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 1919 Copyright, 1919 by Yale University Press...

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

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

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

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.

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 i

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 ou

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 conflic

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

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. I

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 office

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 scamperin

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

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

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. 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 o

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

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. John P. Hale, Daniel Boone, Some Facts and

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 reliable. Incorrect as to causes of Indian wars during the Revolution. On this subject see letters and reports by John and Henry Stuart in Nor

Henry Doniol, Histoire de la participation de la France á l'établissement des États-Unis d'Amérique, 5 vols. 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 Gre

The author spelled powderhorns on Page 46 , but used a hyphen for powder-horns on Page 208 . The inconsistencies were retained. On Page 58 and Page 142 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 . On Page 119 , Tach-nech-dor-us was hyphenated between two lines. We transcribed the name with hyphens after each syllable, Tach-nech-