USA > Tennessee > Old tales retold; or, Perils and adventures of Tennessee pioneers > Part 9
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On the ninth day of the voyage, after they had glided down the Holston into the broader current of the Tennessee and had shot through the "Narrows" where the stream made much ado in passing between two mountains, and had left the swirling waters of the "Skillet" and the "Boiling Pot" behind, they began to look out for another kind of danger, for the stream here ran through the country in which the Chickamau- gas from near Lookout Mountain ·had built several towns on the banks of the river. It was well known that the Chickamaugas were a lawless people, even among Indians. The anxiety of the grown people was not shared by the children, who were enjoying the trip as a delightful adventure. Led by Joseph, the eldest, who was barely fifteen years of age, the five little folks penetrated to every part of the vessel, showing a never-wearying interest in all they saw. The curious, tiny rooms of the cabin, the swivel can- non in the stern (which could be turned up or down or to either side on its pivot), and the portholes through which they peeped to see the hurrying waves running away from the boat, all these possessed a fascinating charm for the small Carolinians, who had never before journeyed by water. It was only an- other pleasant excitement to them when one morning about daybreak everybody on board was roused by John Griffin, who was at the helm, calling out that the
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boat was nearing an Indian village. Soon afterwards Tuskigagee (Running Water) was sighted. Here lived a band of those bad Indians who, while they claimed to be Chickamaugas, and, as such, members of the Cherokee Nation, were in reality the refuse of several tribes mingled with a number of white out- laws from the pioneer settlements who had banded together in the secret places of the mountain country to hide from just punishment for their crimes. In fear of attack, Colonel Brown kept close watch of the shores as he neared Tuskigagee, and the younger men held themselves in readiness to defend the boat. None of them were surprised when presently they saw a canoe put off from shore and come straight up the current toward them. One of the four men who pad- dled the canoe was evidently a chief. Another of them was a half-breed who spoke English. As soon as he came within talking distance, he hailed the peo- ple on the boat as "white brothers," declaring to them that the Indians wished to treat them as friends. "Let us come on board," he said persuasively ; "we desire to have a friendly talk."
Taking a little while to think over the proposition, Colonel Brown concluded that as there were so few men in the canoe it would not be imprudent to allow them to come on board. With his permission then, the red men, in great good humor climbed over the railing onto the deck, to the delight of Joseph and the other children, who beheld in them, especially in their chief, another interesting novelty.
The brawny chief, Cutleotoy, whose dark body was naked to the waist, was decked in beads and feathers. and his head was shaven and dyed with bright colors
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on each side of his scalp lock. Of course, being an In- dian, he had no beard, and all the strong lines and ugly scars on his face showed plainly. But in spite of a natural scowl, he tried to speak fairly. He even went so far as to offer to send a man ahead to Nick- ajack (the next town on the river), where there was, as he said, an Indian who thoroughly understood the stream, and who would, at his bidding, pilot the voyagers over the shallows of Mussel Shoals and other dangers in the Tennessee's fretted current
Colonel Brown gratefully accepted the proffer of a pilot, whereupon Cutleotoy jumped into his canoe and pulled off to the shore with his men. It is true that he sent runners off to Nickajack as soon as he had landed, but they were charged with a message which was quite different from what he had told Colonel Brown it would be. In reality he had sent word to the principal chiefs to raise all the fighting men they could, in a hurry, and send them in canoes, well armed, up the river to meet the white man's boat and destroy the crew.
Not dreaming of treachery, Colonel Brown went on down the river almost as far as Nickajack. The stream was now lighted by the rising sun. Level rays shot along the waters, and not far ahead could be seen the bright flash of oars on four long canoes which had pushed out from shore near the town, and were swiftly moving up the current. Two and two, side by side they glided upstream, each canoe paddled by ten big Indians. Above each boat's crew fluttered a white flag, in token of peace and friendship, yet Colo- nel Brown took alarm at their numbers, and said un- easily : "I do not like the looks of those fellows."
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"O, they surely mean well," replied his son James, "else they would not sail under a white flag."
