The Winning of the West Volume IV Part 8

[Footnote: Carondelet to Alcudia, Sept. 27, 1793.]

He Continually Incites the Indians to War.

The Spaniards in this manner actively fomented hostilities among the Creeks and Cherokees. Their support explained much in the att.i.tude of these peoples, but doubtless the war would have gone on anyhow until the savages were thoroughly cowed by force of arms. The chief causes for the incessantly renewed hostilities were the desire of the young braves for blood and glory, a vague but well-founded belief among the Indians that the white advance meant their ruin unless stayed by an appeal to arms, and, more important still, the absolute lack of any central authority among the tribesmen which could compel them all to war together effectively on the one hand, or all to make peace on the other.

Seagrove the Indian Agent.

Blount was Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Southern Indians as well as Governor of the Territory; and in addition the Federal authorities established an Indian agent, directly responsible to themselves, among the Creeks. His name was James Seagrove. He did his best to bring about a peace, and, like all Indian agents, he was apt to take an unduly harsh view of the deeds of the frontiersmen, and to consider them the real aggressors in any trouble. Of necessity his point of view was wholly different from that of the border settlers. He was promptly informed of all the outrages and aggressions committed by the whites, while he heard little or nothing of the parties of young braves, bent on rapine, who continually fell on the frontiers; whereas the frontiersmen came in contact only with these war bands, and when their kinsfolk had been murdered and their cattle driven off, they were generally ready to take vengeance on the first Indians they could find.

Even Seagrove, however, was at times hopelessly puzzled by the att.i.tude of the Indians. He was obliged to admit that they were the first offenders, after the conclusion of the treaties of New York and Holston, and that for a long time the settlers behaved with great moderation in refraining from revenging the outrages committed on them by the Indians, which, he remarked, would have to be stopped if peace was to be preserved. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., Seagrove to the Secretary of War, St. Mary's, June 14, 1792.]

Disorder among the Frontiersmen.

McGillivray Bewildered.

As the Government took no efficient steps to preserve the peace, either by chastising the Indians or by bridling the ill-judged vengeance of the frontier inhabitants, many of the latter soon grew to hate and despise those by whom they were neither protected nor restrained. The disorderly element got the upper hand on the Georgia frontier, where the backwoodsmen did all they could to involve the nation in a general Indian war; and displayed the most defiant and mutinous spirit toward the officers, civil and military, of the United States Government.

[Footnote: _Do_., Seagrove to the President, Rock Landing, on the Oconee, in Georgia, July 17, 1792.] As for the Creeks, Seagrove found it exceedingly hard to tell who of them were traitors and who were not; and indeed the chiefs would probably themselves have found the task difficult, for they were obliged to waver more or less in their course as the fickle tribesmen were swayed by impulses towards peace or war.

One of the men whom Seagrove finally grew to regard as a confirmed traitor was the chief, McGillivray. He was probably quite right in his estimate of the half-breed's character; and, on the other hand, McGillivray doubtless had as an excuse the fact that the perpetual intrigues of Spanish officers, American traders, British adventurers, Creek chiefs who wished peace, and Creek warriors who wished war, made it out of the question for him to follow any settled policy. He wrote to Seagrove: "It is no wonder the Indians are distracted, when they are tampered with on every side. I am myself in the situation of a keeper of Bedlam, and nearly fit for an inhabitant." [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., McGillivray to Seagrove, May 18, 1793.] However, what he did amounted to but little, for his influence had greatly waned, and in 1793 he died.

The Indians the Aggressors.

On the Georgia frontier the backwoodsmen were very rough and lawless, and were always p.r.o.ne to make aggressions on the red men; nevertheless, even in the case of Georgia in 1791 and '92, the chief fault lay with the Indians. They refused to make good the land cession which they had solemnly guaranteed at the treaty of New York, and which certain of their towns had previously covenanted to make in the various more or less fraudulent treaties entered into with the State of Georgia separately. In addition to this their plundering parties continually went among the Georgians. The latter, in their efforts to retaliate, struck the hostile and the peaceful alike; and as time went on they made ready to take forcible possession of the lands they coveted, without regard to whether or not these lands had been ceded in fair treaty.

In the Tennessee country the wrong was wholly with the Indians. Some of the chiefs of the Cherokees went to Philadelphia at the beginning of the year 1792 to request certain modifications of the treaty of Holston, notably an increase in their annuity, which was granted. [Footnote: _Do_., Secretary of War to Governor Blount, Jan. 31, 1792.]

