the camp was astir early the next morning, and it soon became noised about that we were to fall back, but only so far as might be needful to find a strong position. from this it was evident that a battle was imminent, though as yet there were no signs of the approach of the patriots.
from the camp talk we, tybee and i, gleaned some better information of the situation. a fortnight earlier major ferguson had captured two of the over-mountain men of clark's party and had sent them to the settlement on the watauga with a challenge in due form—or rather with the threat to come and lay the over-mountain region waste in default of an instant return of the pioneers to their allegiance to the king.
this challenge, so our scouts told us, had been immediately accepted. sevier and shelby had embodied some two hundred men each from the watauga and the holston settlements, and colonel william campbell, the stout old presbyterian indian fighter, had joined them with as many more virginians.
crossing the mountain these three troops had fallen in with other scattered parties of the border patriots under benjamin cleaveland, major chronicle and colonel williams, of south carolina, until now, as the scouts reported, the challenged outnumbered the challengers. learning this, ferguson, who was as prudent as he was brave, thought it best to make his stand at some point nearer the main body of the army; and so the withdrawal from gilbert town had fallen into a retreat and a pursuit.
from what captain de peyster has since told me, there would seem to be little doubt that the major meant to fight when he had manoeuvered himself into a favorable position; this in spite of lord cornwallis's commands to the contrary. in his despatches he was continually urging the need for a bold push in his quarter, and asking for tarleton and a sufficient number of the legion to enable him to cope with a mounted enemy. but be this as it may, the garbled letter i had brought him turned whatever scale there was to turn. he had now with him some eleven hundred regulars and tories, the latter decently well drilled; he had every reason to expect the needed help from cornwallis; and, on the night of my arrival, he had word that another tory force under major gibbs would join him in a day or two, at farthest.
for his battle-ground major ferguson chose the top of a forest-covered hill, the last and lowest elevation in the spur named that day king's mountain.
in some respects the position was all that could be desired. there was room on the flat hilltop for an orderly disposition of the fighting force; and the slopes in front and rear were steep enough to give an attacking enemy a sharp climb. moreover, there was a plentiful outcropping of stone on the summit, scantiest on the broad or outer end of the hill, and this was so disposed as to form a natural breastwork for the defenders.
but there were disadvantages also, the chief of these being the heavy wooding of the slopes to screen the advance of the assaulting party; and while the major was busy making his dispositions for the fight, i was on tenter-hooks for fear he would have the trees felled to belt the breastwork with a clear space.
he did not do it, being restrained, as i afterward learned, by his uncertainty as to whether or no the mountain men had cannon. against artillery posted on the neighboring hillocks the trees were his best defense, and so he left them standing.
as you would suppose, my situation was now become most trying, and poor tybee's was scarcely less so. knowing my name and circumstance, and having, moreover, a high regard for my old field-marshal's genius, major ferguson was very willing to make use of my experience. these askings from one whom i knew for a brave and honorable gentleman let me fall between two stools. as a patriot spy, it was my duty to turn the major's confidence as a weapon against him. but as an officer and a gentleman i could by no means descend to such depths of perfidy.
in this dilemma i sought to steer a middle course, saying that i must beg exemption because my long hard ride had re-opened my old sword wound—as indeed it had. so the major generously let me be, thus heaping coals of fire upon my head; and i kept out of his way, consorting with tybee, who, like myself, must be an onlooker in the coming fray.
as for the lieutenant, he was all agog to learn more than i dared tell him, and it irked him most nettlesomely to have a fight in prospect in the which he was in honor bound not to take a hand. time and again he begged me to release him from his parole; and when i would not, he was for fighting me a duel with his freedom for a stake.
"consider of it, captain ireton," he pleaded. "for god's sake, put yourself in my place. here am i, in the camp of my friends, gagged and bound by my word to you whilst your infernal plot, whatever it may be, works out to the coup de grâce. ye gods! it would have been far more merciful had you run me through in our wrestling match last night!"
"mayhap," said i, curtly. "'twas but the choice between two evils. nevertheless, in time to come i hope you may conclude that this is the lesser of the two."
"no, i'm damned if i shall!" he retorted, fuming like a disappointed boy, and minding me most forcibly of my hot-headed richard jennifer. and then he would repeat: "i thought you were my friend."
"so i am, as man to man. but this matter concerns the welfare of a cause to which i have sworn fealty. take your own words back, my lad, and put yourself in my place. can i do less than hold you to your pledge?"
"no, i suppose not," he would say, grumpily. "yet 'tis hard; most devilish hard!"
"'tis the fortune of war. another day the shoe may be upon the other foot."
the baggage wagons had been massed across the broad end of the hill to eke out the stone breastwork, and the last of these arguing colloquies took place beneath one of the wagons whither we had crept for shelter from the rain, which was now pouring again. in the midst of our talk, major ferguson dived to share our shelter, dripping like a water spaniel.