"We will not trust them too far," said his father. "We could not defend the boat against forty men if they should come close alongside and then attack us." Whereupon he hailed the warriors, bidding them keep at a safe distance. As though they did not hear him, the Indians continued to advance. Indignant at their conduct, Colonel Brown promptly had his boat wheeled around so that the stern faced the savages. The swivel gun was leveled, and the young men stood ready to fire.
Seeing the intention of the white people, an English- speaking half-breed, who said his name was Vaun, rose in one of the skiffs and called out: "Stop! It is a time of peace between the whites and the Cherokees. If a gun is fired, it will be in violation of the treaties of Holston and Hopewell. We claim protection under those treaties of peace."
Colonel Brown replied that he did not wish to harm them, but that there were too many of them for him to allow them to come near his boat. Vaun continued to insist that they were friendly, and said smilingly : "Do you not see that we are unarmed?" To all ap- pearances this was true. There were no firearms in sight among the Indians, nothing in their hands ex- cept the paddles, nothing in the bottom of the canoes except bales of deer hides which, as Vaun explained, had been brought along in the hope that they might be exchanged for goods, if the voyagers should have any for trade. After a short consultation with his men, Colonel Brown concluded to yield to Vaun's persua- sions and permit his party to come on board. "For,"
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said he, "we are now in an Indian country, and I do not wish to break any treaty." A moment later and the canoes were alongside and the occupants were soon bounding over the railing of the house boats to the deck. Here they behaved more like guileless children than like the hardened warriors they really were. It was great sport to the young Browns to see them run about the deck, as though in playful curiosity, exam- ining every part of the boat and peering into every corner. While they were thus engaged, seven or eight long canoes filled with Indians were seen winding through the canebrakes where the water had over- flowed on one side and made the river doubly wide. No sooner had the canoes left the backwater and turned into the current than the behavior of Vaun's men underwent a marked change. From being inno- cently friendly in manner they suddenly became rude and boisterous. Some of them began to rifle the cabin of food and clothing, others took pieces of furniture and threw them overboard into their canoes, while still others boldly threw aside the bales of hides and disclosed a full supply of guns in the bottom of each boat. Too late the white men perceived that they had been duped, and that they were now com- pletely in the power of the savages. By this time the approaching canoes had come up, and another still larger crowd of armed warriors vaulted into the boat. It was useless for any one to offer resistance while the newcomers swarmed on deck and joined in the pilfer- ing that was still going on. Joseph Brown had left his sister Jane and little Polly as well as George and the baby in the cabin with their mother, and had gone out again to see what the uproar was about. Having
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found his father, he was standing near him in the stern watching the Indians and wondering at their changed behavior when suddenly his arm was seized by a fierce-looking fellow who had a tomahawk lifted as if to kill him. Colonel Brown saw the action, and, grappling with the savage, he pushed him to one side, while he said sternly: "Do not dare to touch the lad again. He is my own little boy, and must not be injured."
Cowed by the white man's anger, the assassin skulked off ; but as soon as the brave soldier turned his back to enforce order in another part of the vessel the red man slipped up behind and dealt him a blow which nearly severed the head from his body. Colo- nel Brown's murderer quickly threw his body over the rail into the water ; and Joseph, who had not seen the blow that killed him, seeing his father sink in the river, ran to his elder brothers crying: "Our father has fallen overboard, and he is drowned." The young men, who knew their father to be an excellent swim- mer, guessed what had happened, and began to show resistance. Immediately, in a united rush, the Indians bore down upon them and overpowered every man on the vessel. The boat being now in their possession, the robbers steered for the shore and moored it at the upper end of their town.
Here a scene of confusion unexpectedly took place. At the moment of their landing it happened that a band of hostile Creeks dashed among them and began to seize upon the captives the Chickamaugas had led out of the house boat to the shore. They succeeded in getting Mrs. Brown and four of her small children, whom they carried off prisoners toward the Creek
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country, before the men of Nickajack could recover from their surprise.
