,) and after a sharp conflict was obliged to retreat with the
loss of four men.

News of this disaster arrived at Bryant's Station, (a post on the
Elkhorn, near the road from Lexington to Maysville,) on the fourteenth
of August, and the garrison prepared to march to the assistance of Hoy's
Station. But in the night the main body of the enemy arrived before the
fort, it having been selected as the point for the first blow.

The water for the use of the garrison was drawn from a spring at a
considerable distance from the fort on the northwestern side. Near this
spring the greater part of the enemy stationed themselves in ambush. On
the other side of the fort a body was posted with orders to make a feint
of attacking, in order to draw the attention of the garrison to that
point, and give an opportunity for the main attack. At daylight the
garrison, consisting of forty or fifty men, were preparing to march out,
when they were startled by a heavy discharge of rifles, with an
accompaniment of such yells as come only from an Indian's throat.

"All ran hastily to the picketing," says McClung, "and beheld a small
party of Indians exposed to open view, firing, yelling, and making the
most furious gestures. The appearance was so singular, and so different
from their usual manner of fighting, that some of the more wary and
experienced of the garrison instantly pronounced it a decoy party, and
restrained the young men from sallying out and attacking them, as some
of them were strongly disposed to do. The opposite side of the fort was
instantly manned, and several breaches in the picketing rapidly
repaired. Their greatest distress arose from the prospect of suffering
for water. The more experienced of the garrison felt satisfied that a
powerful party was in ambuscade near the spring; but at the same time
they supposed that the Indians would not unmask themselves until the
firing upon the opposite side of the fort was returned with such warmth
as to induce the belief that the feint had succeeded.

"Acting upon this impression, and yielding to the urgent necessity of the
case, they summoned all the women, without exception, and explaining to
them the circumstances in which they were placed, and the improbability
that any injury would be offered them, until the firing had been
returned from the opposite side of the fort, they urged them to go in a
body to the spring, and each to bring up a bucketfull of water. Some of
the ladies, as