Their Outrages on the Tennesseeans.

The General Government had conducted the treaties in good faith and had given the Indians what they asked. The frontiersmen did not molest them in any way or trespa.s.s upon their lands; yet their ravages continued without cessation. The authorities at Was.h.i.+ngton made but feeble efforts to check these outrages, and protect the southwestern settlers. Yet at this time Tennessee was doing her full part in sustaining the National Government in the war against the Northwestern tribes; a company of Tennessee militia, under Captain Jacob Tipton, joined St. Clair's army, and Tipton was slain at the defeat, where he fought with the utmost bravery. [Footnote: _Knoxville Gazette_, Dec. 17, 1791. I use the word "Tennessee" for convenience; it was not at this time used in this sense.] Not unnaturally the Tennesseeans, and especially the settlers on the far-off c.u.mberland, felt it a hards.h.i.+p for the United States to neglect their defence at the very time that they were furnis.h.i.+ng their quota of soldiers for an offensive war against nations in whose subdual they had but an indirect interest. Robertson wrote to Blount that their silence and remoteness was the cause why the interests of the c.u.mberland settlers were thus neglected, while the Kentuckians were amply protected. [Footnote: Robertson MSS., Robertson's letter, Nashville, Aug. 25, 1791.]

Anger of the Tennesseeans.

Blindness of the Federal Government.

Naturally the Tennesseeans, conscious that they had not wronged the Indians, and had scrupulously observed the treaty, grew imbittered over, the wanton Indian outrages. They were entirely at a loss to explain the reason why the warfare against them was waged with such ferocity. Sevier wrote to Madison, with whom he frequently corresponded: "This country is wholly involved in a war with the Creek and Cherokee Indians, and I am not able to suggest the reasons or the pretended cause of their depredations. The successes of the Northern tribes over our late unfortunate armies have created great exultation throughout the whole Southern Indians, and the probabilities may be they expect to be equally successful. The Spaniards are making use of all their art to draw over the Southern tribes, and I fear may have stimulated them to commence their hostilities. Governor Blount has indefatigably labored to keep these people in a pacific humor, but in vain. War is unavoidable, however ruinous and calamitous it may be." [Footnote: State Dep. MSS., Madison Papers, Sevier's letter, Oct. 30, 1792.] The Federal Government was most reluctant to look facts in the face and acknowledge that the hostilities were serious, and that they were unprovoked by the whites.

The Secretary of War reported to the President that the offenders were doubtless merely a small banditti of Creeks and Cherokees, with a few Shawnees who possessed no fixed residence; and in groping for a remedy he weakly suggested that inasmuch as many of the Cherokees seemed to be dissatisfied with the boundary line they had established by treaty it would perhaps be well to alter it. [Footnote: State Dep. MSS., Was.h.i.+ngton Papers, Secretary of War to the President, July 28, and Aug.

5, 1792.] Of course the adoption of such a measure would have amounted to putting a premium on murder and treachery.

Odd Manifestations of Particularistic Feeling.

If the Easterners were insensible to the Western need for a vigorous Indian war, many of the Westerners showed as little appreciation of the necessity for any Indian war which did not immediately concern themselves. Individual Kentuckians, individual colonels and captains of the Kentucky militia, were always ready to march to the help of the Tennesseeans against the Southern Indians; but the highest officials of Kentucky were almost as anxious as the Federal authorities to prevent any war save that with the tribes northwest of the Ohio. One of the Kentucky senators, Brown, in writing to the Governor, Isaac Shelby, laid particular stress upon the fact that nothing but the most urgent necessity could justify a war with the Southern Indians. [Footnote: Shelby MSS., J. Brown to Isaac Shelby, Philadelphia, June 2, 1793.]

Shelby himself sympathized with this feeling. He knew what an Indian war was, for he had owed his election largely to his record as an Indian fighter and to the confidence the Kentuckians felt in his power to protect them from their red foes. [Footnote: _Do_., M. D. Hardin to Isaac Shelby, April 10, 1792, etc., etc.] His correspondence is filled with letters in relation to Indian affairs, requests to authorize the use of spies, requests to establish guards along the wilderness road and to garrison blockhouses on the frontier; and sometimes there are more pathetic letters, from a husband who had lost a wife, or from an "old, frail woman," who wished to know if the Governor could not by some means get news of her little granddaughter who had been captured in the wilderness two years before by a party of Indians. [Footnote: _Do._, Letter of Mary Mitch.e.l.l to Isaac Shelby, May 1, 1793.] He realized fully what hostilities meant, and had no desire to see his State plunged into any Indian war which could be avoided.