All this time a warrior in one of the canoes was trying to persuade Joseph Brown, by signs and mo- tions, to go with him. Half coaxing, half dragging the boy forward, he was doing his best to get him from the shore into the skiff ; but the little fellow, who did not yet realize that they were all captives, flatly re- fused to go. The Cherokee chief then appeared to give up the attempt and went away, but soon returned, bringing with him an old man and his wife who, though they now seemed to be Indians, looked as if they had once been white people. The old man spoke to the child in English, tipped with Irish brogue, ex- plaining to him that it would not be safe for him to an- ger the chief. In conclusion, he said persuasively : "It's to me own house you'll be going, me boy."
"Where do you live?" questioned Joseph, still in doubt.
"Only about a mile out of the town," replied the man coaxingly.
The bewildered boy was at a loss to know what to do. He had seen his eldest brother going in an- other direction with a party of Indians, and he could nowhere find his mother, so at last he compromised by saying: "I suppose I can go with you to-night, but we will continue our journey in the morning." Everything had happened so quickly that the child hardly knew as yet what had taken place.
"Then come along with you," said the Indian-Irish- man ; "I am ready to start."
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Catching sight, just then, of his brother James, the unsuspecting boy called out to him: "This old man
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wishes me to go with him to sleep at his house to- night. If I may go, I will return early in the morn- ing." The elder brother, who knew that they would never see each other again, answered sadly, "Very well;" and Joseph walked off contentedly beside the old man and his wife, chatting with them as he went.
Before they had gone a great distance he paused to listen to a volley of guns firing behind them. "Ah," said he regretfully, "those foolish Indians have taken our guns from the boat, and are firing them off to see how they shoot." Little did he imagine that he had just heard the death shots of his brothers and the other young men as they were being murdered by their captors.
Joseph continued to talk artlessly to the old people, who told him, in return, much about themselves. In answer to his innocent questions, the woman said that she was French, and that the young warrior who tried to get him into the boat was her son, and that after the death of the Indian chief who was his father she had married the Irishman, Tom Tunbridge, who was her present husband, though she still went by the name of Polly Mallette. At last they reached the rough hut which Tom and Polly used as a home. The hut was situated at the foot of a mountain, and was only a few yards from the mouth of the large cavern which is widely known as Nickajack Cave.
The boy's guileless talk on the way had excited the compassion of the old people, and had aroused in them the remnant of generous feeling which was left after a life of outlawry and crime. They resolved to treat him as well in his captivity as circumstances would allow. With this kind thought in their hearts they
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were about to enter the cabin when an old, fat squaw came running after them and rushed, panting, close at their heels, through the door. Sweat was falling in drops from her pendulous cheeks, and her features were quivering with excitement. She appeared to be in a rage, and fell to scolding the people of the house in a language which the boy could not understand. He could only see that she was quarreling with them. He afterwards learned that she was saying to them : "You have acted like fools to keep the child. He should not have been brought away from the town. You know well that he ought to have been killed as the other white men were. He is too large to be kept as a prisoner."
"Indeed, no!" answered Polly Mallette. "I need the boy to wait on me. I, who am growing old, need a slave to save my strength."
"And you care nothing," retorted the squaw, "for the safety of the place. That boy," she continued, as she shook her finger at the lad, "will soon be grown. He will see everything; he will learn the secrets of our caves and hiding places, and find out our hidden paths, and some day, mark my words, he will escape and guide an army here, and will cut us all off." As though it were an inspired prophecy, the squaw's pre- diction rang clear and loud. "He must be killed," she cried, and reached out a hand to seize him. But Tom Tunbridge drove her off, saying she should not have the boy. "Very well," replied the squaw, "my son, Cutleotoy, will be here directly, and he will assuredly kill the young viper."
As her threatening gestures alarmed Joseph, the old man tried to soothe his fears by saying: "You
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shall not be hurt, though the old squaw declares her son will be after murthering you." Polly also tried to comfort him, bidding him sit down on the side of the bed (a mere frame of poles covered with skins), and while he obeyed Tom Tunbridge took his stand in the doorway. As the man stood there, face out- ward, watching uneasily for Cutleotoy to come up the road, he was startled by a short, sharp whoop close to his ear, and the chief of Tuskigagee bounded into view, coming from another direction, and not by the road that led from the river, as Tom had expected.
Cutleotoy confronted the old man with the ques- tion : "Is there a white man within?"
