When this
expedition reached Prince George, on the upper waters of the
Savannah, the Indian hostages were confined within the fort; and
the Governor, satisfied with the result of his maneuver departed
south for Charleston. Then followed a tragedy. Some Indian
friends of the imprisoned chiefs attacked the fort, and the
commander, a popular young officer, was treacherously killed
during a parley. The infuriated frontiersmen within the fort fell
upon the hostages and slew them all--twenty-six chiefs--and the
Indian war was on.
If all were to be told of the struggle which followed in the Back
Country, the story could not be contained in this book. Many
brave and resourceful men went out against the savages. We can
afford only a passing glance at one of them. Hugh Waddell of
North Carolina was the most brilliant of all the frontier
fighters in that war. He was a young Ulsterman from County Down,
a born soldier, with a special genius for fighting Indians,
although he did not grow up on the border, for he arrived in
North Carolina in 1753, at the age of nineteen. He was appointed
by Governor Dobbs to command the second company which North
Carolina had raised for the war, a force of 450 rangers to
protect the border counties; and he presently became the most
conspicuous military figure in the colony.
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