Western news and the Libby times. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1920-1933, 1929-05-02

can be matched anywhere. Here Is fha1 story us
Emerson Hough tells 1t In his book THE Way 10
the Vest.
In l779, one James Robertson Of the Watauga
settlements of North Carolina. steadfast man,
heard certain voices that called him to the West
James Robertson the steadfast. forming his COM
pany for this uncertain, perilous enterprise said.
I'VE the advance guard OF civilization and
our way is the continent" Simple words
yet that In 779
Now. for the building OF this one town. the town
that is the city Of Nashville and the capital
Of Tennessee. this leader had gathered three hun
dred and eighty persons men, women. and children
All the women and children. hundred and
thirty in number, In charge of few men. went by
boat, scow pirogue, and canoe. in the winter Time
down the bold waters OF the Hoston and Tennessee
rivers The rest Travelled best they might over
the FIVE. hundred miles Of trace" across Kentucky
OF this whole party two hundred and twenty-six
got through alive.
The boat party had many hundreds OF miles OF
unknown and dangerous waters to travel and the
Journey took them three months time longer
than II requires to travel around the world.
They ran thirty miles of rapids on the shoals of
the Tennessee, pursued and fired upon by Cher
or this division of the party only ninety
got through alive. and nine of these
wounded. One was drowned. died of natural
causes and was buried, and the rest killed by
the Indians Their voyage indeed without a
parallel in modern history" Among those who sur
vived the hardshps of the journey was Rachel
Donelson later the wife OF Andrew Jackson.
The path Of empire IN America the path of corn
and venison, highway that ran sback-
that they had taken It. But what tax was
this that the barbaric land demanded OF them, In
November of 1880. less than year after the party
was first organized. there were only one hundred
and thirty-four persons left alive out OF the orig
nak three hundred and eighty, but In the settle
nlTht itself there had not been natural death.
The Indians killed these setters, and the settlers
killed the Indians. Death and wounds meant moth
Ing to the adults The infants learned a
stole hardihood.
The spring OF 1871 found only seventy persons
left alive. But when the vote was cast whether
to stay return not man voted give up
the fight In that West corn was worth one hum
dred and sixty-hve dollars a bushe and In its rails
ing the rifle essential as the pillow Powder
and lead were priceless Man and woman togeth-
err. fearless changeless they held the land giving
back inch of the west-bound distance they
had gained!
In 1901 there only fifteen persons left alive
out Of the three hundred and eighty that made
this American migration There had been only one
natural death among them. In such settlement
there suah thing hero. because all
heroes. Each a master OF weapons
and incapable OF fear No fiction pa Inted q
hero like to any OF these. One man, after ha
ing been shot and stabbed many times was sea ped
alive, and TESTED about It, little girl was scaped
alive. and lived to forget It, An army Of indians
assaulted the settlement, and fifteen and thirty
women beat them off. Mrs. Sally Buchanan a for
gotten heroine nodded bullets all one night durir4
an Indian attack. and on the next morning gave
birth to
This was the ancestral, fiber OF the West VIVA,
time had folk like these for powder puff or ruf.
tte for fan or jeweed SNUFF box? Their garb WAS
made from the skin OF the deer. the fox. the wolf
Their shoes were OF hide, the beds were made q,
the robes or the tear and buffalo They laid The
land under tribute. Yet far from mere savan-.
Ey was the spri1=that animated these men that IN
ten years after they had first cut away the fores1
they founding college and establishing 3
court. OF law. Read this forgotten history one
chapter and little one, in the history the NJ ax
ami lke the chapters of Aetfut
in older world. You have your choice OF lacs
or elHskin-