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Show 58 MYTHS OP THE CHEROKEE [ ETH. AHW. 19 with the result that they left thirteen deacl a, nd all their plunder, while not one of the whites was even wounded. 1 A few days later Sevier was joined by Campbell with the remainder of the force. Advancing to the Little Tennessee 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 Nancy Ward, the Cherokee woman who had so befriended the whites in 1776, 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 by the whites. The soldiers lost only one man, who was buried in an Indian cabin which was then burned down to conceal the trace of the interment The return march was begun on New Year's day. Ten principal towns, including Echota, the capital, had been destroyed, 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 committed 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. 8 Some Cherokee who met them at Echota, on the return march, to talk of peace, brought in and surrendered several white prisoners. 3 One reason for the slight resistance made by the Indians was probably the fact that at the very time of the invasion many of their warriors were away, raiding on the Upper Holston and in the neighborhood of Cumberland gap. 4 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, n, pp. 298- 300,1889; Ramsey, Tennessee, pp. 261- 264,1853. There is great discrepancy in the various accounts of this fight, from the attempts of Interested historians to magnify the size of the victory. One writer gives the Indians 1,000 warriors. Here, as elsewhere, Roosevelt is a more reliable guide, his statements being usually from official^ documents. 2 Roosevelt, op. cit., pp. 300- 304; Ramsey, op. cit., pp. 266- 268; Campbell, report, January 16,1781, in Virginia State Papers, i, p. 436. Haywood and others after him make the expedition go as far as Chickamauga and Coosa river, but Campbell's report expressly denies this. 8 Ramsey, op. cit., p. 266. « Roosevelt, op. cit., p. 302. |