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Fort DobbsF.0 R T D 0 B B S ii Iredell County, North Carolina Daniel Boone Red Man Against White Man steady increase in the herds, it was neces- continually active against the New York, sary each season to find new pastures. Thus i Pennsylvania, and Virginia frontiers, and the herdsmen pushed farther and farther were known to be attempting the corrup- into the wilderness to the south and west, tion of the Southern Indians. Fort Prince and actually crossed the mountains at many George was accordingly erected upon the Sa- points. Even before the arrival of the vannah River, and Fort Loudon upon the Boones, the Bryans had frequently, towardTennessee. 1756 Fort Dobbs was con - the end of summer, as the lower pastures strutted a short distance south of the South thinned, driven their stock to a distance of Fork of the Yadkin. These three centers of sixty and seventy miles to green valleys lying ( refuge were upon the extreme southwestern between the western buttresses of the moun- ! borders of the English colonies. tain wall. These " forts " of the American border This gradual pressure upon the hunting- ! would have proved slight defenses in the of the Cherokees and the Catawbas presence of an enemy armed with even the grounds was not unnoticed by the tribesmen. There I lightest artillery, but were generally suffi- had long been heard deep mutterings, es- tient to withstand a foe possessing only mus- pecially by the former, who were well-dis- $ kets and rifles. Fort Dobbs was an oblong toward the ever -meddling French; but space forty-three by fifty-three feet, girt by posed until the year of Daniel Boone's wedding walls about twelve feet high, consisting of the southern frontiers had not known an In- ` double rows of logs standing on end; earth (t dug from the ditch which surrounded the fort dian uprising. The year previous (1755) the Cherokees was piled against the feet of these palisades, had given reluctant permission to the whites i inside and out, to steady them; they were to build two posts in their country for the fastened to one another by wooden pin:, and protection of the frontiers against the their tops were sharpened so as to impede French, who, with their Indian allies, were those who might seek to climb over. At. the 36 37 1 OAVIE CO. PUBLIC UBMHY MOCKSMA ho Daniel Boone angles of the stockade were blockhouses three stories high, each story projecting about eighteen inches beyond the one be- neath; there were openings in the floors of the two upper stories to enable the defenders to fire down upon an enemy which sought to enter below. Along the inside of one, or perhaps two, of the four walls of the stockade was a range of cabins—or rather, one long cabin with log partitions—with the slope of the roof • turned inward to the square; this furnished a- platform for the garrison, who, protected by the rampart of pointed logs, could fire into the attacking party-.' other platforms were bracketed against the walls not. backed by cabins. There was. a large double gate made of thick slabs and so situ- ated as to be guarded by the blockhouses on either corner; this was the main entrance, but another and smaller gate furnished a rear exit to and entrance from the spring hard by. Blockhouses, cabins, and walls were all amply provided with port -holes; Fort Dobbs had capacity for a hundred men- at-arms to fire at one volley. Destructive fusillades could be. maintained from within, 38 Red Man Against White Man and everywhere the walls were bullet-proof ; but good marksmen in the attacking force could work great havoc by firing through the port -holes, and thus quietly picking off those who chanced to be in range. Fortunately for the whites few Indians became so expert as this. Upon the arrival of breathless messengers bringing news of the approach of hostile In- dians, the men, women, and children of a wide district would flock into such a fort as this. "I well remember,"- says Dr. Dodd - ridge in his Notes on Virginia, « that when a little boy the family were sometimes waked up in the dead of night by an express with a- report that the Indians were at hand. . The express came softly to the door or back win- dow, and by gentle tapping waked the fam- ily; amily; this was easily done, as an habitual fear made us ever watchful and sensible to the slightest alarm. The whole family were in- stantly in motion: my father seized his gun and other implements of war; my stepmoth- er waked up and dressed the children as well as she could; and being myself -the oldest of the children, I had to take my share of the