creek nation to the Choctaws and Chickasaws and the +Southern Cherokees. He had long been wooed by the Louisiana authorities, +but there is no evidence that he had made alliance with them prior to +the Revolution. + +¹ Probably about 1741 or 1742. Some writers give 1739 and others 1746. +His father landed in Charleston, Pickett (_History of Alabama_) says, +in 1735, and was then only sixteen. 258 Early in the war he joined the +British, received a colonel's commission, and led his formidable Creeks +against the people of Georgia. When the British were driven from the +Back Countries, McGillivray, in his British uniform, went on with the +war. When the British made peace, McGillivray exchanged his British +uniform for a Spanish one and went on with the war. In later days, when +he had forced Congress to pay him for his father's confiscated property +and had made peace, he wore the uniform of an American Brigadier +General; but he did not keep the peace, never having intended to keep +it. It was not until he had seen the Spanish plots collapse and had +realized that the Americans were to dominate the land, that the White +Leader ceased from war and urged the youths of his tribe to adopt +American civilization. + +Spent from hate and wasted with dissipation, he retired at last to the +spot where Lachlan had set up his first Creek home. Here he lived his +few remaining days in a house which he built on the site of the old +ruined cabin about which still stood the little grove of apple trees his +father had planted. He died at the age of fifty of a fever contracted +while he was on a business errand in Pensacola. Among those who visited +him in his last years, one 259 has left this description of him: +Dissipation has sapped a constitution originally delicate and feeble. He +possesses an atticism of diction aided by a liberal education, a +great fund of wit and humor meliorated by a perfect good nature and +politeness. Set beside that kindly picture this rough etching by James +Robertson: The biggest devil among them [the Spaniards] is the half +Spaniard, half Frenchman, half Scotchman and altogether Creek scoundrel, +McGillivray. + +How indefatigably McGillivray did his work we know from the bloody +annals of the years which followed the British-American peace, when the +men of the Cumberland and of Franklin were on the defensive continually. +How cleverly Miró played his personal rôle we discover in the letters +addressed to him by Sevier and Robertson. These letters show that, as +far as words go at any rate, the founders of Tennessee were willing +to negotiate with Spain. In a letter dated September 12, 1788, Sevier +offered himself and his tottering State of Franklin to the Spanish King. +This offer may have been made to gain a respite, or it may have been +genuine. The situation in the Tennessee settlements was truly desperate, +for neither North Carolina nor Congress apparently cared in the least +260 what befell them or how soon. North Carolina indeed was in +an anomalous position, as she had not yet ratified the Federal +Constitution. If Franklin went out of existence and the territory which +it included became again part of North Carolina, Sevier knew that a +large part of the newly settled country would, under North Carolina's +treaties, revert to the Indians. That meant ruin to large numbers of +those who had put their faith in his star, or else it meant renewed +conflict either with the Indians or with the parent State. The +probabilities aria that Sevier hoped to play the Spaniards against the +Easterners who, even while denying the Westerners' contention that the +mountains were a natural barrier between them, were making of them a +barrier of indifference. It would seem so, because, although this was +the very aim of all Miró's activities so that, had he been assured of +the sincerity of the offer, he must have grasped at it, yet nothing +definite was done. And Sevier was presently informing Shelby, now in +Kentucky, that there was a Spanish plot afoot to seize the western +country. + +Miró had other agents besides McGillivray--who, by the way, was costing +Spain, for his own services and those of four tribes aggregating over +261 six thousand warriors, a sum of fifty-five thousand dollars a +year. McGillivray did very well as superintendent of massacres; but the +Spaniard required a different type of man, an American who enjoyed his +country's trust, to bring the larger plan to fruition. Miró found that +man in General James Wilkinson, lately of the Continental Army and now a +resident of Kentucky, which territory Wilkinson undertook to deliver +to Spain, for a price. In 1787 Wilkinson secretly took the oath of +allegiance to Spain and is listed in the files of the Spanish secret +service, appropriately, as Number Thirteen. He was indeed the thirteenth +at table, the Judas at the feast. Somewhat under middle height, +Wilkinson was handsome, graceful, and remarkably magnetic. Of a good, +if rather impoverished, Maryland family, he was well educated and widely +read for the times. With a brilliant and versatile intellectuality and +ready gifts as a speaker, he swayed men easily. He was a bold soldier +and was endowed with physical courage, though when engaged in personal +contests he seldom exerted it--preferring the red tongue of slander +or the hired assassin's shot from behind cover. His record fails to +disclose one commendable trait. He was inordinately avaricious, but 262 +love of money was not his whole motive force: he had a spirit so jealous +and malignant that he hated to the death another man's good. He seemed +to divine instantly wherein other men were weak and to understand the +speediest and best means of suborning them to his own interests--or of +destroying them. + +Wilkinson was able to lure a number of Kentuckians into the separatist +movement. George Rogers Clark seriously