The magistrate gave the order, and drawing a long, silver-handled knife, which was his only weapon, Weatherford advanced upon the murderers, who warned him off, swearing that they would kill him if he should advance. Without a sign of hesitation, and with a calm look of resolution in his countenance which appalled even his desperate antagonists, he stepped quickly up to one of them and seized him by the throat, calling to the bystanders to "tie the rascal." Then going up to the other he arrested him, the desperado saying as he approached: "I will not resist you, Billy Weatherford."
Weatherford's plantation was among the white settlements, and the country round about him rapidly filled up with white people, among whom the warrior lived in peace and friendship. Mr. Meek writes of him at this time in these words:
"The character of the man seemed to have been changed by the war. He was no longer cruel, vindictive, idle, intemperate, or fond of display: but surrounded by his family he preserved a dignified and retiring demeanor; was industrious, sober, and economical; and was a kind and indulgent master to his servants, of whom he had many. A gentleman who had favorable opportunities of judging says of him that 'in his intercourse with the whites his bearing was marked by nobleness of purpose, and his conduct was always honorable. No man was more fastidious in complying with his engagements. His word was by him held to be more sacred than the most binding legal obligation. Art and dissimulation formed no part of his character. Ever frank and guileless, no one had the more entire confidence of those among whom he lived.' Another gentleman who knew Weatherford intimately for a number of years informs me that 'he possessed remarkable intellectual powers; that his perceptions were quick almost to intuition, his memory tenacious, his imagination vivid, his judgment strong and accurate, and his language copious, fluent, and expressive. In short,' he says, 'Weatherford possessed naturally one of the finest minds our country has produced.' These traits of character exhibited for a number of years won for their possessor the esteem and respect of those who knew him, notwithstanding the circumstances of his earlier life. Indeed those circumstances threw around the man a romance of character which made him the more attractive. After the bitterness which the war engendered had subsided his narratives were listened to with interest and curiosity. Though unwilling generally to speak of his adventures, he would, when his confidence was obtained, describe them with a graphic particularity and coloring which gave an insight into conditions of life and phases of character of which we can now only see the outside. He always extenuated his conduct at Fort Mims and during the war under the plea that the first transgressions were committed by the white people, and that he was fighting for the liberties of his nation. He also asserted that he was reluctantly forced into the war."
Red Eagle died on the 9th of March, 1824, from over-fatigue incurred in a bear hunt. He left a large family of children, who intermarried with the whites, well-nigh extinguishing all traces of Indian blood in his descendants.
[1] Colonel Gaines was still living in the year 1866 at State Line, Mississippi. The author met him in that year engaged, old and feeble as he was, in a charitable work that involved considerable labor.
[2] Parton's "Life of Jackson."
[3] "Light-wood" is a term used in the South to signify richly resinous pine, of the kind sometimes called "pitch-pine" in other parts of the country.
[4] From a sketch by General John H. F. Claiborne, published in the Natchez (Miss.) Free-Trader, on the occasion of Dale's death in the year 1841.
[5] Parton's Life of Andrew Jackson.