58 MYTHS OF THE CHEROKEE [eth.ans.19 



with the result that they lef t thii'teen dead and all their plunder, while 

 not one of the whites was even wounded.' 



A few daj's later Sevier was joined by Campbell with the remainder 

 of the force. Advancing to the Little Teimessee with but slight 

 resistance, they crossed three miles below Echota while the Indians 

 were watching for them at the ford above. Then dividing into two 

 bodies, they proceeded to destroy the towns along the river. The 

 chiefs sent peace talks through Nanc}' Ward, the Cherokee woman 

 who had so befi-iended the whites in ITTfi, but to these overtures 

 Campbell returned an evasive answer until he could first destroy 

 the towns on lower Hiwassee, whose warriors had been particularly 

 hostile. Continuing southward, the troops destroyed these towns, 

 Hiwassee and Chestuee, with all their stores of provisions, finishing 

 the work on the last day of the year. The Indians had fled before 

 them, keeping spies out to watch their movements. One of these, 

 while giving signals from a ridge by beating a drum, was shot b\' the 

 whites. The soldiers lost only one man, who was bui'ied in an Indian 

 cabin which was then burned down to conceal the trace of the inter- 

 ment. The return march was begun on New Year's dav. Ten prin- 

 cipal towns, including Echota, the capital, had been destroj'ed, besides 

 several smaller villages, containing in the aggregate over one thousand 

 houses, and not less than fifty thousand bushels of corn and large stores 

 of other provision. Everything not needed on the return march 

 was coiumitted to the flames or otherwise wasted. Of all the towns 

 west of the mountains only Talassee, and one or two about Chicka- 

 mauga or on the headwaters of the Coosa, escaped. The whites had 

 lost only one man killed and two wounded. Before the return a 

 proclamation was sent to the Cherokee chiefs, warning them to make 

 peace on penalty of a worse visitation.' 



Some Cherokee who met them at Echota, on the return march, to 

 talk of peace, brought in and surrendered several white prisoners.^ 

 One reason for the slight resistance made bj' the Indians was prob- 

 ably the fact that at the very time of the invasion many of their 

 warriors were away, raiding on the Upper Holston and in the neigh- 

 borhood of Cumberland gap.* 



Although the Upper or Overhill Cherokee were thus humbled, 

 those of the middle towns, on the head waters of Little Tennessee, still 

 continued to send out parties against the back settlements. Sevier 



1 Roosevelt. Winning of the West, ii, pp. 298-300, 1S89; Ramsey, Tennessee, pp. 2fil-264, 18.53. There 

 is great discrepanc.v in the various accounts of this tight, from the attempts of interested historians 

 to magnify the size of the victory. One writer gives the Indians 1,000 warrior.s. Here, as el-sewhere, 

 Roosevelt is a more reliable guide, his statements being usually from ottieial documents. 



^Roosevelt, op. cit., pp. 300-304: Ramsey, op. oit., pp. 2e.5-2C8; Campbell, report, .January 1,5, 1781, in 

 Virginia State Papers, i, p. 436. Haywood and others after him make the expedition go as far as 

 Chickamauga and Coosa river, hut Campbell's report expressly denies this. 



■'Ramsey, op. cit., p. 20(). 



* Roosevelt, op. cit., p. 302. 



