The Winning of the West

by Theodore Roosevelt

  One of the clumsy craft, however, did not share the good fortune that befell the rest, in escaping with so little loss and damage. Jonathan Jennings’ boat, in which was Mrs. Peyton, with her new-born baby, struck on a rock at the upper end of the whirl, the swift current rendering it impossible for the others to go to his assistance; and they drifted by, leaving him to his fate. The Indians soon turned their whole attention to him, and from the bluffs opened a most galling fire upon the disabled boat. He returned it as well as he could, keeping them somewhat in check, for he was a most excellent marksman. At the same time he directed his two negroes, a man and woman, his nearly grown son, and a young man who was with him, to lighten the boat by throwing his goods into the river. Before this was done, the negro man, the son, and the other young man most basely jumped into the river, and swam ashore. It is satisfactory to record that at least two of the three dastards met the fate they deserved. The negro was killed in the water, and the other two captured, one of them being afterward burned at the stake, while the other, it is said, was ultimately released. Meanwhile Mrs. Jennings, assisted by the negro woman and Mrs. Peyton, actually succeeded in shoving the lightened boat off the rock, though their clothes were cut in many places by the bullets; and they rapidly drifted out of danger. The poor little baby was killed in the hurry and confusion; but its mother, not eighteen hours from child-bed, in spite of the cold, wet, and exertion, kept in good health. Sailing by night as well as day, they caught up with the rest of the flotilla before dawn on the second morning afterward, the men being roused from their watch-fires by the cries of “help poor Jennings,” as the wretched and worn-out survivors in the disabled boat caught the first glimpse of the lights on shore.

  Having successfully run the gauntlet of the Chickamauga banditti, the flotilla was not again molested by the Indians, save once when the boats that drifted near shore were fired on by a roving war party, and five men wounded. They ran over the great Muscle Shoals in about three hours without accident, though the boats scraped on the bottom here and there. The swift, broken water surged into high waves, and roared through the piles of driftwood that covered the points of the small islands, round which the currents ran in every direction; and those among the men who were unused to river-work were much relieved when they found themselves in safety. One night, after the fires had been kindled, the tired travelers were alarmed by the barking of the dogs. Fearing that Indians were near by, they hastily got into the boats and crossed to camp on the opposite shore. In the morning two of them returned to pick up some things that had been left; they found that the alarm had been false, for the utensils that had been overlooked in the confusion were undisturbed, and a negro who had been left behind in the hurry was still sleeping quietly by the camp-fires.

  On the 20th of the month they reached the Ohio. Some of the boats then left for Natchez, and others for the Illinois country; while the remainder turned their prows up stream, to stem the rapid current—a task for which they were but ill-suited. The work was very hard, the provisions were nearly gone, and the crews were almost worn out by hunger and fatigue. On the 24th they entered the mouth of the Cumberland. The Adventure, the heaviest of all the craft, got much help from a small square-sail that was set in the bow.

  Two days afterward the hungry party killed some buffalo, and feasted on the lean meat, and the next day they shot a swan “which was very delicious,” as Donelson recorded. Their meal was exhausted and they could make no more bread; but buffalo were plenty and they hunted them steadily for their meat; and they also made what some of them called “Shawnee salad” from a kind of green herb that grew in the bottoms.

  On the last day of the month they met Col. Richard Henderson, who had just come out and was running the line between Virginia and North Carolina. The crews were so exhausted that the progress of the boats became very slow, and it was not until April 24th that they reached the Big Salt Lick, and found Robertson awaiting them. The long, toilsome, and perilous voyage had been brought to a safe end.

  There were then probably nearly five hundred settlers on the Cumberland, one half of them being able-bodied men in the prime of life.11 The central station, the capital of the little community, was that at the Bluff, where Robertson built a little stockaded hamlet and called it Nashborough;12 it was of the usual type of small frontier forted town. Other stations were scattered along both sides of the river; some were stockades, others merely block-houses, with the yard and garden inclosed by stout palings. As with all similar border forts or stations, these were sometimes called by the name of the founder; more rarely they were named with reference to some natural object, such as the river, ford, or hill by which they were, or commemorated some deed, or the name of a man the frontiersmen held in honor; and occasionally they afforded true instances of clan-settlement and clan-nomenclature, several kindred families of the same name building a village which grew to be called after them. Among these Cumberland stations was Mansker’s (usually called Kasper’s or Gaspers—he was not particular how his name was spelled), Stone River, Bledsoe’s, Freedland’s, Eatons’, Clover-Bottom, and Fort Union.

  As the country where they had settled belonged to no tribe of Indians, some of the people thought they would not be molested, and, being eager to take up the best lands, scattered out to live on separate claims. Robertson warned them that they would soon suffer from the savages; and his words speedily came true—whereupon the outlying cabins were deserted and all gathered within the stockades. In April roving parties of Delawares, Chickasaws, and Choctaws began to harass the settlement. As in Kentucky, so on the banks of the Cumberland, the Indians were the first to begin the conflict. The lands on which the whites settled were uninhabited, and were claimed as hunting-grounds by many hostile tribes; so that it is certain that no one tribe had any real title to them.