Yet, in spite of this cautious att.i.tude, Shelby had much influence with the people of the Tennessee territory. They confided to him their indignation with Blount for stopping Logan's march to the aid of Robertson; while on the other hand the Virginians, when anxious to prevent the c.u.mberland settlers from breaking the peace, besought him to use his influence with them in order to make them do what was right. [Footnote: Shelby MSS., Arthur Campbell to Shelby, January 6, 1890; letter from c.u.mberland to Shelby, May 11, 1793; John Logan to Shelby, June 19, 1794; pet.i.tion of inhabitants of Nelson County, May 9, 1793.] When such a man as Shelby was reluctant to see the United States enter into open hostilities with the Southern Indians, there is small cause for wonder in the fact that the authorities at the National capital did their best to deceive themselves into the belief that there was no real cause for war.

Intolerable Hards.h.i.+ps of the Settlers.

Inability to look facts in the face did not alter the facts. The Indian ravages in the Southern Territory grew steadily more and more serious.

The difficulties of the settlers were enormously increased because the United States strictly forbade any offensive measures. The militia were allowed to drive off any war bands found among the settlements with evidently hostile intent; but, acting under the explicit, often repeated, and emphatic commands of the General Government, Blount was obliged to order the militia under no circ.u.mstances to a.s.sume the offensive, or to cross into the Indian hunting grounds beyond the boundaries established by the treaty of Holston. [Footnote: Robertson MSS., Blount to Robertson, April 1, 1792.] The inhabitants of the c.u.mberland region, and of the frontier counties generally, pet.i.tioned strongly against this, stating that "the frontiers will break if the inroads of the savages are not checked by counter expeditions."

[Footnote: _Do_., Feb. 1, 1792.]

Blount's Good Conduct.

It was a very disagreeable situation for Blount, who, in carrying out the orders of the Federal authorities, had to incur the ill-will of the people whom he had been appointed to govern; but even at the cost of being supposed to be lukewarm in the cause of the settlers, he loyally endeavored to execute the commands of his superiors. Yet like every other man acquainted by actual experience with frontier life and Indian warfare, he knew the folly of defensive war against Indians. At this very time the officers on the frontier of South Carolina, which was not a State that was at all inclined to unjust aggression against the Indians, notified the Governor that the defensive war was "expensive, hazardous, and distressing" to the settlers, because the Indians "had such advantages, being so wolfish in their manner and so savage in their nature," that it was impossible to make war upon them on equal terms if the settlers were confined to defending themselves in their own country, whereas a speedy and spirited counter-attack upon them in their homes would probably reduce them to peace, as their mode of warfare fitted them much less to oppose such an attack than to "take skulking, wolfish advantages of the defenceless" settlers. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., Robert Anderson to the Governor of South Carolina, Sep. 20, 1792.]

Doublefaced Conduct of the Creeks and Cherokees.

The difficulties of Blount and the Tennessee frontiersmen were increased by the very fact that the Cherokees and Creeks still nominally remained at peace. The Indian towns nearest the frontier knew that they were jeopardized by the acts of their wilder brethren, and generally strove to avoid committing any offense themselves. The war parties from the remote towns were the chief offenders. Band after band came up from among the Creeks or from among the lower Cherokees, and, pa.s.sing through the peaceful villages of the upper Cherokees, fell on the frontier, stole horses, ambushed men, killed or captured women and children, and returned whence they had come. In most cases it was quite impossible to determine even the tribe of the offenders with any certainty; and all that the frontiersmen knew was that their b.l.o.o.d.y trails led back towards the very villages where the Indians loudly professed that they were at peace. They soon grew to regard all the Indians with equal suspicion, and they were so goaded by the blows which they could not return that they were ready to take vengeance upon any one with a red skin, or at least to condone such vengeance when taken. The peaceful Cherokees, though they regretted these actions and were alarmed and disquieted at the probable consequences, were unwilling or unable to punish the aggressors.

Blount Warns the Federal Government.

