The Escape--The Hunters find the Camp Deserted--Change of
Quarters--Boone and Kenton--Welcome Visitors--News from Home--In
Union there is Strength--Death of Stuart--Squire Boone returns to
North Carolina for Ammunition--Alone in the Wilderness--Danger on
Every Hand--Rejoined by his Brother--Hunting along the Cumberland
River--Homeward Bound--Arrival in North Carolina--Anarchy and
Distress--Boone remains there Two Years--Attention directed towards
Kentucky--George Washington--Boone prepared to move Westward.
It was near midnight when, having satisfied himself that every warrior,
including the guard, was sound asleep, Boone cautiously raised his head
and looked towards Stuart.
But he was as sound asleep as the Indians themselves, and it was a
difficult and dangerous matter to awaken him, for the Indian sleeps as
lightly as the watching lioness. The slightest incautious movement or
muttering on the part of the man would be sure to rouse their captors.
But Boone managed to tell his companion the situation, and the two with
infinite care and caution succeeded in gradually extricating themselves
from the ring of drowsy warriors.
"Make not the slightest noise," whispered Boone, placing his mouth
close to the ear of Stuart, who scarcely needed the caution.
The camp-fire had sunk low, and the dim light thrown out by the
smouldering logs cast grotesque shadows of the two crouching figures as
they moved off with the noiselessness of phantoms. Having gained such
immense advantage at the very beginning, neither was the one to throw
it away, and Stuart followed the instructions of his companion to the
letter.
The forms of the Indians in their picturesque positions remained
motionless, and it need hardly be said that at the end of a few
minutes, which seemed ten times longer than they were, the two pioneers
were outside the camp, and stood together beneath the dense shadows of
the trees.
It was a clear, starlit night, and the hunters used the twinkling orbs
and the barks of the trees to guide them in determining the direction
of their camp, towards which they pushed to the utmost, for having been
gone so long, they were naturally anxious to learn how their friends
had fared while they were away.
Boone and Stuart scarcely halted during the darkness, and when the sun
rose, were in a portion of the country which they easily recognized as
at no great distance from the gorge in which they had erected their
cabin more than six months before.
They pressed on with renewed energy, and a few hours later reached the
camp, which to their astonishment they found deserted. The supposition
was that the hunters had grown tired or homesick and had gone home,
though there is no certainty as to whether they were not all slain by
the Indians, who seem to have roused themselves to the danger from the
encroachments of the whites upon their hunting-grounds.
It was a great disappointment to Boone and Stuart to find themselves
alone, but they determined to stay where they were some time longer,
even though their supply of ammunition was running low, and both were
anxious to hear from home.
The certainty that the Indians were in the section about them, as the
friends had learned from dear experience, rendered it necessary to
exercise the utmost caution, for, if they should fall into their hands
again, they could not hope for such a fortunate deliverance.
Instead of using the headquarters established so long before, they
moved about, selecting the most secret places so as to avoid discovery,
while they were constantly on the alert through the day.
But both were masters of woodcraft, and Boone probably had no superior
in the lore of the woods. It is said of him that, some years later, he
and the great Simon Kenton reached a river from opposite directions at
the same moment, and simultaneously discovered, when about to cross,
that a stranger was on the other side.
Neither could know of a certainty whether he confronted a friend or
enemy, though the supposition was that he was hostile, in which event
the slightest advantage gained by one was certain to be fatal to the
other.
Immediately the two hunters began maneuvering, like a couple of
sparrers, to discover an unguarded point which would betray the truth.
It was early morning when this extraordinary duel opened, and it was
kept steadily up the entire day. Just at nightfall the two intimate
friends succeeded in identifying each other.
A man with such Esquimau-like patience, and such marvelous ingenuity
and skill, was sure to take the best care of himself, and during the
few days of hunting which followed, he and Stuart kept clear of all
"entangling alliances," and did not exchange a hostile shot with the
red-men.
In the month of January, they were hunting in the woods, when they
caught sight of two hunters in the distance among the trees. Boone
called out:
"Hallo, strangers! who are you?"
"White men and friends," was the astonishing answer.
The parties now hastened towards each other, and what was the amazement
and happiness of the pioneers to find that one of the men was Squire
Boone, the younger brother of Daniel, accompanied by a neighbor from
his home on the far-off Yadkin.
They had set out to learn the fate of the hunting party that left North
Carolina early in the spring, and that had now been so long absent that
their friends feared the worst, and had sent the two to learn what had
become of them, just as in these later days we send an expedition to
discover the North Pole, and then wait a little while and send another
to discover the expedition.