  True to their customs and traditions, and to their race-capacity for self-rule, the settlers determined forthwith to organize some kind of government under which justice might be done among themselves, and protection afforded against outside attack. Not only had the Indians begun their ravages, but turbulent and disorderly whites were also causing trouble. Robertson, who had been so largely instrumental in founding the Watauga settlement, and giving it laws, naturally took the lead in organizing this, the second community which he had caused to spring up in the wilderness. He summoned a meeting of delegates from the various stations, to be held at Nashborough;13 Henderson being foremost in advocating the adoption of the plan.

  In fact, Henderson, the treaty-maker and land-speculator, whose purchase first gave the whites clear color of title to the valleys of the Kentucky and Cumberland, played somewhat the same part, though on a smaller scale, in the settlement made by Robertson as in that made by Boone. He and the Virginian commissioner, Walker, had surveyed the boundary line and found that the Cumberland settlements were well to the south of it. He then claimed the soil as his under the Cherokee deed; and disposed of it to the settlers who contracted to pay ten dollars a thousand acres. This was but a fraction of the State price, so the settlers were all eager to hold under Henderson’s deed; one of the causes of their coming out had been the chance of getting land so cheap. But Henderson’s claim was annulled by the legislature, and the satisfaction-piece of 200,000 acres allotted him was laid off elsewhere; so his contracts with the settlers came to nothing, and they eventually got title in the usual way from North Carolina. They suffered no loss in the matter, for they had merely given Henderson promises to pay when his title was made good.

  The settlers, by their representatives, met together at Nashborough, and on May 1, 1780, entered into articles of agreement or a compact of government. It was doubtless drawn up by Robertson, with perhaps the help of Henderson, and was modeled upon what may be called the “constitution” of Watauga, with some hints from that of Transylvania.14 The settlers ratified the deeds of their delegates on May 13th, when they signed the articles, binding themselves to obey them to the number of two hundred and fifty-six men
. The signers practically guaranteed one another their rights in the land, and their personal security against wrong-doers; those who did not sign were treated as having no rights whatever—a proper and necessary measure as it was essential that the naturally lawless elements should be forced to acknowledge some kind of authority.

  The compact provided that the affairs of the community should be administered by a Court or Committee of twelve Judges, Triers or General Arbitrators, to be elected in the different stations by vote of all the freemen in them who were over twenty-one years of age. Three of the Triers were to come from Nashborough, two from Mansker’s, two from Bledsoe’s, and one from each of five other named stations.15 Whenever the freemen of any station were dissatisfied with their Triers, they could at once call a new election, at which others might be chosen in their stead. The Triers had no salaries, but the Clerk of the Court was allowed some very small fees, just enough to pay for the pens, ink, and paper, all of them scarce commodities.16 The Court had jurisdiction in all cases of conflict over land titles; a land office being established and an entry taker appointed. Over half of the compact was devoted to the rules of the land office. The Court, acting by a majority of its members, was to have jurisdiction for the recovery of debt or damages, and to be allowed to tax costs. Three Triers were competent to make a Court to decide a case where the debt or damage was a hundred dollars or less; and there was no appeal from their decision. For a larger sum an appeal lay to the whole Court. The Court appointed whomsoever it pleased to see decisions executed. It had power to punish all offences against the peace of the community, all misdemeanors and criminal acts, provided only that its decisions did not go so far as to affect the life of the criminal. If the misdeed of the accused was such as to be dangerous to the State, or one “for which the benefit of clergy was taken away by law,” he was to be bound and sent under guard to some place where he could be legally dealt with. The Court levied fines, payable in money or provisions, entered up judgments and awarded executions, and granted letters of administration upon estates of deceased persons, and took bonds “payable to the chairman of the Committee.” The expenses were to be paid proportionately by the various settlers. It was provided, in view of the Indian incursions, that the militia officers elected at the various stations should have power to call out the militia when they deemed it necessary to repel or pursue the enemy. They were also given power to fine such men as disobeyed them, and to impress horses if need be; if damaged, the horses were to be paid for by the people of the station in the proportion the Court might direct. It was expressly declared that the compact was designed as a “temporary method of restraining the licentious”; that the settlement did not desire to be exempt from the ratable share of the expense for the Revolutionary War, and earnestly asked that North Carolina would immediately make it part of the State, erecting it into a county. Robertson was elected chairman of the Court, and colonel of the militia, being thus made both civil and military commandant of the settlement. In common with the other Triers he undertook the solemnization of marriages; and these were always held legal, which was fortunate, as it was a young and vigorous community, of which the members were much given to early wedlock.