disturbed the arch plotter by +seizing a Spanish trader's store wherewith to pay his soldiers, whom +Virginia had omitted to recompense. This act aroused the suspicions of +the Spanish, either as to Number Thirteen's perfect loyalty or as to +his ability to deliver the western country. In 1786, when Clark led +two thousand men against the Ohio Indians in his last and his only +unsuccessful campaign, Wilkinson had already settled himself near the +Falls (Louisville) and had looked about for mischief which he might do +for profit. Whether his influence had anything to do with what amounted +virtually to a mutiny among Clark's forces is not ascertainable; but, +for a disinterested onlooker, he was overswift to spread the news of +Clark's debacle and to declare gleefully that Clark's sun of military +glory had now forever 263 set. It is also known that he later served +other generals treacherously in Indian expeditions and that he intrigued +with Mad Anthony Wayne's Kentucky troops against their commander. + +Spain did not wish to see the Indians crushed; and Wilkinson himself +both hated and feared any other officer's prestige. How long he had +been in foreign pay we can only conjecture, for, several years before +he transplanted his activities to Kentucky, he had been one of a +cabal against Washington. Not only his ambitions but his nature must +inevitably have brought him to the death-battle with George Rogers +Clark. As a military leader, Clark had genius, and soldiering was his +passion. In nature, he was open, frank, and bold to make foes if he +scorned a man's way as ignoble or dishonest. Wilkinson suavely set about +scheming for Clark's ruin. His communication or memorial to the Virginia +Assembly--signed by himself and a number of his friends--villifying +Clark, ended Clark's chances for the commission in the Continental +Army which he craved. It was Wilkinson who made public an incriminating +letter which had Clark's signature attached and which Clark said he had +never seen. It is to be supposed that Number Thirteen was responsible +also for 264 the malevolent anonymous letter accusing Clark of +drunkenness and scheming which, so strangely, found its way into the +Calendar of State Papers of Virginia.¹ As a result, Clark was censured +by Virginia. Thereupon he petitioned for a Court of Inquiry, but this +was not granted. Wilkinson had to get rid of Clark; for if Clark, +with his military gifts and his power over men, had been elevated to a +position of command under the smile of the Government, there would have +been small opportunity for James Wilkinson to lead the Kentuckians and +to gather in Spanish gold. So the machinations of one of the vilest +traitors who ever sold his country were employed to bring about the +stultification and hence the downfall of a great servant. + +¹ See Thomas M. Greene's _The Spanish Conspiracy,_ p. 72, footnote. It +is possible that Wilkinson's intrigues provide data for a new biography +of Clark which may recast in some measure the accepted view of Clark at +this period. Wilkinson's chief aids were the Irishmen, O'Fallon, Nolan, +and Powers. Through Nolan, he also vended Spanish secrets. He sold, +indeed, whatever and whomever he could get his price for. So clever +was he that he escaped detection, though he was obliged to remove some +suspicions. He succeeded Wayne as commander of the regular army in +1796. He was one of the commissioners 265 to receive Louisiana when the +Purchase was arranged in 1803. He was still on the Spanish pay roll at +that time. Wilkinson's true record came to light only when the Spanish +archives were opened to investigators. + +There were British agents also in the Old Southwest, for the +dissatisfaction of the Western men inspired in Englishmen the hope of +recovering the Mississippi Basin. Lord Dorchester, Governor of Canada, +wrote to the British Government that he had been approached by important +Westerners; but he received advice from England to move slowly. For +complicity in the British schemes, William Blount, who was first +territorial Governor of Tennessee and later a senator from that State, +was expelled from the Senate. + +Surely there was never a more elaborate network of plots that came to +nothing! The concession to Americans in 1796 of the right of navigation +on the Mississippi brought an end to the scheming. + +In the same year Tennessee was admitted to the Union, and John Sevier +was elected Governor. Sevier's popularity was undiminished, though there +were at this time some sixty thousand souls in Tennessee, many of whom +were late comers who 266 had not known him in his heyday. His old power +to win men to him must have been as strong as ever, for it is recorded +that he had only to enter a political meeting--no matter whose--for the +crowd to cheer him and shout for him to give them a talk. + +This adulation of Sevier still annoyed a few men who had ambitions of +their own. Among these was Andrew Jackson, who had come to Jonesborough +in 1788, just after the collapse of the State of Franklin. He was +twenty-one at that time, and he is said to have entered Jonesborough +riding a fine racer and leading another, with a pack of hunting dogs +baying or nosing along after him. A court record dated May 12, 1788, +avers that Andrew Jackson, Esq. came into Court and produced a licence +as an Attorney With A Certificate sufficiently Attested of his Taking +the Oath Necessary to said office and Was admitted to Practiss as an +Attorney in the County Courts. Jackson made no history in old Watauga +during that year. Next year he moved to Nashville, and one year later, +when the Superior Court was established (1790), he became prosecuting +attorney. + +The feud between Jackson and Sevier began about the time that Tennessee +entered the Union. 