"No," said the Irishman, "there is a bit of a white boy in there."
"I know how big he is," retorted the chief; "and he must be killed."
"Sure," said the old man, "it is a pity to kill women and children."
"That is no child," said Cutleotoy angrily, and, re- peating almost the words of his mother, he continued : "The boy will soon be grown and will perhaps be ex- changed for a prisoner of war, and will afterwards return here to show the palefaces the mountain paths and strongholds which no white man now knows." After a short pause he said with decision: "Tom Tun- bridge, the boy must die. I have spoken."
"You forget," said Tunbridge, "that he is our son's captive. You dare not kill the prisoner of Chia-Chatt- Alla. He is still in the town, but he will be here directly."
This speech was insulting to Cutleotoy's pride, for Tom Tunbridge's stepson, though he was the brother
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of the powerful chief, Dragging Canoe, was himself only a young brave, barely twenty-two years of age, while he, Cutleotoy, was a seasoned warrior, and the head man of Tuskigagee. In his anger he sprang upon the old man with his knife drawn, saying taunt- ingly : "Are you going to be the white man's friend ? After casting your lot with the Chickamaugas, are you going to betray them?"
Tunbridge backed from the doorsill into the house, saying timorously: "No, no, take him along if you must have him."
Following the Irishman into the house, the chief strode to the bedside and flourished his tomahawk above Joseph's head. "Ah! ah! ah!" shrieked Polly Mallette, "I cannot have the child killed in my house. Evil luck will fall upon it." Whereupon Cutleotoy caught Joseph by the arm and took him out of doors into the midst of a band of his followers who had collected about the house. As they closed in around him in a circle, yelling and brandishing clubs and cocking their guns, the boy thought his last hour had come, and called out to Tom Tunbridge to beg the chief to allow him a few minutes for prayer. To this request, when Tunbridge had translated it into Cher- okee, Cutleotoy answered roughly: "It is not worth while to waste time in such foolishness."
To prepare the victim for death, the clothes were now stripped off of his slender body in order that they might not be spoiled by blood. His continental coat, ruffled shirt, and knee breeches had been laid aside, and the savages were in the act of striking him down when Polly Mallette ran forward scream- ing : "I pray you, do not kill the boy on the path along
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which I am obliged to carry water every day. His ghost will haunt me, and I will have no peace of my life."
"To Running Water with him!" cried out one of the men; and the others, catching up the words, said : "We will take him to Tuskigagee, where we will have a frolic knocking him over. There will be no silly squaws there to feel sorry for him."
Joseph did not understand their language, but he saw by their actions that he was to be killed, and while they were waiting to start he fell on his knees to pray the prayer of St. Stephen, "Lord, receive my spirit," an act of piety which touched old Tunbridge's Irish heart. Stealing to the lad's side, he laid a kindly hand on his shoulder and said : "They will not kill you here, me boy. You must get up and go with them to another place." Joseph rose, and the troop started off with him at a running pace. But they had gone only about eighty yards when Cutleotoy halted his men ab- ruptly. They looked at their chief in wonder at his irresolution, astonished to hear him say: "I cannot kill this boy. He is the prisoner of Chia-Chatt-Alla, who is a full-grown man of war, entitled to his own pris- oner. You are my men, and it will be as bad for you to do so as for me to kill him myself. Besides," he added, "I have taken a prisoner of my own. I took a negro woman out of the white men's boat and sent her by water to my lodge. If we kill this lad, Chia-Chatt- Alla will go and kill my negro, nor could all the In- dians in the nation keep him from putting her to death, and I do not want to lose my slave."
Well might the bravest chief fear the anger of the young warrior who had already, in spite of his youth,
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won the title of the "White Man Killer," having slain six white men while he was still a boy.
