mportance to communicate to the commander, he dispatched
a woman who had usually obtained access to the station, to solicit an
interview with him. This was to take place on the banks of the river.
Meanwhile the savage prepared his ambush. Cotymore imprudently assented
to the meeting, and, attended by Lieutenants Bell and Foster, walked
down towards the river, from the opposite side of which Occonostota
addressed him. While they spoke, the Indian was seen to wave a bridle
over his head. This was the signal agreed upon with the ambushed
warriors. At this signal they rose and poured in their fire. Cotymore
was slain on the spot, and his companions wounded. But the savages
failed to get possession of the fort. Suspecting a concerted movement
among the hostages, by which they would cooperate with the assailing foe
without, the officer in command of the fort gave orders to secure them
with irons. The attempt to obey these orders ended in a bloody tragedy.
The Indians resisted with arms, and, stabbing three of the soldiers, so
exasperated the rest, already excited by the murder of their captain,
that they fell upon the miserable wretches and butchered them to a man.

This unhappy event, completing what the indiscreet severities of
Governor Lyttleton had begun, united the whole nation of Cherokees in
war. There had been a strong party favorable to peace, and friendly to
the whites. This unfortunate proceeding involved the loss of this party.
The hostages were among their chief men, and scarcely a family in the
nation but lost a relative or friend in their massacre. They were now
unanimous for battle; and, numerous parties rushing simultaneously down
upon the frontiers, baffled the courage and prevented the flight of the
fugitives. They fell without distinction upon men, women and children.
"Such as fled to the woods and escaped the scalping-knife, perished
of hunger.... Every day brought fresh accounts to the capital of their
ravages, murders and desolations. But while the back settlers looked to
their governor for relief, the small-pox raged to such a degree in
town that few of the militia could be prevailed upon to leave their
distressed families to serve the public."* Lyttleton, meanwhile, by whom
all the mischief was occasioned, was made Governor of Jamaica, and the
charge of the colony devolved on William Bull, a native--"a man of
great integrity and erudition." In the almost hopeless condition of the
province, her sisters,