267 Jackson, then twenty-nine, was defeated for the +post of Major General of the Militia through the influence which Sevier +exercised against him, and it seems that Jackson never forgave this +opposition to his ambitions. By the close of Sevier's third term, +however, in 1802, when Archibald Roane became Governor, the post +of Major General was again vacant. Both Sevier and Jackson offered +themselves for it, and Jackson was elected by the deciding vote of the +Governor, the military vote having resulted in a tie. A strong current +of influence had now set in against Sevier and involved charges against +his honor. His old enemy Tipton was still active. The basis of the +charges was a file of papers from the entry-taker's office which a +friend of Tipton's had laid before the Governor, with an affidavit +to the effect that the papers were fraudulent. Both the Governor and +Jackson believed the charges. When we consider what system or lack +of system of land laws and land entries obtained in Watauga and such +primitive communities--when a patch of corn sealed a right and claims +were made by notching trees with tomahawks--we may imagine that a file +from the land office might appear easily enough to smirch a landholder's +integrity. The scandal was, of course, 268 used in an attempt to ruin +Sevier's candidacy for a fourth term as Governor and to make certain +Roane's reëlection. To this end Jackson bent all his energies but +without success. Nolichucky Jack was elected, for the fourth time, as +Governor of Tennessee. + +Not long after his inauguration, Sevier met Jackson in Knoxville, where +Jackson was holding court. The charges against Sevier were then being +made the subject of legislative investigation instituted by Tipton, and +Jackson had published a letter in the Knoxville _Gazette_ supporting +them. At the sight of Jackson, Sevier flew into a rage, and a fiery +altercation ensued. The two men were only restrained from leaping on +each other by the intervention of friends. The next day Jackson sent +Sevier a challenge which Sevier accepted, but with the stipulation that +the duel take place outside the State. Jackson insisted on fighting in +Knoxville, where the insult had been offered. Sevier refused. I have +some respect, he wrote, for the laws of the State over which I have the +honor to preside, although you, a judge, appear to have none. No duel +followed; but, after some further _billets-doux_, Jackson published +Sevier as a base coward and poltroon. He will basely insult but has not +269 the courage to repair the wound. Again they met, by accident, and +Jackson rushed upon Sevier with his cane. Sevier dismounted and drew +his pistol but made no move to fire. Jackson, thereupon, also drew his +weapon. Once more friends interfered. It is presumable that neither +really desired the duel. By killing Nolichucky Jack, Jackson would have +ended his own career in Tennessee--if Sevier's tribe of sons had not, by +a swifter means, ended it for him. At this date Jackson was thirty-six. +Sevier was fifty-eight; and he had seventeen children. + +The charges against Sevier, though pressed with all the force that his +enemies could bring to bear, came to nothing. He remained the Governor +of Tennessee for another six years--the three terms in eight years +allowed by the constitution. In 1811 he was sent to Congress for the +second time, as he had represented the Territory there twenty years +earlier. He was returned again in 1813. At the conclusion of his term +in 1815 he went into the Creek country as commissioner to determine the +Creek boundaries, and here, far from his Bonnie Kate and his tribe, +he died of fever at the age of seventy. His body was buried with full +military honors at Tuckabatchee, one of the Creek towns. In 1889, +Sevier's 270 remains were removed to Knoxville and a high marble spire +was raised above them. + +His Indian enemies forgave the chastisement he had inflicted on them +and honored him. In times of peace they would come to him frequently for +advice. And in his latter days, the chiefs would make state visits to +his home on the Nolichucky River. John Sevier is a good man--so declared +the Cherokee, Old Tassel, making himself the spokesman of history. + +Sevier had survived his old friend, co-founder with him of Watauga, by +one year. James Robertson had died in 1814 at the age of seventy-two, +among the Chickasaws, and his body, like that of his fellow pioneer, was +buried in an Indian town and lay there until 1825, when it was removed +to Nashville. + +What of the red tribes who had fought these great pioneers for the wide +land of the Old Southwest and who in the end had received their dust and +treasured it with honor in the little soil remaining to them? Always the +new boundary lines drew closer in, and the red men's foothold narrowed +before the pushing tread of the whites. The day came soon when there was +no longer room for 271 them in the land of their fathers. But far off +across the great river there was a land the white men did not covet +yet. Thither at last the tribes--Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and +Creek--took their way. With wives and children, maids and youths, the +old and the young, with all their goods, their cattle and horses, in the +company of a regiment of American troops, they--like the white men who +had superseded them--turned westward. In their faces also was the red +color of the west, but not newly there. From the beginning of their +race, Destiny had painted them with the hue of the brief hour of the +dying sun. + +272 + + + + +Chapter XI + +Boone's Last Days + +One spring day in 1799, there might have been observed a great stir +through the valley of the Kanawha. With the dawn, men were ahorse, and +women, too. Wagons crowded with human freight wheeled over the rough +country, and boats, large and small, were afloat on the streams which +pour into the Great Kanawha and at length mingle with