eir dead. The whites took thirteen scalps,
and of their own number but four were seriously hurt; they also took
many guns and much plunder.

In this battle of the Island Flats[36] the whites were slightly
superior[37] in number to their foes; and they won without difficulty,
inflicting a far heavier loss than they received. In this respect it
differs markedly from most other Indian fights of the same time; and
many of its particulars render it noteworthy. Moreover, it had a very
good effect, cheering the frontiersmen greatly, and enabling them to
make head against the discouraged Indians.

On the same day the Watauga fort[38] was attacked by a large force at
sunrise. It was crowded with women and children,[39] but contained only
forty or fifty men. The latter, however, were not only resolute and
well-armed, but were also on the alert to guard against surprise; the
Indians were discovered as they advanced in the gray light, and were at
once beaten back with loss from the loopholed stockade. Robertson
commanded in the fort, Sevier acting as his lieutenant. Of course, the
only hope of assistance was from Virginia, North Carolina being
separated from the Watauga people by great mountain chains; and Sevier
had already notified the officers of Fincastle that the Indians were
advancing. His letter was of laconic brevity, and contained no demand
for help; it was merely a warning that the Indians were undoubtedly
about to start, and that "they intended to drive the country up to New
River before they returned"--so that it behooved the Fincastle men to
look to their own hearthsides. Sevier was a very fearless, self-reliant
man, and doubtless felt confident that the settlers themselves could
beat back their assailants. His forecast proved correct; for the
Indians, after maintaining an irregular siege of the fort for some three
weeks, retired, almost at the moment that parties of frontiersmen came
to the rescue from some of the neighboring forts.[40]

While the foe was still lurking about the fort the people within were
forced to subsist solely on parched corn; and from time to time some of
them became so irritated by the irksome monotony of their confinement,
that they ventured out heedless of the danger. Three or four of them
were killed by the Indians, and one boy was carried off to one of their
towns, where he was burnt at the stake; while a woman who was also
captured at this time was only saved from a like fate by the exert