Herald and tribune. [volume] (Jonesborough, Tenn.) 1869-current, 1897-05-19
their homes on these lands should not
be driven off.

be driven off.
But John Upton, whose home was
just few miles out from where John
son City now stands, and who, with
John Sewer between him and the In.
dians, was secure from all danger, be.
came dissatisfied with the new State,
and got himself elected to the North
Carolina Legislature. He also sue
ceedod in getting writ issued to levy
on Sewers estate; and, during Sewer 3
absence Upton seized his negroes and
took them to his farm out on Sink.
ing Creek. Sewer gathered u company
OF friends and marched to the Upton
place to get possession of his negroes
again, but company of Upton g
friends, coming from Sullivan County,
drove off the Sewer men, capturing
two of Sewers sons, John and James:
two young men who had heen with
their father at the battle of King g
Mountain.
Mr.. Roosevelt says: "Tipton was
with difficulty persuaded from hang
ing them" This is all he says about it,
No word of condemnation for John
Upton, who, if he could have carried
out his cowardly and brutal purpose,
would have forever disgraced his name
and his race.
Roosevelt adds: This scrambling
tight marked the ignoble end of the
State of Franklin. Sewer fled to the
uttermost part of the frontier, where
no writs ran and the rough settlers were
devoted to him. Here he especially be-
came engaged In the Indian war. This
Indian war, it seems, grew out OF the
murder Of John Kinks wife and ten of
his children out on Little River, seven
miles south of Knoxville. by a band of
Indians under Slim Tom.
Sewer, it seems, was there among
the settlers, there, though, as a private
citizen, no longer Governor of Frank.
lin and bearing no commission, as an
officer from North Carolina. But when
the alarm came the settlers few to
arms, both to avenge the murder of
Kinks family and to protect their own
families. They looked upon Sewer as
their leader, and so they gave him COM
mand of the expedition; and it was
while on this expedition that those
Cherokees were captured, aud during
SEWERS absence were killed by young
John Kirk, whose mother and sisters
had been so cruelty murdered by Slim
Tom; and for which Mr. Roosevelt is
so unjust and unreasonable as to hold
John Sewer responsible. He not only
applies every harsh epithet to the poor
boy that he commandment even stop.
ping TO consider that pooryouag Kirk
had feelings In common with others
and that the loss of his mother and his
sisters, under such terrible circum-
stances, was enough to drive him in
sane-and that no court or jury at this
day or time would hold any person, cir
cumstanced as that boy was, respon.
sible for their conduct, but he also
turns on John Sewer and pHrsues him
with such, fierce AM unsparing Ian.
guage US one would hardly expect from
man of Mr.. Roosevelt's standing.
The fact that Sewer was absent at
the time and was therefore powerless
to prevent the murder, seems to weigh
nothing in his favor with Mr.. Roosevelt;
an alibi, both proven and admitted,
would be sufficient in any court, and
before any impartial jury to set the
worst criminal free-unless, perhaps,
1t was court where Theodore Roose
welt was the judge and John Sewer
was the accused; in proof of which
brief extract from Mr.. Roose velts book
will here be given;
He sank to the level of Lieuten.
ant of Alva, Guse or lilly, to the level
OF a crusading noble of the middle
ages. 1t would be unfair to couple
even this crime with those habitually
committed by Sidney and Sir Peter
Carew, Shan O'Neil and Fitzgerald
and other dismal heroes of the hideous
wars waged between the Elizabethan
English and Irish. But it is not unfair
to compare this border warfare in the
Tennessee, mountains with the border
warfare Of England aud Scotland two
centuries earlier. There is no blinking
the fact that in this instance Sewer and
his followers stood on the same level
of brutality with Keen Lord Evers.'
and on the same level of treachery
with the assured Scots at the battle of
Ancram Muir"
When this Indian war broke out
Gen Joseph Martin was living among
the Cherokees. This frontier leader
and Indian fighter of note, held Bri.
gadier Generals commission from
North Carolina and was therefore the
ranking officer here in East Tennessee.
But when the war broke out, and there
was fighting to be done, General Mar.
tin took his negroes, horses and goods
and came up in this part of the coun-
try, where it was safer, leaving Sewer
to do the fighting. Now to the unpreju.
diced and inquiring reader of the pres.
-ent day that conduct of General" Mar
tins seems rather inexplicable. That
Indian war was either a just or an un-