The War in the Northwest 269 



ment, their military organization, with Robertson 

 as captain, and finally their devotion to the Revolu- 

 tionary cause; and recited their lack of proper au- 

 thority to deal promptly with felons, murderers, and 

 the like, who came in from the neighboring States, 

 as the reason why they wished to become a self- 

 governing portion of North Carolina. 1 The Legis- 

 lature of the State granted the prayer of the peti- 

 tioners, Washington District was annexed, and four 

 representatives therefrom, one of them Sevier, took 

 their seats that fall in the Provincial Congress at 

 Halifax. But no change whatever was made in 

 the government of the Watauga people until 1777. 

 In the spring of that year laws were passed pro- 

 viding for the establishment of courts of pleas and 

 quarter sessions in the district, as well as for the 

 appointment of justices of the peace, sheriffs, and 

 militia officers ; and in the fall the district was made 

 a county, under the same name. The boundaries 

 of Washington County were the same as those of 

 the present State of Tennessee, and seem to have 

 been outlined by Sevier, the only man who at that 

 time had a clear idea as to what should be the 

 logical and definite limits of the future State. 



The nominal change of government worked little 

 real alteration in the way the Holston people man- 

 aged their affairs. The members of the old commit- 

 tee became the justices of the new court, and, with 



1 The petition, drawn up in the summer of '76, was signed 

 by Ti2 men. It is given in full by Ramsey, p. 138. See also 

 Phelan, p. 40. 