the Ohio at +Point Pleasant, where the battle was fought which opened the gates of +Kentucky. + +Some of the travelers poured into the little settlement at the junction +of the Elk and the Kanawha, where Charleston now lies. Others, who had +been later in starting or had come from a greater distance, gathered +along the banks of the Kanawha. At last shouts from those stationed +farthest up the stream echoed down the valley and told the rest that +what they had come out to see was at hand. + +Several pirogues drifted into view on the river, 273 now brightening +in the sunshine. In the vessels were men and their families; bales and +bundles and pieces of household furnishings, heaped to the gunwale; a +few cattle and horses standing patiently. But it was for one man above +all that the eager eyes of the settlers were watching, and him they saw +clearly as his boat swung by--a tall figure, erect and powerful, his +keen friendly blue eyes undimmed and his ruddy face unlined by time, +though sixty-five winters had frosted his black hair. + +For a decade these settlers had known Daniel Boone, as storekeeper, as +surveyor, as guide and soldier. They had eaten of the game he killed and +lavishly distributed. And they too--like the folk of Clinch Valley in +the year of Dunmore's War--had petitioned Virginia to bestow military +rank upon their protector. Lieutenant Colonel had been his title among +them, by their demand. Once indeed he had represented them in the +Virginia Assembly and, for that purpose, trudged to Richmond with rifle +and hunting dog. Not interested in the Legislature's proceedings, he +left early in the session and tramped home again. + +But not even the esteem of friends and neighbors could hold the great +hunter when the deer had fled. So Daniel Boone was now on his way +westward to 274 Missouri, to a new land of fabled herds and wide spaces, +where the hunter's gun might speak its one word with authority and +where the soul of a silent and fearless man might find its true abode in +Nature's solitude. Waving his last farewells, he floated past the little +groups--till their shouts of good will were long silenced, and his fleet +swung out upon the Ohio. + +As Boone sailed on down the Beautiful River which forms the northern +boundary of Kentucky, old friends and newcomers who had only heard +his fame rode from far and near to greet and godspeed him on his way. +Sometimes he paused for a day with them. Once at least--this was in +Cincinnati where he was taking on supplies--some one asked him why, at +his age, he was leaving the settled country to dare the frontier once +more. + +Too crowded, he answered; I want more elbow-room! + +Boone settled at the Femme Osage Creek on the Missouri River, +twenty-five miles above St. Charles, where the Missouri flows into the +Mississippi. There were four other Kentucky families at La Charette, +as the French inhabitants called the post, but these were the only +Americans. The Spanish authorities granted Boone 840 acres of land, and +here Daniel 275 built the last cabin home he was to erect for himself +and his Rebecca. + +The region pleased him immensely. The governmental system, for instance, +was wholly to his mind. Taxes were infinitesimal. There were no +elections, assemblies, or the like. A single magistrate, or Syndic, +decided all disputes and made the few regulations and enforced them. +There were no land speculators, no dry-mouthed sons of the commercial +Tantalus, athirst for profits. Boone used to say that his first years in +Missouri were the happiest of his life, with the exception of his first +long hunt in Kentucky. + +In 1800 he was appointed Syndic of the district of Femme Osage, which +office he filled for four years, until Louisiana became American +territory. He was held in high esteem as a magistrate because of his +just and wise treatment of his flock, who brought him all their small +bickerings to settle. He had no use for legal procedure, would not +listen to any nice subtleties, saying that he did not care anything +at all about the evidence, what he wanted was the truth. His favorite +penalty for offenders was the hickory rod well laid on. Often he decided +that both parties in a suit were equally to blame and chastised them +both alike. When in 276 March, 1804, the American Commissioner received +Louisiana for the United States, Delassus, Lieutenant Governor of Upper +Louisiana, reporting on the various officials in the territory, wrote +of the Femme Osage Syndic: Mr. Boone, a respectable old man, just +and impartial, he has already, since I appointed him, offered his +resignation owing to his infirmities. Believing I know his probity, I +have induced him to remain, in view of my confidence in him, for the +public good.¹ + +* Thwaites, _Daniel Boone._ To this and other biographies of Boone, +cited in the Bibliographical Note at the end of this volume, the author +is indebted for the material contained in this chapter. Daniel, no doubt +supposing that a Syndic's rights were inviolable, had neglected to apply +to the Governor at New Orleans for a ratification of his grant. He was +therefore dispossessed. Not until 1810, and after he had enlisted the +Kentucky Legislature in his behalf, did he succeed in inducing Congress +to restore his land. The Kentucky Legislature's resolution was adopted +because of the many eminent services rendered by Colonel Boone in +exploring and settling the western country, from which great advantages +have resulted not only to the State but to the country in general, +and that from circumstances over which he had no 277 control he is now +reduced to poverty; not having so far as appears an acre of land out of +the vast territory he has been a great instrument in peopling. Daniel +was seventy-six then; so it was late in the day for him to have his +first experience of justice in the matter of land. Perhaps