192 The Winning of the West 



inability either to control their own people or to 

 make war effectively. 73 



Such a state of things as that which existed in the 

 Tennessee territory could not endure. The failure 

 of the United States authorities to undertake active 

 offensive warfare and to protect the frontiersmen 

 rendered it inevitable that the frontiersmen should 

 protect themselves; and under the circumstances, 

 when retaliation began it was certain sometimes to 

 fall upon the blameless. The rude militia officers 

 began to lead their retaliatory parties into the In- 

 dian lands, and soon the innocent Indians suffered 

 with the guilty, for the frontiersmen had no means 

 of distinguishing between them. The Indians who 

 visited the settlements with peaceful intent were of 

 course at any time liable to be mistaken for their 

 brethren who were hostile, or else to be attacked by 

 scoundrels who were bent upon killing all red men 

 alike. Thus, on one day, as Blount reported, a 

 friendly Indian passing the home of one of the set- 

 tlers was fired upon and wounded; while in the 

 same region five hostile Indians killed the wife 

 and three children of a settler in his sight; and 

 another party stole a number of horses from a sta- 

 tion; and yet another party, composed of peaceful 

 Indian hunters, was attacked at night by some white 

 militia, one man being killed and another wounded. 74 



One of the firm friends of the whites was Scola- 



73 "Knoxville Gazette," Feb. 26, 1794, March 27, 1794, etc. 



74 State Department MSS., Washington Papers, War De- 

 partment, Ex. C., page 19, extract of letter from Blount to 

 Williamson April 14, 1792. 