Blount was soon at his wits' ends to prevent the outbreak of a general war. In November, 1792, he furnished the War Department with a list of scores of people--men, women, and children--who had been killed in Tennessee, chiefly in the c.u.mberland district, since the signing of the treaty of Holston. Many others had been carried off, and were kept in slavery. Among the wounded were General Robertson and one of his sons, who were shot, although not fatally, in May, 1792, while working on their farm. Both Creeks and Cherokees took part in the outrages, and the Chickamauga towns on the Tennessee, at Running Water, Nickajack, and in the neighborhood, ultimately supplied the most persistent wrongdoers. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., Blount to Secretary of War, Nov. 8, 1792; also page 330, etc. Many of these facts will be found recited, not only in the correspondence of Blount, but in the Robertson MSS., in the _Knoxville Gazette_, and in Haywood, Ramsey, and Putman.]

Effect of the Defeat of Harmar and St. Clair.

Growth of the War Spirit.

As Sevier remarked, the Southern, no less than the Northern Indians were much excited and encouraged by the defeat of St. Clair, coming as it did so close upon the defeat of Harmar. The double disaster to the American arms made the young braves very bold, and it became impossible for the elder men to restrain them. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., pp.

263, 439, etc.] The Creeks hara.s.sed the frontiers of Georgia somewhat, but devoted their main attention to the Tennesseeans, and especially to the isolated settlements on the c.u.mberland. The Chickamauga towns were right at the crossing place both for the Northern Indians when they came south and for the Creeks when they went north. Bands of Shawnees, who were at this time the most inveterate of the enemies of the frontiersmen, pa.s.sed much time among them; and the Creek war parties, when they journeyed north to steal horses and get scalps, invariably stopped among them, and on their return stopped again to exhibit their trophies and hold scalp dances. The natural effect was that the Chickamaugas, who were mainly Lower Town Cherokees, seeing the impunity with which the ravages were committed, and appreciating the fact that under the orders of the Government they could not be molested in their own homes by the whites, began to join in the raids; and their nearness to the settlements soon made them the worst offenders. One of their leading chiefs was John Watts, who was of mixed blood. Among all these Southern Indians, half-breeds were far more numerous than among the Northerners, and when the half-breeds lived with their mothers' people they usually became the deadliest enemies of their fathers' race. Yet, they generally preserved the father's name. In consequence, among the extraordinary Indian t.i.tles borne by the chiefs of the Creeks, Cherokees, and Choctaws--the b.l.o.o.d.y Fellow, the Middle Striker, the Mad Dog, the Gla.s.s, the Breath--there were also many names like John Watts, Alexander Cornell, and James Colbert, which were common among the frontiersmen themselves.

Fruitless Peace Negotiations.

These Chickamaugas, and Lower Cherokees, had solemnly entered into treaties of peace, and Blount had been taken in by their professions of friends.h.i.+p, and for some time was loath to believe that their warriors were among war parties who ravaged the settlements. By the spring of 1792, however, the fact of their hostility could no longer be concealed.

Nevertheless, in May of that year the chiefs of the Lower Cherokee Towns, joined with those of the Upper Towns in pressing Governor Blount to come to a council at Coyatee, where he was met by two thousand Cherokees, including all their princ.i.p.al chiefs and warriors. [Footnote: Robertson's MSS., Blount to Robertson, May 20, 1792.] The head men, not only from the Upper Towns, but from Nickajack and Running Water, including John Watts, solemnly a.s.sured Blount of their peaceful intentions, and expressed their regret at the outrages which they admitted had been committed by their young men. Blount told them plainly that he had the utmost difficulty in restraining the whites from taking vengeance for the numerous murders committed on the settlers, and warned them that if they wished to avert a war which would fall upon both the innocent and the guilty they must themselves keep the peace. The chiefs answered, with seeming earnestness, that they were most desirous of being at peace, and would certainly restrain their men; and they begged for the treaty goods which Blount had in his possession. So sincere did they seem that he gave them the goods. [Footnote: _Knoxville Gazette_, March 24,1792; American State Papers, IV., Blount to Secretary of War, June 2, 1792, with minutes of conference at Coyatee.]

This meeting began on the 17th of May, yet on the 16th, within twelve miles of Knoxville, two boys were killed and scalped while picking strawberries, and on the 13th a girl had been scalped within four miles of Nashville; and on the 17th itself, while Judge Campbell of the Territorial Court was returning from the c.u.mberland Circuit his party was attacked, and one killed. [Footnote: _Knoxville Gazette_, June 2, 1792.]

Chickamaugas Make Open War.

Try to Deceive Blount.

