the mountains.

But while Cornwallis was thus making his march of triumph, the American
patriots were not at rest. Marion was flying about, like a wasp with a
very sharp sting. Sumter was back again, cutting off strays and
foragers. Other parties of patriots were afoot and active. And in the
new settlements west of the Alleghanies the hardy backwoodsmen, who had
been far out of the reach of war and its terrors, were growing eager to
strike a blow for the country which they loved.

Such was the state of affairs in the middle South in the month of
September, 1780. And it leads us to a tale of triumph in which the
Western woodsmen struck their blow for freedom, teaching the
over-confident Cornwallis a lesson he sadly needed. It is the tale of
how Ferguson, the Tory leader, met his fate at the hands of the
mountaineers and hunters of Tennessee and the neighboring regions.

After leaving Cornwallis, Ferguson met with a small party of North
Carolina militia under Colonel Macdowell, whom he defeated and pursued
so sharply as to drive them into the mountain wilds. Here their only
hope of safety lay in crossing the crags and ridges to the great forest
land beyond. They found a refuge at last among the bold frontiersmen of
the Watauga in Tennessee, many of whom were the Regulators of North
Carolina, the refugees from Governor Tryon's tyranny.

The arrival of these fugitives stirred up the woodsmen as they had never
been stirred before. It brought the evils of the war for the first time
to their doors. These poor fugitives had been driven from their homes
and robbed of their all, as the Regulators had been in former years. Was
it not the duty of the freemen of Tennessee to restore them and strike
one blow for the liberty of their native land?

The bold Westerners thought so, and lost no time in putting their
thoughts into effect. Men were quickly enlisted and regiments formed
under Isaac Shelby and John Sevier, two of their leaders. An express was
sent to William Campbell, who had under him four hundred of the
backwoodsmen of Southwest Virginia, asking him to join their ranks. On
the 25th of September these three regiments of riflemen, with Macdowell
and his fugitives, met on the Watauga, each man on his own horse, armed
with his own rifle, and carrying his own provisions, and each bent on
dealing a telling blow for the relief of their brethren in the East.

True patriots were they, risking their all for their duty to their