d into
companies of volunteer soldiers.

At Fort Madison, one of the smallest of the forts, there was a very
daring frontiersman, named Samuel (or Sam) Dale--a man who had lived
much with the Indians, and was like them in many respects, even in his
dress and manners. Hearing that the Indians were in force on the
southeastern bank of the Alabama River, the people in Fort Madison were
greatly alarmed, fearing that all the crops in that region--which were
ripe in the fields--would be destroyed. If that should occur, they knew
they must starve during the coming winter, and so they made up their
minds to drive the savages away, at least until they could gather the
corn.

Captain Dale at once made up a party, consisting of seventy-two men,
all volunteers. With this force he set out on the 11th of November,
taking Tandy Walker, a celebrated scout, for his guide. The column
marched to the Alabama River, and crossed it at a point about twenty
miles below the present town of Claiborne.

Once across the river, Dale knew that he was among the Indians, and,
knowing their ways, he was as watchful as if he had been one of them
himself. He forbade his men to sleep at all during the night after
crossing the river, and kept them under arms, in expectation of an
attack.

No attack being made, he moved up the river the next morning, marching
most of the men, but ordering Jerry Austill, with six men, to paddle up
in two canoes that had been found. This Jerry Austill--who afterwards
became a merchant in Mobile and a state senator--was a boy only nineteen
years of age at the time, but he had already distinguished himself in
the war by his courage.

At a point called Peggy Bailey's Bluff, Dale, who was marching with one
man several hundreds of yards ahead of his men, came upon a party of
Indians at breakfast. He shot one of them, and the rest ran away,
leaving their provisions behind them. Securing the provisions, Dale
marched on for a mile or two, but, finding no further trace of Indians,
he concluded that the country on that side of the river was now pretty
clear of them, and so he set to work to cross to the other side, meaning
to look for enemies there.

The river at that point is about a quarter of a mile wide, and, as there
were only two small canoes at hand, the work of taking the men across
was very slow. When all were over except Dale and about a dozen others,
the little remnant of the force was suddenly attacked.

The situa