OAVie co, PuBuc LIBRArly MOCKSViLL.E, Daniel Boone burthens to be carried to the fort. There was no possibility of getting a horse in the night to aid us in removing to the fort; be- sides the little children, we caught up what articles of clothing and provisions we could get hold of in the dark, for we durst not light a candle or even stir the fire. All this was done with the utmost despatch and the silence of death; the greatest care was taken not to awaken the youngest child; to the rest it was 'enough to say Indian, and not a whimper was heard afterwards. Thus it often happened that the whole number of families belonging to a fort, who were in the evening at their homes, were all in their little fortress before the dawn of the neat morn- ing. In the course of the succeeding day their household furniture was brought in by parties of the men under arms." - The large public frontier forts, such as we have described, did not house all of the backwoodsmen. There were some who, either- because of great distance or other reasons, erected their own private defenses; or, .in many cases, several isolated families united in such a structure. Often these were 40 Red Man Against White Man but single blockhouses, with a few outlying cabins. It was difficult to induce some of the more venturesome folk to enter the forts unless Indians- were actually- in the settle- ment; ettlement; they took great risks in order to care for their crops and stock until the last mo- ment; and, soon tiring of the monotony of life within the fort cabins, would often leave the refuge before the danger was really over. "Such families," reports Doddridge, "'gave no small amount of trouble by creating fre- quent necessities of sending runners to warn them of their danger, and sometimes parties of our men to protect them during their re- moval.'t For-- the first few years bort Dobbs was but little used. There was, however, much uneasiness. The year 1757 had, all along the line, been disastrous to English arms in the North, and the Cherokees became increas- ingly insolent. The neat year they com- mitted several deadly assaults in the Valley of Virginia, but themselves suffered greatly in return. The French, at last driven from Fort Duquesne ( Pittsburg), had retreated down the Ohio Diver to Fort Massac, in 41 DAVIE CO. PUBUC LIBRARY MOCKSVILLE, NC N T ,4 Daniel Boone Red Man Against White Man southern Illinois, and sent their emissaries fled with all their possessions to settlements far and near to stir up the Indiana west of on or near the Atlantic coast. the mountains. The following April (1759) Among the latter were old Squire Boone the Yadkin and Catawba Valleys were raided and his wife, Daniel and Rebecca, with their by the Cherokees, with the usual results of two sons,' and several other families of ruined crops, burned farm -buildings, and Bryans and Boones, although some of both murdered households; not a few of the bor- names preferred to remain at Fort Dobbs. derers being carried off as prisoners into the The fugitives scattered to various parts of Indian country, there generally to suffer Virginia and Maryland—Squire going to either slavery or slow death from the most Georgetown, now in the District of Columbia, horrid forms of torture. The Catawbas, where he lived for three years and then re - meanwhile, remained faithful to their white turned to the Yadkin; while Daniel's fam- friends. ily went in their two -horse wagon to Cul - Until this outbreak the Carolinas had ; peper County, in eastern Virginia. The prospered greatly. Hundreds of settlers settlers there employed him with his wagon had poured in from the more exposed north in hauling tobacco to Fredericksburg, the ern valleys, and the western uplands were nearest market -town. now rapidly being dotted over with clearings 1 The April forays created almost as much and log cabins. The Indian forays at once 'tf consternation at Charleston as on the Yad created a general panic throughout this re- i lin. Governor Lyttleton, of South Carolina, gion, heretofore considered safe. Most of sent out fifteen hundred men to overcome the the Yadkin families, together with English *The children of Daniel Boone were as follows: James fur -traders who hurried in from the woods, t (born in 1757), rsrael (1759), Susannah (1760), Jemima (1762), huddled within the walls either of Fort Lavinia (1766), Rebecca (1768), Daniel Morgan (1769), John B. (1773), and Nathan (1780). The four daughters all married and Dobbs or of small neighborhood forts hastily died in Kentucky. The two eldest sons were killed by Indians, constructed; but many others, in their fright, the three younger emigrated to Missouri. 