[CHAPTER XII.]
The Peculiar Position of Boonesborough—Boone rejoins his Family in North Carolina—Returns to Boonesborough—Robbed of a Large Amount of Money—Increased Emigration to the West—Colonel Rogers and his Party almost Annihilated—Captain Denham's Strange Adventure.
It must have caused Captain Duquesne great mortification to come to this conclusion, after setting out with a force ten times as great as that against which he contended, and with every reason to count upon success; but his provisions were almost exhausted, and nearly every time he heard the sharp crack of a rifle from the defences it meant that he had one less warrior than before. The prospect of his triumph was diminishing slowly, but none the less steadily, day by day.
Under such circumstances there was but one thing to do, and that was to raise the siege. This was done at the close of the ninth day after the attack, having lost, as is stated, thirty-seven men, with a much larger number wounded.
Boonesborough was never again subjected to a formidable assault by Indians. It had gone through its crucial period, and there was many a day and hour when it seemed certain that the advanced station in the wilderness must succumb to the hordes of Indians who, like so many fierce bloodhounds, were bounding against the stockades.
A peculiar condition of the settlement of the West now acted as a shield to Boonesborough. Between the site of the station and the Ohio River were continually springing up smaller stations, and many of these were so weak as to invite attack, while Boonesborough had proved her powers of resistance.
The Indians were too wise to pass beyond the weaker stations with a view of attacking one further away and much stronger. It therefore came to pass, as already stated, that the siege of which we have made mention was the last danger to which Boonesborough was subjected.
Something like peace and quietness came to the station, where every stockade was pierced with bullets, and the settlers began more earnestly the work of clearing the land for cultivation.