One day, some months after Boone's family had come to
Boonesborough, Boone's daughter, with two girl friends, was on the river
floating in a boat near the bank. Suddenly five Indians darted out of the
woods, seized the three girls, and hurried away with them. In their flight
the Indians observed the eldest of the girls breaking twigs and dropping
them in their trail. They threatened to tomahawk her unless she stopped
it. But, watching her chance, from time to time she tore off strips of her
dress and dropped them as a clew for those she knew would come to rescue
them.
When the capture became known, Boone, accompanied by the three lovers of
the captured maidens and four other men from the fort, started upon the
trail and kept up the pursuit until, early on the second morning, they
discovered the Indians sitting around a fire cooking breakfast. Suddenly
the white men fired a volley, killing two of the Indians and frightening
the others so badly that they beat a hasty retreat without harming the
girls.
Another exciting experience, which nearly caused the settlement to lose
its leader, came about through the settlers' need of salt. We can get salt
so easily that it is hard to imagine the difficulty which those settlers,
living far back from the ocean, had in obtaining this necessary part of
their food.
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