it pleased +him, however, to hear that, in confirming his grant, Congress had +designated him as the man who has opened the way for millions of his +fellow-men. + +The infirmities which had caused the good Syndic to seek relief from +political cares must have been purely magisterial. The hunter could have +been very little affected by them, for as soon as he was freed from his +duties Boone took up again the silent challenge of the forest. Usually +one or two of his sons or his son-in-law, Flanders Calloway, accompanied +him, but sometimes his only companions were an old Indian and his +hunting dog. On one of his hunting trips he explored a part of Kansas; +and in 1814, when he was eighty, he hunted big game in the Yellowstone +where again his heart rejoiced over great herds as in the days of his +first lone wanderings in the Blue Grass country. At last, with the +proceeds of these expeditions he was able to pay the debts he had left +behind in Kentucky thirty years before. The story runs that 278 Daniel +had only fifty cents remaining when all the claims had been settled, but +so contented was he to be able to look an honest man in the face that he +was in no disposition to murmur over his poverty. + +When after a long and happy life his wife died in 1813, Boone lived with +one or other of his sons¹ and sometimes with Flanders Calloway. Nathan +Boone, with whom Daniel chiefly made his home, built what is said to +have been the first stone house in Missouri. Evidently the old pioneer +disapproved of stone houses and of the luxuries in furnishings which +were then becoming possible to the new generation, for one of his +biographers speaks of visiting him in a log addition to his son's house; +and when Chester Harding, the painter, visited him in 1819 for the +purpose of doing his portrait, he found Boone dwelling in a small log +cabin in Nathan's yard. When Harding entered, Boone was broiling a +venison steak on the end of his ramrod. During the sitting, one day, +Harding 279 asked Boone if he had ever been lost in the woods when on +his long hunts in the wilderness. + +¹ Boone's son Nathan won distinction in the War of 1812 and entered the +regular army, rising to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Daniel Morgan +Boone is said to have been the first settler in Kansas (1827). One of +Daniel's grandsons, bearing the name of Albert Gallatin Boone, was +a pioneer of Colorado and was to the forefront in Rocky Mountain +exploration. Another grandson was the scout, Kit Carson, who led Frémont +to California. No, I never got lost, Boone replied reflectively, but I +was bewildered once for three days. Though now having reached the age +of eighty-five, Daniel was intensely interested in California and was +enthusiastic to make the journey thither next spring and so to flee once +more from the civilization which had crept westward along his path. The +resolute opposition of his sons, however, prevented the attempt. + +A few men who sought out Boone in his old age have left us brief +accounts of their impressions. Among these was Audubon. The stature +and general appearance of this wanderer of the western forests, the +naturalist wrote, approached the gigantic. His chest was broad, and +prominent; his muscular powers displayed themselves in every limb; +his countenance gave indication of his great courage, enterprise and +perseverance; and, when he spoke, the very motion of his lips brought +the impression that whatever he uttered could not be otherwise than +strictly true. + +Audubon spent a night under Boone's roof. He related afterwards that the +old hunter, having removed his hunting shirt, spread his blankets on +the 280 floor and lay down there to sleep, saying that he found it more +comfortable than a bed. A striking sketch of Boone is contained in a +few lines penned by one of his earliest biographers: He had what +phrenologists would have considered a model head--with a forehead +peculiarly high, noble and bold, thin compressed lips, a mild clear blue +eye, a large and prominent chin and a general expression of countenance +in which fearlessness and courage sat enthroned and which told +the beholder at a glance what he had been and was formed to be. In +criticizing the various portraits of Daniel, the same writer says: They +want the high port and noble daring of his countenance.… Never was +old age more green, or gray hairs more graceful. His high, calm, bold +forehead seemed converted by years into iron. + +Although we are indebted to these and other early chroniclers for +many details of Boone's life, there was one event which none of his +biographers has related; yet we know that it must have taken place. +Even the bare indication of it is found only in the narrative of the +adventures of two other explorers. + +It was in the winter of 1803 that these two men came to Boone's +Settlement, as La Charette was 281 now generally called. They had +planned to make their winter camp there, for in the spring, when the +Missouri rose to the flood, they and their company of frontiersmen were +to take their way up that uncharted stream and over plains and mountains +in quest of the Pacific Ocean. They were refused permission by the +Spanish authorities to camp at Boone's Settlement; so they lay through +the winter some forty miles distant on the Illinois side of the +Mississippi, across from the mouth of the Missouri. Since the records +are silent, we are free to picture as we choose their coming to the +settlement during the winter and again in the spring, for we know that +they came. + +We can imagine, for instance, the stir they made in La Charette on some +sparkling day when the frost bit and the crusty snow sent up a dancing +haze of diamond points. We can see the friendly French _habitants_ +staring after the two young leaders and their men--all mere boys, though +they were also