"ha! ye're carpet soldiers, both of ye!" he snorted, and then he began to swear piteously at the rain.
"'twill be worse for the enemy than for us," said tybee. "we can at least keep our powder dry."
"damn the enemy!" quoth the major, cheerfully. "so the weather does not put the creeks up and hold tarleton and major gibbs back from us, 'tis a small matter whether the rebels' powder be dry or soaked."
"you have made all your dispositions, major?" tybee asked.
the major nodded. "all in apple-pie order, no thanks to either of ye. 'tis a strong position, this, eh, captain ireton? i'm thinking not all the rebel banditti out of hell will drive us from it."
"'tis good enough," i agreed; and here the talk was broken off by the major's diving out to berate some of his tory militiamen who were preparing to make a night of it with a jug of their vile country liquor.
the rain continued all that friday night and well on into the forenoon of the saturday. during this interval we waited with scouts out for the upcoming of the mountain men. at noon major ferguson sent a final express to lord cornwallis, urging the hurrying on of the reinforcements, not knowing that his former despatch had been intercepted, nor that tarleton had not as yet started to the rescue. a little later the scouts began to come in one by one with news of the approaching riflemen.
there was but a small body of them, not above a thousand men in all, so the spies said, and my heart misgave me. they were without cannon and they lacked bayonets; and moreover, when all was said, they were but militia, all untried save in border warfare with the indians. could they successfully assault the fortified camp whose defenders—thanks to the major's ingenuity—had fitted butcher-knives to the muzzles of their guns in lieu of bayonets? nay, rather would they have the courage to try?
'twas late in the afternoon before these questions were answered. the rain had ceased, and the chill october sunlight filtered aslant through the trees. with the clearing skies a cold wind had sprung up, and on the hilltop the men cowered behind the rock breastwork and waited in strained silence. at the last moment major ferguson sent captain de peyster to me with the request that i take command of the tory force set apart to defend the wagon barricade—this if my weariness would permit. i went with the captain to make my excuses in person.
"say no more, captain," said this generous soldier, when i began some lame plea for further exemption; "i had forgot your sword-cut. take shelter for yourself, and look on whilst we skin this riffraff alive."
and so he let me off; a favor which will make me think kindly of patrick ferguson so long as i shall live. for now my work was done; and had he insisted, i should have told him flatly who and what i was—and paid the penalty.
i had scarce rejoined tybee at the wagons when the long roll of the drums broke the silence of the hilltop, and a volley fire of musketry from the rock breastwork on the right told us the battle was on. tybee gave me one last reproachful look and stood out to see what could be seen, and i stood with him.
"your friends are running," he said, when there was no reply to the opening volley; and truly, i feared he was right. at the bottom of the slope, scattering groups of the riflemen could be seen hastening to right and left. but i would not admit the charge to tybee.
"i think not," i objected, denying the apparent fact. "they have come too far and too fast to turn back now for a single overshot volley."
"but they'll never face the fire up the hill with the bayonet to cap it at the top," he insisted.
"that remains to be seen; we shall know presently. ah, i thought so; here they come!"
at the word the forest-covered steep at our end of the hill sprang alive with dun-clad figures darting upward from tree to tree. volley after volley thundered down upon them as they climbed, but not once did the dodging charge up the slope pause or falter. unlike all other irregulars i had ever seen, whose idea of a battle is to let off the piece and run, these mountain men held their fire like veterans, closing in upon the hilltop steadily and in a grim silence broken only by the shouting encouragements of the leaders—this until their circling line was completed.
then suddenly from all sides of the beleaguered camp arose a yell to shake the stoutest courage, and with that the wood-covered slopes began to spit fire, not in volleys, but here and there in irregular snappings and cracklings as the sure-shot riflemen saw a mark to pull trigger on.
the effect of this fine-bead target practice—for it was naught else—was most terrific. all along the breastwork, front and rear, crouching men sprang up at the rifle crackings to fling their arms all abroad and to fall writhing and wrestling in the death throe. at our end of the hill, where the rock barrier was thinnest, the slaughter was appalling; and above the din of the firearms we could hear the bellowed commands of the sturdy old indian fighter, benjamin cleaveland, urging his men up to still closer quarters. "a little nearer, my brave boys; a little nearer and we have them! press on up to the rocks. they'll be as good a breastwork from our side as from theirs!"
you will read in the histories that the tory helpers of ferguson fought as men with halters round their necks; and so, indeed, a-many of them did. but though they were most pitiless enemies of ours, i bear them witness that they did fight well and bravely, and not as men who fight for fear's sake.
and they were most bravely officered. major ferguson, boldly conspicuous in a white linen hunting-shirt drawn on over his uniform, was here and there and everywhere, and always in the place where the bullets flew thickest. his left hand had been hurt at the first patriot gun fire, but it still held the silver whistle to his lips, and the shrill skirling of the little pipe was the loyalist rallying signal. captain de peyster, too, did ample justice to the uniform he wore; and when campbell's virginians gained the summit at the far end of the hilltop, 'twas de peyster who led the bayonet charge that forced the patriot riflemen some little way down the slope.
