160 The Winning of the West 



again and again in rescuing hapless women and 

 children, or in scattering although usually with 

 small loss war parties bound against the settle 

 ments. 



One of the best known Indian fighters in Kentucky 

 was William Whitley, who lived at Walnut Flat, 

 some five miles from Crab Orchard. He had come 

 to Kentucky soon after its settlement, and by his 

 energy and ability had acquired property and leader 

 ship, though of unknown ancestry and without edu 

 cation. He was a stalwart man, skilled in the use 

 of arms, jovial and fearless ; the backwoods fighters 

 followed him readily, and he loved battle; he took 

 part in innumerable Indian expeditions, and in his 

 old age was killed fighting against Tecumseh at the 

 battle of the Thames. In 1786 or '87 he built the 

 first brick house ever built in Kentucky. It was a 

 very handsome house for those days, every step in 

 the hall stairway having carved upon it the head of 

 an eagle bearing in its beak an olive branch. Each 

 story was high, and the windows were placed very 

 high from the ground, to prevent the Indians from 

 shooting through them at the occupants. The glass 

 was brought from Virginia by pack train. He 

 feasted royally the hands who put up the house ; and 

 to pay for the whiskey they drank he had to sell one 

 of his farms. 



In 1785 (the year of the above recited ravages on 

 the upper Ohio in the neighborhood of Wheeling), 

 Colonel Whitley led his rangers, once and again, 

 against marauding Indians. In January he followed 



