208 The Winning of the West 



not read when he was married, while most of the 

 frontiersmen could not only read but also write, or 

 at least sign their names. 21 



Sevier, who came to the Watauga early in 1772, 

 nearly a year after Robertson and his little colony 

 had arrived, differed widely from his friend in al- 

 most every respect save highmindedness and daunt- 

 less, invincible courage. He was a gentleman by 

 birth and breeding, the son of a Huguenot who had 

 settled in the Shenandoah Valley. He had received 

 a fair education, and though never fond of books, 

 he was to the end of his days an interested and 

 intelligent observer of men and things, both in 

 America and Europe. He corresponded on inti- 

 mate and equal terms with Madison, Franklin, and 

 others of our most polished statesmen; while Rob- 

 ertson's letters, when he had finally learned to write 

 them himself, were almost as remarkable for their 

 phenomenally bad spelling as for their shrewd com- 

 mon-sense and homely, straightforward honesty. 

 Sevier was a very handsome man; during his life- 

 time he was reputed the handsomest in Tennessee. 

 He was tall, fair-skinned, blue-eyed, brown-haired, 

 of slender build, with erect, military carriage and 

 commanding bearing, his lithe, finely proportioned 

 figure being well set off by the hunting-shirt which 

 he almost invariably wore. From his French fore- 



21 In examining numerous original drafts of petitions and 

 the like, signed by hundreds of the original settlers cf Ten- 

 nessee and Kentucky, I have been struck by the small pro- 

 portion not much over three or four per cent at the outside 

 of men who made their mark instead of signing. 