  Thus a little commonwealth, a self-governing state, was created. It was an absolute democracy, the majority of freemen of full age in each stockade having power in every respect, and being able not only to elect, but to dismiss their delegates at any moment. Their own good sense and a feeling of fair play could be depended upon to protect the rights of the minority, especially as a minority of such men would certainly not tolerate anything even remotely resembling tyranny. They had formed a representative government in which the legislative and judicial functions were not separated, and were even to a large extent combined with the executive. They had proceeded in an eminently practical manner, having modeled their system on what was to them the familiar governmental unit of the county with its county court and county militia officers. They made the changes that their peculiar position required, grafting the elective and representative systems on the one they adopted, and of course enlarging the scope of the court’s action. Their compact was thus in some sort an unconscious reproduction of the laws and customs of the old-time court-leet, profoundly modified to suit the peculiar needs of backwoods life, the intensely democratic temper of the pioneers and above all the military necessities of their existence. They had certain theories of liberty and justice; but they were too shrewd and hard-headed to try to build up a government on an entirely new foundation, when they had ready to hand materials with which they were familiar. They knew by experience the workings of the county system; all they did was to alter the immediate channel from which the court drew its powers, and to adapt the representation to the needs of a community where constant warfare obliged the settlers to gather in little groups, which served as natural units.

  When the settlers first came to the country they found no Indians living in it, no signs of cultivation or cleared land, and nothing to show that for ages past it had been inhabited. It was a vast plain, covered with woods and canebrakes, through which the wild herds had beaten out broad trails. The only open places were the licks, sometimes as large as corn-fields, where the hoofs of the game had trodden the ground bare of vegetation, and channeled its surface with winding seams and gullies. It is even doubtful if the spot of bare ground which Mansker called an “old field” or sometimes a “Chickasaw old field” was not merely one of these licks. Buffalo, deer, and bear abounded; elk, wolves, and panthers were plentiful.

  Yet there were many signs that in long bygone times a numerous population had dwelt in the land. Round every spring were many graves, built in a peculiar way, and covered eight or ten inches deep by mould. In some places there were earth-covered foundations of ancient walls and embankments that inclosed spaces of eight or ten acres. The Indians knew as little as the whites about these long-vanished mound-builders, and were utterly ignorant of the race to which they had belonged.17

  For some months the whites who first arrived dwelt in peace. But in the spring, hunting and war parties from various tribes began to harass the settlers. Unquestionably the savages felt jealous of the white hunters, who were killing and driving away the game, precisely as they all felt jealous of one another, and for the same reason. The Chickasaws in particular were much irritated by the fort Clark had built at Iron Bank, on the Mississippi. But the most powerful motive for the attacks was doubtless simply the desire for scalps and plunder. They gathered from different quarters to assail the colonists, just as the wild beasts gathered to prey on the tame herds.

  The Indians began to commit murders, kill the stock, and drive off the horses in April, and their ravages continued unceasingly throughout the year. Among the slain was a son of Robertson, and also the unfortunate Jonathan Jennings, the man who had suffered such loss when his boat was passing the whirl of the Tennessee River. The settlers were shot as they worked on their clearings, gathered the corn crops, or ventured outside the walls of the stockades. Hunters were killed as they stooped to drink at the springs, or lay in wait at the licks. They were lured up to the Indians by imitations of the gobbling of a turkey or the cries of wild beasts. They were regularly stalked as they still-hunted the game, or were ambushed as they returned with their horses laden with meat. The inhabitants of one station were all either killed or captured. Robertson led pursuing parties after one or two of the bands, and recovered some plunder; and once or twice small marauding parties were met and scattered, with some loss, by the hunters. But, on the whole, very little could be done at first to parry or revenge the strokes of the Indians.18

  Horses and cattle had been brought into the new settlement in some number during the year; but the savages killed or drove off most of them, shooting the hogs and horned stock, and stealing the riding animals. The loss of the milch cows in particular, was severely felt by the women. Moreover, there were heavy freshets, flooding the low bottoms on which the corn had been planted, and destroying
most of the crop.

  These accumulated disasters wrought the greatest discouragement among the settlers. Many left the country, and most of the remainder, when midsummer was past, began to urge that they should all go back in a body to the old settlements. The panic became very great. One by one the stockades were deserted, until finally all the settlers who remained were gathered in Nashborough and Freelands.19 The Cumberland country would have been abandoned to the Indians, had Robertson not shown himself to be exactly the man for whom the crisis called.

  Robertson was not a dashing, brilliant Indian fighter and popular frontier leader, like Sevier. He had rather the qualities of Boone, with the difference that he was less a wandering hunter and explorer, and better fitted to be head of a settled community. He was far-seeing, tranquil, resolute, unshaken by misfortune and disaster; a most trustworthy man, with a certain severe fortitude of temper. All people naturally turned to him in time of panic, when the ordinarily bold and daring became cowed and confused. The straits to which the settlers were reduced, and their wild clamor for immediate flight, the danger from the Indians, the death of his own son all combined failed to make him waver one instant in his purpose. He strongly urged on the settlers the danger of flight through the wilderness. He did not attempt to make light of the perils that confronted them if they remained, but he asked them to ponder well if the beauty and fertility of the land did not warrant some risk being run to hold it, now that it was won. They were at last in a fair country fitted for the homes of their children. Now was the time to keep it. If they abandoned it, they would lose all the advantages they had gained, and would be forced to suffer the like losses and privations if they ever wished to retake possession of it or of any similar tract of land. He, at least, would not turn back, but would stay to the bitter end.