husky, seasoned frontiersmen--with their bronzed faces of +English cast, as in their gayly fringed deerskins they swaggered through +the hamlet to pay their respects to the Syndic. We may think of that +dignitary as smoking his pipe before his fireplace, perhaps; or making +out, in his 282 fantastic spelling, a record of his primitive court--for +instance, that he had on that day given Pierre a dozen hickory thwacks, +well laid on, for starting a brawl with Antoine, and had bestowed the +same upon Antoine for continuing the brawl with Pierre. A knock at the +door would bring the amiable invitation to enter, and the two young men +would step across his threshold, while their followers crowded about the +open door and hailed the old pathfinder. + +One of the two leaders--the dark slender man with a subtle touch of the +dreamer in his resolute face--was a stranger; but the other, with the +more practical mien and the shock of hair that gave him the name of Red +Head among the tribes, Boone had known as a lad in Kentucky. To Daniel +and this young visitor the encounter would be a simple meeting of +friends, heightened in pleasure and interest somewhat, naturally, by the +adventure in prospect. But to us there is something vast in the thought +of Daniel Boone, on his last frontier, grasping the hands of William +Clark and Meriwether Lewis. + +As for the rough and hearty mob at the door, Daniel must have known not +a few of them well; though they had been children in the days when 283 +he and William Clark's brother strove for Kentucky. It seems fitting +that the soldiers with this expedition should have come from the +garrison at Kaskaskia; since the taking of that fort in 1778 by George +Rogers Clark had opened the western way from the boundaries of Kentucky +to the Mississippi. And among the young Kentuckians enlisted by William +Clark were sons of the sturdy fighters of still an earlier border line, +Clinch and Holston Valley men who had adventured under another Lewis +at Point Pleasant. Daniel would recognize in these--such as Charles +Floyd--the young kinsmen of his old-time comrades whom he had preserved +from starvation in the Kentucky wilderness by the kill from his rifle as +they made their long march home after Dunmore's War. + +In May, Lewis and Clark's pirogues ascended the Missouri and the leaders +and men of the expedition spent another day in La Charette. Once again, +at least, Daniel was to watch the westward departure of pioneers. In +1811, when the Astorians passed, one of their number pointed to the +immobile figure of an old man on the bank, who, he said, was Daniel +Boone. + +Sometimes the aged pioneer's mind cast forward 284 to his last journey, +for which his advancing years were preparing him. He wrote on the +subject to a sister, in 1816, revealing in a few simple lines that the +faith whereby he had crossed, if not more literally removed, mountains +was a fixed star, and that he looked ahead fearlessly to the dark trail +he must tread by its single gleam. Autumn was tinting the forest and the +tang he loved was in the air when the great hunter passed. The date of +Boone's death is given as September 26, 1820. He was in his eighty-sixth +year. Unburdened by the pangs of disease he went out serenely, by the +gentle marches of sleep, into the new country. + +The convention for drafting the constitution of Missouri, in session +at St. Louis, adjourned for the day, and for twenty days thereafter the +members wore crape on their arms as a further mark of respect for the +great pioneer. Daniel was laid by Rebecca's side, on the bank of Teugue +Creek, about a mile from the Missouri River. In 1845, the Missouri +legislators hearkened to oft-repeated pleas from Kentucky and +surrendered the remains of the pioneer couple. Their bones lie now in +Frankfort, the capital of the once Dark and Bloody Ground, and in 1880 a +monument was raised over them. + +To us it seems rather that Kentucky itself is 285 Boone's monument; even +as those other great corn States, Illinois and Indiana, are Clark's. +There, these two servants unafraid, who sacrificed without measure in +the wintry winds of man's ingratitude, are each year memorialized anew; +when the earth in summer--the season when the red man slaughtered--lifts +up the full grain in the ear, the life-giving corn; and when autumn +smiles in golden peace over the stubble fields, where the reaping and +binding machines have hummed a nation's harvest song. + +287 + +Bibliographical Note + +The Races And Their Migration + +C. A. Hanna, _The Scotch-Irish,_ 2 vols. New York, 1902. A very full if +somewhat over-enthusiastic study. + +H. J. Ford, _The Scotch-Irish in America._ Princeton, 1915. Excellent. + +A. G. Spangenberg, Extracts from his Journal of travels in North +Carolina, 1752. Publication of the Southern History Association. Vol. I, +1897. + +A. B. Faust, _The German Element in the United States,_ 2 vols. (1909). + +J. P. MacLean, _An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch +Highlanders in America_ (1900). + +S. H. Cobb, _The Story of the Palatines_ (1897). + +N. D. Mereness (editor), _Travels in the American Colonies._ New York, +1916. This collection contains the diary of the Moravian Brethren cited +in the first chapter of the present volume. + +Life In The Back Country + +Joseph Doddridge, _Notes on the Settlements and Indian Wars of the +Western Parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania,_ from 1763 to 1783. Albany, +1876. An intimate description of the daily life of the early settlers in +the Back Country by one of themselves. + +288 J. F. D. Smyth, _Tour in the United States of America,_ 2 vols. +London, 1784. Minute descriptions of the Back Country and interesting +pictures of the life of the settlers; biased as to political views by +Royalist sympathies. + +William H. Foote, _Sketches of North Carolina,_ New York, 1846. See +Foote also for history of the first Presbyterian ministers in the Back +Country. As to political history, inaccurate. + +Early History And Exploration + +J. S. Bassett (editor), _The Writings of Colonel William Byrd of +Westover._ New York, 1901. A contemporary record of early Virginia. + +Thomas Walker, _Journal of an Exploration in the Spring of the Year +1750._ Boston, 1888. The record of his travels by the discoverer of +Cumberland Gap. + +William M. Darlington (editor), _Christopher Gist's Journals._ +Pittsburgh, 1893. Contains Gist's account of his surveys for the Ohio +Company, 1750. + +C. A. Hanna, _The Wilderness Trail,_ 2 vols. New York, 1911. An +exhaustive work of research, with full accounts of Croghan and Findlay. +See also Croghan's and Johnson's correspondence in vol. VII, New York +Colonial Records. + +James Adair, _The History of the American Indians,_ etc. London, 1775. +The personal record of a trader who was one of the earliest explorers +of the Alleghanies and of the Mississippi region east of the river; a +many-sided work, intensely interesting. + +C. W. Alvord, _The Genesis of the Proclamation of 1763._ Reprinted from +Canadian Archives Report, 1906. A new and authoritative interpretation. +In this connection see also the correspondence between Sir William 289 +Johnson and the Lords of Trade in vol. VII of New York Colonial Records. + +Justin Winsor, _The Mississippi Basin. The Struggle in America between +England and France._ Cambridge, 1895. Presents the results of exhaustive +research and the coördination of facts by an historian of broad +intellect and vision. + +_Colonial and State Records of North Carolina._ 30 vols. The chief +fountain source of the early history of North Carolina and Tennessee. + +W. H. Hoyt, _The Mecklenburg Declaration of Independence._ New York, +1907. This book presents the view generally adopted by historians, that +the alleged Declaration of May 20, 1775, is spurious. + +Justin Winsor (editor), _Narrative and Critical History of America._ 8 +vols. (1884-1889). Also _The Westward Movement._ Cambridge, 1897. Both +works of incalculable value to the student. + +C. W. Alvord, _The Mississippi Valley in British Politics._ 2 vols. +Cleveland, 1917. A profound work of great value to students. + +Kentucky + +R. G. Thwaites and L. P. Kellogg (editors), _Documentary History of +Dunmore's War, 1774._ Compiled from the Draper Manuscripts in the +library of the Wisconsin Historical Society. Madison, 1905. A collection +of interesting and valuable documents with a suggestive introduction. + +R. G. Thwaites, _Daniel Boone._ New York, 1902. A short and accurate +narrative of Boone's life and adventures compiled from the Draper +Manuscripts and from earlier printed biographies. + +290 John P. Hale, _Daniel Boone, Some Facts and Incidents not Hitherto +Published._ A pamphlet giving an account of Boone in West Virginia. +Printed at Wheeling, West Virginia. Undated. + +Timothy Flint, _The First White Man of the West or the Life and Exploits +of Colonel Dan'l Boone._ Cincinnati, 1854. Valuable only as regards +Boone's later years. + +John S. C. Abbott, _Daniel Boone, the Pioneer of Kentucky._ New York, +1872. Fairly accurate throughout. + +J. M. Peck, _Daniel Boone_ (in Sparks, _Library of American Biography._ +Boston, 1847). + +William Henry Bogart. _Daniel Boone and the Hunters of Kentucky._ New +York, 1856. + +William Hayden English, _Conquest of the Country Northwest of the River +Ohio, 1778-1783, and Life of General George Rogers Clark,_ 2 vols. +Indianapolis, 1896. An accurate and valuable work for which the author +has made painstaking research among printed and unprinted documents. +Contains Clark's own account of his campaigns, letters he wrote on +public and personal matters, and also letters from contemporaries in +defense of his reputation. + +Theodore Roosevelt, _The Winning of the West,_ 4 vols. New York, +1889-1896. A vigorous and spirited narrative. + +Tennessee + +J. G. M. Ramsey, _The Annals of Tennessee._ Charleston, 1853. John +Haywood, _The Civil and Political History of the State of Tennessee._ +Nashville, 1891. (Reprint from 1828.) These works, with the North +Carolina _Colonial Records,_ are the source books of early Tennessee. +In statistics, such as numbers of Indians and other foes defeated by +Tennessee heroes, not 291 reliable. Incorrect as to causes of Indian +wars during the Revolution. On this subject see letters and reports by +John and Henry Stuart in North Carolina _Colonial Records,_ vol. X; and +letters by General Gage and letters and proclamation by General Ethan +Allen in American Archives, Fourth Series, vol. II, and by President +Rutledge of South Carolina in North Carolina _Colonial Records,_ vol. X. +See also Justin Winsor, _The Westward Movement._ + +J. Allison, _Dropped Stitches in Tennessee History._ Nashville, 1897. +Contains interesting matter relative to Andrew Jackson in his younger +days as well as about other striking figures of the time. + +F. M. Turner, _The Life of General John Sevier._ New York, 1910. A +fairly accurate narrative of events in which Sevier participated, +compiled from the _Draper Manuscripts._ + +A. W. Putnam, _History of Middle Tennessee, or Life and Times of +General James Robertson._ Nashville, 1859. A rambling lengthy narrative +containing some interesting material and much that is unreliable. Its +worst fault is distortion through sentimentality, and indulgence in the +habit of putting the author's rodomontades into the mouths of Robertson +and other characters. + +J. S. Bassett, _Regulators of North Carolina,_ in Report of the American +Historical Association, 1894. + +L. C. Draper, _King's Mountain and its Heroes._ Cincinnati, 1881. The +source book on this event. Contains interesting biographical material +about the men engaged in the battle. + +French And Spanish Intrigues + +Henry Doniol, _Histoire de la participation de la France á +l'établissement des États-Unis d'Amérique,_ 5 vols. 292 Paris, +1886-1892. A complete exposition of the French and Spanish policy +towards America during the Revolutionary Period. + +Manuel Serrano y Sanz, _El brigadier Jaime Wilkinson y sus tratos con +España para la independencia del Kentucky, años 1787 á 1797._ Madrid, +1915. A Spanish view of Wilkinson's intrigues with Spain, based on +letters and reports in the Spanish Archives. + +Thomas Marshall Green, _The Spanish Conspiracy._ Cincinnati, 1891. A +good local account, from American sources. The best material on this +subject is found in Justin Winsor's _The Westward Movement and Narrative +and Critical History_ because there viewed against a broad historical +background. See Winsor also for the Latin intrigues in Tennessee. For +material on Alexander McGillivray see the American Archives and the +Colonial Records of Georgia. + +Edward S. Corwin, _French Policy and the American Alliance of 1778._ +Princeton, 1916. Deals chiefly with the commercial aspects of French +policy and should be read in conjunction with Winsor, Jay, and +Fitzmaurice's _Life of William, Earl of Shelburne._ 3 vols. London, +1875. + +John Jay, _On the Peace Negotiations of 1782-83 as Illustrated by the +Secret Correspondence of France and England._ New York, 1888. A paper +read before the American Historical Association, May 23, 1887. + +The Chronicles of America Series + +1. The Red Man's Continent by Ellsworth Huntington 2. The Spanish +Conquerors by Irving Berdine Richman 3. Elizabethan Sea-Dogs by William +Charles Henry Wood 4. The Crusaders of New France by William Bennett +Munro 5. Pioneers of the Old South by Mary Johnson 6. The Fathers of New +England by Charles McLean Andrews 7. Dutch and English on the Hudson by +Maud Wilder Goodwin 8. The Quaker Colonies by Sydney George Fisher 9. +Colonial Folkways by by Charles McLean Andrews 10. The Conquest of New +France by George McKinnon Wrong 11. The Eve of the Revolution by Carl +Lotus Becker 12. Washington and His Comrades in Arms by George McKinnon +Wrong 13. The Fathers of the Constitution by Max Farrand 14. Washington +and His Colleagues by Henry Jones Ford 15. Jefferson and his Colleagues +by Allen Johnson 16. John Marshall and the Constitution by Edward Samuel +Corwin 17. The Fight for a Free Sea by Ralph Delahaye Paine 18. Pioneers +of the Old Southwest by Constance Lindsay Skinner 19. The Old Northwest +by Frederic Austin Ogg 20. The Reign of Andrew Jackson by Frederic +Austin Ogg 21. The Paths of Inland Commerce by Archer Butler Hulbert +22. Adventurers of Oregon by Constance Lindsay Skinner 23. The Spanish +Borderlands by Herbert E. Bolton 24. Texas and the Mexican War by +Nathaniel Wright Stephenson 25. The Forty-Niners by Stewart Edward White +26. The Passing of the Frontier by Emerson Hough 27. The Cotton Kingdom +by William E. Dodd 28. The Anti-Slavery Crusade by Jesse Macy 29. +Abraham Lincoln and the Union by Nathaniel Wright Stephenson 30. The Day +of the Confederacy by Nathaniel Wright Stephenson 31. Captains of the +Civil War by William Charles Henry Wood 32. The Sequel of Appomattox by +Walter Lynwood Fleming 33. The American Spirit in Education by Edwin +E. Slosson 34. The American Spirit in Literature by Bliss Perry 35. Our +Foreigners by Samuel Peter Orth 36. The Old Merchant Marine by Ralph +Delahaye Paine 37. The Age of Invention by Holland Thompson 38. The +Railroad Builders by John Moody 39. The Age of Big Business by Burton +Jesse Hendrick 40. The Armies of Labor by Samuel Peter Orth 41. The +Masters of Capital by John Moody 42. The New South by Holland Thompson +43. The Boss and the Machine by Samuel Peter Orth 44. The Cleveland Era +by Henry Jones Ford 45. The Agrarian Crusade by Solon Justus Buck 46. +The Path of Empire by Carl Russell Fish 47. Theodore Roosevelt and His +Times by Harold Howland 48. Woodrow Wilson and the World War by Charles +Seymour 49. The Canadian Dominion by Oscar D. Skelton 50. The Hispanic +Nations of the New World by William R. Shepherd + +Transcriber Notes + +The author spelled powderhorns on p46, but used a hyphen for +powder-horns on p208. The inconsistencies were retained, and were +entirely a function of the author. On p58 and p142 the word pack-horse +was hyphenated between two lines. Since the author wrote pack-horse five +times in the middle of a sentence, with the hyphen, and did not +write packhorse, both words were transcribed pack-horse. P119 - +Tach-nech-dor-us was hyphenated between two lines, so the name could +have been transcribed Tachnech-dor-us. Wikipedia has an entry on Chief +Logan from the Yellow Creek massacre. The name was spelled without +hyphens, Tachnechdorus. The proper transcription was to place hyphens +after each syllable, Tach-nech-dor-us. The author referred to the +back water men on p204. On p201, the _backwater men_ were quoted. My +interpretation is that the author borrowed that spelling from another +source, without necessarily approving of it. Major Patrick Ferguson +capitalized Back Water, separated the syllables by a space, but +alternately capitalized Men on p203, while not doing so in his +proclamation presented on p213. The Back Water Men and Back Water men of +Ferguson make it four different spellings for the same word in the same +chapter. + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Pioneers of the Old Southwest, by +Constance Lindsay Skinner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PIONEERS OF THE OLD SOUTHWEST +*** + +***** This file should be named 3073.txt or 3073.zip ***** This and +all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/3/0/7/3073/ + +Produced by The James J. Kelly Library of St. Gregory's University, Alev +Akman, Doris Ringbloom, David Widger, and Robert J. 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