42 43 UAVIE CO. PUBLIC UBRARY MOCKSVILLE, NO tN Daniel Boone Cherokees, who now pretended to be grieved at the acts of their young hot -bloods and patched up a peace. Fur -traders, eager to renew their profitable barter, hastened back into the western forests. But very soon their confidence was shattered, for the Indians again dug up the tomahawk. Their war -par- ties infested every road and trail; most of the traders, with trains of packhorses to carry their goods and furs, fell an easy prey to their forest customers; and Forts Loudon, Dobbs, and Prince George were besieged. By January (1760) the entire southwest border was once more a scene of carnage. Captain Waddell, our old friend of Brad - dock's campaign, commanded at Fort Dobbs, with several Bryans and Boones in his little garrison. Here the Cherokees were repulsed with great loss. At Fort Prince George the country round about was sadly harried by the enemy, who finally withdrew. Fort Loudon, however, had one of the saddest ex- periences in the thrilling annals of the frontier. In April General Amherst, of the British Army, sent Colonel Montgomery against the 44 Red Man Against White Man Cherokees with a formidable column com- posed of twelve hundred regular troops— among them six hundred kilted Highlanders —to whom were attached seven hundred Carolina backwoods rangers under Waddell, with some Catawba allies. They laid waste with fire and sword all the Cherokee villages on the Keowee and Tennessee Rivers, includ- ing the growing crops and magazines of corn. The soldiers killed seventy Indians, captured forty prisoners, and reduced the greater part of the tribe to the verge of starvation. The Cherokees were good fighters, and soon had their revenge. On the morning of the twenty-seventh of June the army was proceeding along a rough road on the south- ern bank of the Little Tennessee, where on one side is a sheer descent to the stream, on the other a lofty cliff. Here it was ambus- caded by over six hundred savage warriors under the noted chief Silouee. In the course of an engagement lasting several hours the whites lost twenty killed and sixty wounded, and the Cherokee casualties were perhaps greater. Montgomery desperately beat his way to a level tract, but in the night hastily 45 OAVIE CO. PUBLJC L18RARy MOCKSVILLE, NQ Daniel Boone withdrew, and did not stop until he reached Charleston. Despite the entreaties of the- Assembly, heAssembly, he at once retired to the North with his little army, and left the frontiers of Carolina open to the assaults of the merci- less foe. The siege of Fort Loudon was now pushed by the Cherokees with vigor. It had already withstood several desperate and protracted assaults. But the garrison contrived to exist for seveial months, almost wholly upon the active sympathy of several Indian women who were married to frontiersmen shut up within the walls. The dusky wives fre- quently contrived to smuggle food into the fort despite the protests of the Indian lead- ers. Women, however, despite popular no- tions to the contrary, have a powerful influ- ence in Indian camps; and they but laughed the chiefs to scorn, saying that they would suffer death rather than refuse assistance to their white husbands. This relief, however, furnished but a pre- carious existence. . Receiving no help from the settlements, which were cut off from com- munication with them, and weak from irregn- 46 i Red Man Against White Man Jar food, the garrison finally surrendered on promise of a safe-conduct to their fellows in the East. Early in the morning of August ninth they marched out—men, women, and children to the number of several hundred— leaving behind them their cannon, ammuni- tion, and spare arms. The next day, upon` their sorry march, they were set upon by a bloodthirsty mob of seven hundred Chero- kees. Many were killed outright, others sur- rendered merely to meet torture and death. Finally, after several hours of horror, a friendly chief succeeded, by browbeating his people and by subterfuge, in saving the lives of about two hundred persons, who in due time and after great suffering, reached the relief party which had for several months been making its way thither from Virginia; but it had been delayed by storms and high water in the mountain streams, and was now seeking needed rest in a camp at the head of the Holston. It is recorded that during the heartrending melee several other Indians risked their lives for white friends, perform- ing deeds of heroism which deserve to be remembered. 47 DAVIE CO. PUBLIC LIBRARY MOCKSVILL" NO 0 i