366 The Winning of the West 



In the burnt towns, and on the dead warriors, 

 were found many letters and proclamations from the 

 British agents and commanders, showing that almost 

 every chief in the nation had been carrying on a 

 double game; for the letters covered the periods at 

 which they had been treating with the Americans 

 and earnestly professing their friendship for the 

 latter and their determination to be neutral in the 

 contest then waging. As Campbell wrote in his 

 report to the Virginia Governor, no people had ever 

 acted with more foolish duplicity. 



Before returning, the three commanders, Camp- 

 bell, Sevier, and Martin, issued an address to the 

 Otari chiefs and warriors, and sent it by one of their 

 captured braves, who was to deliver it to the head- 

 men. 6 The address set forth what the white troops 

 had done, telling the Indians it was a just punish- 

 ment for their folly and perfidy in consenting to 

 carry out the wishes of the British agents ; it warned 

 them shortly to come in and treat for peace, lest their 

 country should again be visited, and not only laid 

 waste, but conquered and held for all time. Some 



ishes of his own, such as that at the Chickamauga towns 

 "the blood of the slaughtered cattle dyed red the Tennessee" 

 for some twenty miles, and that "the homes of over forty 

 thousand people were laid in ashes." This last estimate is 

 just about ten times too strong, for the only country visited 

 was that of the Overhill Cherokees, and the outside limit for 

 the population of the devastated territory would be some 

 four thousand souls, or a third of the Cherokee tribe, which 

 all told numbered perhaps twelve thousand people. 



6 Campbell MSS. Issued at Kai-a-tee, Jan. 4, 1781; the 

 copy sent to Governor Jefferson is dated Feb. 28th. 