but these are digressions. no man sees more of a battle than that little circle of which he is the center; and the fighting was hot enough at the wagon barricade to keep both tybee and me from knowing at the time what was going on beyond our narrow range of sight or hearing. you must picture, therefore, for yourselves, a very devils' pandemonium let loose upon the little hilltop so soon as the mountain men gained their vantage ground at the fronting of the rock breastwork; cries; frantic shouts of "god save the king!" yells fierce and wordless; men in red and men in homespun rushing madly hither and yon in a vain attempt to repel a front and rear attack at the same instant. 'twas a hell set free, with no quarter asked or given, and where we stood, the tory defenders of the wagon barrier were presently dropping around us in heaps and windrows of dead and dying, like men suddenly plague-smitten.
in such a time of asking you must not think we stood aloof and looked on coldly. at the first fire tybee stripped off his coat and fell to work with the wounded, and i quickly followed his lead, praying that now my work was done, some one of the flying missiles would find its mark in me and let me die a soldier's death.
so it was that i saw little more of the battle detail, and of that fierce frenzy-time i have memory pictures only of the dead and dying; of the torn and wounded and bleeding men with whom we wrought, striving as we might to stanch the ebbing life-tide or to ease the dying gently down into the valley of shadows.
and as for my prayer, it went all unanswered. once when i had a dying tory's head pillowed on my knee i saw a rifleman thrust his weapon between the wheel-spokes of the outer wagon and draw a bead on me. i heard the crack of the deckard, the zip of the bullet singing at my ear, and the man's angry oath at his missing of me. once again a rifle-ball passed through my hair at the braiding of the queue and i felt the hot touch of it on my scalp like a breath of flame. another time a mountaineer leaped the rock barrier to beat me down with the butt of his rifle—and in the very act tybee rose up and throttled him. i saw the grapple, sprang to my feet and whipped out my sword.
"stop!" i commanded; "you have broken your parole, lieutenant!"
the freed borderer glared from one to the other of us. "loonies!" he yelled; "i'll slaughter the both of ye!" and so he would have done, i make no doubt, had we not laid hold of him together and heaved him back over the breastwork.
these are but incidents, points of contact where the fray touched us two at the wagon barricade. i pass them by with the mention, as i have passed by the sterner horrors of that furious killing-time. these last are too large for my poor pen. as we could gather in the din and tumult, the mountain men rushed again and again to the attack, and as often the brave major, or de peyster, led the bayonet charges that pushed them back. yet in the end the unerring bullet outpressed the bayonet; there came a time when flesh and blood could no longer endure the death-dealing cross-fire from front and rear.
i saw the end was near when the major ordered the final charge, and captain de peyster formed his line and led it forward at a double-quick. the mountaineers held more than half the hilltop now, and this forlorn hope was to try to drive them down the farther slopes. on it went, and i could see the men pitch and tumble out of the line until at bayonet-reach of the riflemen there were less than a dozen afoot and fit to make the push.
de peyster fought his way back to the wagons, gasping and bloody. some of the tories crowding around us raised a white flag. the major, sorely wounded now and all but disabled, swore a great oath and rode rough-shod into the ruck of cowering militiamen to pull down the flag. again the white token of surrender was raised, and again the major rode in to beat it down with his sword. at this captain de peyster put in his word.
"'tis no use, major; there is no more fight left in us! five minutes more of this and we'll be shot down to a man!"
ferguson's reply was a raging oath broad enough to cover all the enemy and his own beaten remnant as well; and then, before a hand could be lifted to stay him, he had wheeled his horse and was galloping straight for the patriot line at the farther extremity of the hilltop.
what he meant to do will never be known till that great day when all secrets shall be revealed. for that furious oath was this brave gentleman's last word to us or to any. a dozen bounds, it may be, the good charger carried him; then the storm of rifle-bullets beat him from the saddle. and so died one of the gallantest officers that ever did an unworthy king's work on the field of battle.
i would i might forget the terrible scene which followed this killing of the british commander. 'twas little to our credit, but i may not pass it over in silence. de peyster quickly sent a man to the front with a white flag, and the answer was a murderous volley which killed the flag-bearer and many others. again the flag was raised on a rifle-barrel, and once more the answer was a storm of the leaden death poured into the panic-stricken crowd huddled like sheep at the wagons.
"god!" said de peyster; and with that he began to beat his men into line with the flat of his sword in a frenzy of desperation, being minded, as he afterward told me, to give them the poor chance to die a-fighting.
i saw not what followed upon this last despairing effort, for now tybee was down and i was kneeling beside him to search for the wound. but when i looked again, the crackling crashes of the rifle-firing had ceased. a stout, gray-headed man, whom i afterward knew as isaac shelby's father, was riding up from the patriot line to receive captain de peyster's sword, and the battle was ended.