When such outrages were committed at the very time the treaty was being held, it was hopeless to expect peace. In September the Chickamaugas threw off the mask and made open war. When the news was received Blount called out the militia and sent word to Robertson that some friendly Cherokees had given warning that a big war party was about to fall on the settlements round Nashville. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., Blount to Secretary of War, Sept. 11, 1792.] Finding that the warning had been given, the Chickamauga chiefs sought to lull their foes into security by a rather adroit peace of treachery. Two of their chiefs, The Gla.s.s and The b.l.o.o.d.y Fellow, wrote to Blount complaining that they had a.s.sembled their warriors because they were alarmed over rumors of a desire on the part of the whites to maltreat them; and on the receipt of a.s.surances from Blount that they were mistaken, they announced their pleasure and stated that no hostilities would be undertaken. Blount was much relieved at this, and thought that the danger of an outbreak was past. Accordingly he wrote to Robertson telling him that he could disband his troops, as there was no longer need of them. Robertson, however, knew the Indian character as few men did know it, and, moreover, he had received confidential information about the impending raid from a half-breed and a Frenchman who were among the Indians. He did not disband his troops, and wrote to Blount that The Gla.s.s and The b.l.o.o.d.y Fellow had undoubtedly written as they did simply to deceive him and to secure their villages from a counter-attack while they were off on their raid against the c.u.mberland people. Accordingly three hundred militia were put under arms. [Footnote: Robertson MSS., Blount to Robertson, Sept. 6, 1792; Blount to The b.l.o.o.d.y Fellow, Sept. 10, 1792; to Robertson, Sept. 12; to The Gla.s.s, Sept. 13; to The b.l.o.o.d.y Fellow, Sept. 13; to Robertson, Sept. 14; Robertson to Blount, Sept. 26, 1792.]

Attack Buchanan's Station.

Failure of the Attack.

It was well that the whites were on their guard. Towards the end of September a big war party, under the command of John Watts and including some two hundred Cherokees, eighty Creeks, and some Shawnees, left the Chickamauga Towns and marched swiftly and silently to the c.u.mberland district. They attempted to surprise one of the more considerable of the lonely little forted towns. It was known as Buchanan's Station, and in it there were several families, including fifteen "gun-men." Two spies went out from it to scour the country and give warning of any Indian advance; but with the Cherokees were two very white half-breeds, whose Indian blood was scarcely noticeable, and these two men met the spies and decoyed them to their death. The Indians then, soon after midnight on the 30th of September, sought to rush the station by surprise. The alarm was given by the running of the frightened cattle, and when the sentinel fired at the a.s.sailants they were not ten yards from the gate of the blockhouse. The barred door withstood the shock and the flame-flashes lit up the night as the gun-men fired through the loop-holes. The Indians tried to burn the fort, one of the chiefs, a half-breed, leaping on the roof; he was shot through the thigh and rolled off; but he stayed close to the logs trying to light them with his torch, alternately blowing it into a blaze and halloing to the Indians to keep on with the attack. However, he was slain, as was the Shawnee head chief, and several warriors, while John Watts, leader of the expedition, was shot through both thighs. The log walls of the grim little blockhouse stood out black in the fitful glare of the cane torches; and tongues of red fire streamed into the night as the rifles rang. The attack had failed, and the throng of dark, flitting forms faded into the gloom as the baffled Indians retreated. So disheartened were they by the check, and by the loss they had suffered, that they did not further molest the settlements, but fell back to their strongholds across the Tennessee. Among the Cherokee chiefs who led the raid were two signers of the treaty of Holston. [Footnote: Robertson MSS., Blount to Robertson, Oct. 17, 1792; _Knoxville Gazette_, Oct. 10, and Oct. 20, 1792; Brown's Narrative, in _Southwestern Monthly_.]

Monotony of the Indian Outrages.

