we could not carry with us; and on the twenty-fifth day of
September, 1773, bade a farewel to our friends, and proceeded on
our journey to Kentucke, in company with five families more, and
forty men that joined us in Powel's Valley, which is one hundred
and fifty miles from the now settled parts of Kentucke. This
promising beginning was soon overcast with a cloud of adversity;
for upon the tenth day of October, the rear of our company was
attacked by a number of Indians, who killed six, and wounded one
man. Of these my eldest son was one that fell in the action. Though
we defended ourselves, and repulsed the enemy, yet this unhappy
affair scattered our cattle, brought us into extreme difficulty,
and so discouraged the whole company, that we retreated forty
miles, to the settlement on Clench river. We had passed over two
mountains, viz. Powel's and Walden's, and were approaching
Cumberland mountain when this adverse fortune overtook us. These
mountains are in the wilderness, as we pass from the old
settlements in Virginia to Kentucke, are ranged in a S. west and N.
east direction, are of a great length and breadth, and not far
distant from each other. Over these, nature hath formed passes,
that are less difficult than might be expected from a view of such
huge piles. The aspect of these cliffs is so wild and horrid, that
it is impossible to behold them without terror. The spectator is
apt to imagine that nature had formerly suffered some violent
convulsion; and that these are the dismembered remains of the
dreadful shock; the ruins, not of Persepolis or Palmyra, but of the
world!

I remained with my family on Clench until the sixth of June,
1774, when I and one Michael Stoner were solicited by Governor
Dunmore, of Virginia, to go to the Falls of the Ohio, to conduct