io The Winning of the West 



flank, and rear, to guard against the savages. 13 A 

 tent or brush lean-to gave cover at night. Each 

 morning the men packed the animals while the 

 women cooked breakfast and made ready the chil- 

 dren. Special care had to be taken not to let the 

 loaded animals brush against the yellow- jacket nests, 

 which were always plentiful along the trail in the 

 fall of the year ; for in such a case the vicious swarms 

 attacked man and beast, producing an immediate 

 stampede, to the great detriment of the packs. 14 In 

 winter the fords and mountains often became im- 

 passable, and trains were kept in one place for 

 weeks at a time, escaping starvation only by killing 

 the lean cattle ; for few deer at that season remained 

 in the mountains. 



Both the water route and the Wilderness Road 

 were infested by the savages at all times, and when- 

 ever there was open war the sparsely settled regions 

 from which they started were likewise harried. 

 When the Northwestern tribes threatened Fort Pitt 

 and Fort Henry or Pittsburg and Wheeling, as 

 they were getting to be called, they threatened one 



13 McAfee MSS. Just as the McAfee family started for 

 Kentucky, the wife of one of their number, George, was con- 

 fined. The others had to leave her ; but at the first long halt 

 the husband hurried back, only to meet his wife on the way ; 

 for she had ridden after them just three days after her con- 

 finement, taking her baby along. 



14 "Pioneer Biography," James McBride (son of a pioneer 

 who was killed by the Indians in 1789 in Kentucky), p. 183, 

 Cincinnati, 1869. One of the excellent series published by 

 Robert Clarke & Co., to whom American historians owe a 

 special and unique debt of gratitude. 