No one could have been more welcome to the two pioneers, for they
brought not only a plentiful supply of ammunition, but, what was best
of all, full tidings of the dear ones at home.
Squire Boone and his companion had found the last encampment of their
friends the night before, so they were expecting to meet them, though
not entirely relieved of their anxiety until they saw each other.
It can be imagined with what delight the four men gathered around
their carefully guarded camp-fire that evening, and talked of home
and friends, and listened to and told the news and gossip of the
neighborhood, where all their most loving associations clustered. It
must have been a late hour when they lay down to sleep, and Daniel
Boone and Stuart that night could not fail to dream of their friends on
the banks of the distant Yadkin.
The strength of the party was doubled, for there were now four skillful
hunters, and they had plenty of ammunition, so it was decided to stay
where they were some months longer.
It seems strange that they should not have acted upon the principle
that in union there is strength, for instead of hunting together, they
divided in couples. This may have offered better prospects in the
way of securing game, but it exposed them to greater danger, and a
frightful tragedy soon resulted.
Boone and Stuart were hunting in company, when they were suddenly
fired into by a party of Indians, and Stuart dropped dead. Boone was
not struck, and he dashed like a deer into the forest. Casting one
terrified glance over his shoulder, he saw poor Stuart scalped as soon
as he fell to the earth, pierced through the heart by the fatal bullet.
This left but three of them, and that fearfully small number was
soon reduced to two. The hunter who came from North Carolina with
Squire Boone was lost in the woods, and did not return to camp. The
brothers made a long and careful search, signaling and using every
means possible to find him, but there was no response, and despairing
and sorrowful they were obliged to give over the hunt. He was never
seen again. Years afterward the discovery of a skeleton in the woods
was believed to indicate his fate. It is more than probable that the
stealthy shot of some treacherous Indian, hidden in the canebrake, had
closed the career of the man as that of Stuart was ended.
The subsequent action of Boone was as characteristic as it was
remarkable. It is hard to imagine a person, placed in the situation of
the two, who would not have made all haste to return to his home; and
this would be expected, especially, of the elder brother, who had been
absent fully six months longer than the other.
And yet he did exactly the opposite. He had fallen in love with the
enchantments of the great Kentucky wilderness, with its streams, rivers
and rich soil, and its boundless game, and he concluded to stay where
he was, while Squire made the long journey back to North Carolina for
more ammunition.
Daniel reasoned that when Squire rejoined his family and acquainted
them with his own safety, and assured the wife and children that all
was going well with him, the great load of anxiety would be lifted from
their minds, and they would be content to allow the two to make a still
more extended acquaintance with the peerless land beyond the Cumberland
mountains.
Accordingly Squire set out for his home, and it should be borne in mind
that his journey was attended by as much danger as was the residence of
the elder brother in Kentucky, for he was in peril from Indians all the
way.
Daniel Boone was now left entirely alone in the vast forests, with
game, wild beasts and ferocious Indians, while his only friend and
relative was daily increasing the distance between them, as he
journeyed toward the East.
Imagination must be left to picture the life of this comparatively
young man during the three months of his brother's absence. Boone was
attached to his family, and yet he chose deliberately to stay where he
was, rather than accompany his brother on his visit to his home.
But he had little time to spend in gloomy retrospection or
apprehensions, for there were plenty of Indians in the woods, and they
were continually looking for him.
He changed his camp frequently, and more than once when he lay hidden
in the thick cane and crawled stealthily back to where he had spent
the previous night, the print of moccasins in the earth told him how
hot the hunt had been for him.
Indian trails were all about him, and many a time the warriors
attempted to track him through the forest and canebrakes, but the
lithe, active pioneer was as thorough a master of woodcraft as they,
and he kept out of their way with as much skill as Tecumseh himself
ever showed in eluding those who thirsted for his life.
He read the signs with the same unerring accuracy he showed in bringing
down the wild turkey, or in barking the squirrel on the topmost limb.
Often he lay in the canebrake, and heard the signals of the Indians as
they pushed their search for the white man who, as may be said, dared
to defy them on their own ground.
Boone could tell from these carefully guarded calls how dangerous the
hunt was becoming, and when he thought the warriors were getting too
close to his hiding-place, he carefully stole out and located somewhere
else until perhaps the peril passed.
There must have been times when, stretched beneath the trees and
looking up at the twinkling stars, with the murmur of the distant river
or the soughing of the night-wind through the branches, his thoughts
wandered over the hundreds of miles of intervening wilderness to the
humble home on the bank of the Yadkin, where the loved wife and little
ones looked longingly toward the western sun and wondered when the
husband and father would come back to them.