During Cutleotoy's speech Joseph Brown had again knelt to give his soul into God's keeping. He remem- bered the story his mother had read to him about the martyr Stephen, and he believed that if he asked it the same blessed vision of the Saviour would be sent to comfort his own dying moments. Such was the faith of his innocent heart when he opened his eyes and saw the savages still surrounding him. Yet could he believe it? They were looking kindly on him. The only Indian in the crowd who seemed not to be ap- peased was the old squaw who had prophesied against him. She was so disappointed that he was not to be tortured and killed that she began kicking and abus- ing him while she muttered: "The young snake will live to bring an army here and destroy us." Still grumbling, she declared that she did not intend to be cheated out of his scalp lock altogether ; she gathered up the cue of his long hair and haggled it in two with her dull knife as she exclaimed: "I will have part of it anyhow." She did not let him alone until the last warrior had gone off and left him with his protectors, Tom and Polly, who led him back to the cabin near the cave.
Joseph Brown was taken by them the next day to the presence of "The Breath," the head man of Nickajack, who told him that so long as he looked and dressed like a white boy his life would be in con- stant danger from the warriors, who hated all pale- faces. "In order to save yourself," said The Breath, "you must become an Indian. If you do not put on the Indian dress, you will surely be killed." In a few
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hours the change was made. Joseph was clothed in a hunting shirt, such as Indian boys wear, his hair was all sheared off except a scalp lock on top, the sides of his head were painted in contrasting colors, and his skin was stained red. When, in addition, bone ear- rings were suspended from holes bored in his ears, it would have been hard for any one to tell that he was not Cherokee born.
From this time on Joseph led the life of a slave. Although Tunbridge and his wife did not mistreat him in other ways, he was made to toil in the field beyond his strength, and at night he had no better bed than a bearskin spread upon the dirt floor of the hut. Be- sides enduring these hardships, he was in constant. danger of death and his heart was all the time heavy with grief for his lost mother and sisters and brothers. What had become of them after the men were all killed he could not learn, though he often made him- self troublesome with questions about them.
But one joyful day he learned that Jane and little Polly were not only still alive but that they were then both of them in the town of Nickajack, scarcely a mile away. It appeared that though they had been stolen by the Creeks, together with their mother and the other two children, directly after the landing of Colonel Brown's boat, the Chickamaugas had succeeded in recapturing the two little girls from them. Jane, the elder of the two, had been living all the while in Nickajack; but Polly had fallen into the hands of a squaw in Running Water, who had brought the child with her that day to Nickajack. Joseph begged to be allowed to see his sisters, and finally persuaded Polly Mallette to
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accompany him to the town for the purpose. At the end of the road, which ran almost straight from the cabin to the river town, at right angle with the stream, they entered a wigwam where two little girls dressed in the clumsy clothes worn by Indian children were caressing each other as they played together in the room. Joseph, seeing that they were about the size of his sisters, longed more than ever to see his lost playmates. "Where are Jane and Polly ?" he inquired.
"Make use of your eyes," replied the French wom- an. "You are a dull boy not to know your own sis- ters."
Instantly Joseph clasped the smaller girl in his arms, exclaiming : "I did not know our little Polly without her pretty curls and pinafores." With tears in his eyes, he questioned both to find out how they were faring, and was greatly comforted to learn that each was kindly treated, and that Polly especially was ten- derly cared for by the squaw to whom she belonged. Indian women, as he knew, made particularly fond mothers to the young, a knowledge which enabled the lad to endure with more patience than he otherwise could have had the weary months of toil in the summer's heat. Yet he was sad at best. He could not banish the thought that they were all three fast becoming real savages. A longing for freedom con- sumed him. There were days when the intensity of his feelings allowed him no rest. After the summer had passed and the hardships of winter were being felt his discontent grew stronger. He could not sit in the hut for restlessness, no matter how cold it might be outside. At such times he would climb to the highest point on the mountain behind the cabin
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and gaze across the country through the wide Se- quatchie Valley toward the distant peaks where he fancied the valiant John Sevier, the terror of all bad Indians, might have his home. Somewhere in that direction, he thought, was the eyrie of "The Great Eagle of the Palefaces," who, if he only knew of the cruelties that were being practiced on white prisoners by the Chickamauga bandits, would hasten to their relief. There were times when he tried to be re- signed, and only prayed for patience; but on other days the boy's frail body, worn by toil and hard fare to a mere skeleton, weighing only eighty pounds, was shaken by sobs, and all his prayer was for help to come quickly, before his strength should give out.
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