After this the war was open, so far as the Indians of the Lower Cherokee Towns and of many of the Creek Towns were concerned; but the whites were still restrained by strict orders from the United States authorities, who refused to allow them to retaliate. Outrage followed outrage in monotonously b.l.o.o.d.y succession. The Creeks were the worst offenders in point of numbers, but the Lower Cherokees from the Chickamauga towns did most harm according to their power. Sometimes the bands that entered the settlements were several hundred strong; but their chief object was plunder, and they rarely attacked the strong places of the white frontiersmen, though they forced them to keep huddled in the stockaded stations; nor did they often fight a pitched battle with the larger bodies of militia. There is no reason for reciting in full the countless deeds of rapine and murder. The incidents, though with infinite variety of detail, were in substance the same as in all the Indian wars of the backwoods. Men, women, and children were killed or captured; outlying cabins were attacked and burned; the husbandman was shot as he worked in the field, and the housewife as she went for water. The victim was now a militiaman on his way to join his company, now one of a party of immigrants, now a settler on his lonely farm, and now a justice of the peace going to Court, or a Baptist preacher striving to reach the c.u.mberland country that he might preach the word of G.o.d to the people who had among them no religious instructor. The express messengers and post riders, who went through the wilderness from one commander to the other, always rode at hazard of their lives. In one of Blount's letters to Robertson he remarks: "Your letter of the 6th of February sent express by James Russell was handed to me, much stained with his blood, by Mr. Shannon, who accompanied him." Russell had been wounded in an ambuscade, and his fifty dollars were dearly earned. [Footnote: Robertson MSS., Blount to Robertson, March 8, 1794. The files of the _Knoxville Gazette_ are full of details of these outrages, and so are the letters of Blount to the Secretary of War given in the American State Papers, as well as the letters of Blount and Robertson in the two bound volumes of Robertson MSS. Many of them are quoted in more accessible form in Haywood.]

Horse-stealing.

Brutal White Ruffians.

The Indians were even more fond of horse-stealing than of murder, and they found a ready market for their horses not only in their own nations and among the Spaniards, but among the American frontiersmen themselves.

Many of the unscrupulous white scoundrels who lived on the borders of the Indian country made a regular practice of receiving the stolen horses. As soon as a horse was driven from the Tennessee or c.u.mberland it was hurried through the Indian country to the Carolina or Georgia frontiers, where the red thieves delivered it to the foul white receivers, who took it to some town on the seaboard, so as effectually to prevent a recovery. At Swannanoa in North Carolina, among the lawless settlements at the foot of the Oconee Mountain in South Carolina, and at Tugaloo in Georgia, there were regular markets for these stolen horses.

[Footnote: Blount to the Secretary of War, May 5, 1792, and Nov. 10, 1794. As before, I use the word "Tennessee" instead of "Southwestern Territory" for convenience; it was not regularly employed until 1796.]

There were then, and continued to exist as long as the frontier lasted, plenty of white men who, though ready enough to wrong the Indians, were equally ready to profit by the wrongs they inflicted on the white settlers, and to encourage their misdeeds if profit was thereby to be made. Very little evildoing of this kind took place Tennessee, for Blount, backed by Sevier and Robertson, was vigilant to put it down; but as yet the Federal Government was not firm in its seat, and its arm was not long enough to reach into the remote frontier districts, where lawlessness of every kind throve, and the whites wronged one another as recklessly as they wronged the Indians.

Sufferings of the Honest Settlers.

Blount's Efforts to Prevent Brutality.

The white scoundrels throve in the confusion of a nominal peace which the savages broke at will; but the honest frontiersmen really suffered more than if there had been open war, as the Federal Government refused to allow raids to be carried into the Indian territory, and in consequence the marauding Indians could at any time reach a place of safety. The blockhouses were of little consequence in putting a stop to Indian attacks. The most efficient means of defence was the employment of the hardiest and best hunters as scouts or spies, for they travelled hither and thither through the woods and continually harried the war parties. [Footnote: American State Papers, IV., p. 364; letter of Secretary of War, May 30, 1793.] The militia bands also travelled to and fro, marching to the rescue of some threatened settlement, or seeking to intercept the attacking bands or to overtake those who had delivered their stroke and were returning to the Indian country. Generally they failed in the pursuit. Occasionally they were themselves ambushed, attacked, and dispersed; sometimes they overtook and scattered their foes. In such a case they were as little apt to show mercy to the defeated as were the Indians themselves. Blount issued strict orders that squaws and children were not to be slain, and the frontiersmen did generally refuse to copy their antagonists in butchering the women and children in cold blood. When an attack was made on a camp, however, it was no uncommon thing to have the squaws killed while the fight was hot. Blount, in one of his letters to Robertson, after the c.u.mberland militia had attacked and destroyed a Creek war party which had murdered a settler, expressed his pleasure at the perseverance with which the militia captain had followed the Indians to the banks of the Tennessee, where he had been lucky enough to overtake them in a position where not one was able to escape. Blount especially complimented him upon having spared the two squaws, "as all civilized people should"; and he added that in so doing the captain's conduct offered a most agreeable contrast to the behavior of some of his fellow citizens under like circ.u.mstances.

[Footnote: Robertson MSS., Blount's letter, March 8, 1794.]