And yet Boone has said, while admitting these gloomy moments, when
he was weighed down by the deepest depression, that some of the most
enjoyable hours of his life were those spent in solitude, without a
human being, excepting a deadly enemy, within hail.
The perils which followed every step under the arches of the trees, but
rendered them the more attractive, and the pioneer determined to remove
his family, and to make their home in the sylvan land of enchantment
just so soon as he could complete the necessary arrangements for doing
so.
On the 27th of July, 1770, Squire Boone returned and rejoined his
brother, who was glad beyond description to receive him, and to hear so
directly from his beloved home. During the absence of the younger, the
other had explored pretty much all of the central portion of Kentucky,
and the result was that he formed a greater attachment than ever for
the new territory.
When Squire came back, Daniel said that he deemed it imprudent to stay
where they were any longer. The Indians were so numerous and vigilant
that it seemed impossible to keep out of their way; accordingly they
proceeded to the Cumberland River, where they spent the time in hunting
and exploration until the early spring of 1771.
They gave names to numerous streams, and, having enjoyed a most
extraordinary hunting jaunt, were now ready to go back to North
Carolina and rejoin their families.
But they set out for their homes with not the slightest purpose of
staying there. They had seen too much of the pleasures of the wood,
for either to be willing to give them up. In North Carolina there
was the most exasperating trouble. The tax-gatherer was omnipresent
and unbearably oppressive; the social lines between the different
classes was drawn as if with a two-edged sword; there were murmurs
and mutterings of anger in every quarter; Governor Tryon, instead of
pacifying, was only fanning the flames; ominous signs were in the
skies, and anarchy, red war and appalling disaster seemed to loom up in
the near future.
What wonder, therefore, that Daniel Boone turned his eyes with a
longing such as comes over the weary traveler who, after climbing a
precipitous mountain, looks beyond and sees the smiling verdure of the
promised land.
He had determined to emigrate long before, and he now made what might
be called the first move in that direction. He and his brother pushed
steadily forward without any incident worth noting, and reached their
homes in North Carolina, where, as may well be supposed, they were
welcomed like those who had risen from the dead. They had been gone
many months, and in the case of Daniel, two years had passed since he
clasped his loved wife and children in his arms.
The neighbors, too, had feared the worst, despite the return of Squire
Boone with the good news of the pioneer, and they were entertained as
were those at court when Columbus, coming back from his first voyage
across the unknown seas, related his marvelous stories of the new world
beyond.
Daniel Boone found his family well, and, as his mind was fixed upon his
future course, he began his preparations for removal to Kentucky.
This was a most important matter, for there was a great deal to do
before the removal could be effected. It was necessary to dispose of
the little place upon which they had lived so long and bestowed so much
labor, and his wife could not be expected to feel enthusiastic over the
prospect of burying herself in the wilderness, beyond all thought of
returning to her native State.
Then again Boone was not the one to entertain such a rash scheme as
that of removing to Kentucky, without taking with him a strong company,
able to hold its own against the Indians, who were certain to dispute
their progress.
It is easy to understand the work which lay before Boone, and it may be
well believed that months passed without any start being made, though
the great pioneer never faltered or wavered in his purpose.
Matters were not improving about him. The trouble, distress, and
difficulties between the authorities and the people were continually
aggravated, and the Revolution was close at hand.
At the end of two years, however, Boone was prepared to make the
momentous move, and it was done. The farm on the Yadkin was sold, and
he had gathered together a goodly company for the purpose of forming
the first real settlement in Kentucky.
During the few years immediately preceding, the territory was visited
by other hunters, while Boone himself was alone in the solitude. A
company numbering forty, and led by Colonel James Knox, gathered for
a grand buffalo hunt in the valleys of the Clinch, New River, and
Holston. A number of them skirted along the borders of Tennessee and
Kentucky.
While they were thus engaged, others penetrated the valleys from
Virginia and Pennsylvania, and among them was a young man named George
Washington.
As is well known, his attention had been directed some time before
to the lands along the Ohio, and he owned a number of large claims.
He clearly foresaw the teeming future of the vast West, and he was
especially desirous of informing himself concerning the lands lying in
the neighborhood of the mouth of the Kanawha.
At that particular date, the Virginians were converging toward the
country south of the river, and there were many difficulties with
the Indians, who then as now are ready to resist entrance upon
their hunting-grounds, even though the immigrants are backed by the
stipulations of a recently signed treaty.