lby received any pay for their
services, nor asked it. Before Shelby left the Holston in 1782 and moved
to Kentucky, of which State he was to become the first Governor, the
Assembly of North Carolina passed a resolution of gratitude to the
overmountain men in general, and to Sevier and Shelby in particular,
for their "very generous and patriotic services" with which the
"General Assembly of this State are feelingly impressed." The resolution
concluded by urging the recipients of the Assembly's acknowledgments
to "continue" in their noble course. In view of what followed, this
resolution is interesting!

For some time the overhill pioneers had been growing dissatisfied with
the treatment they were receiving from the State, which on the plea
of poverty had refused to establish a Superior Court for them and to
appoint a prosecutor. As a result, crime was on the increase, and
the law-abiding were deprived of the proper legal means to check the
lawless. In 1784 when the western soldiers' claims began to reach the
Assembly, there to be scrutinized by unkindly eyes, the dissatisfaction
increased. The breasts of the mountain men--the men who had made that
spectacular ride to bring Ferguson to his end--were kindled with hot
indignation when they heard that they had been publicly assailed as
grasping persons who seized on every pretense to "fabricate demands
against the Government." Nor were those fiery breasts cooled by further
plaints to the effect that the "industry and property" of those east of
the hills were "becoming the funds appropriated to discharge the debts"
of the Westerners. They might with justice have asked what the industry
and property of the Easterners were worth on that day when the overhill
men drilled in the snows on the high peak of Yellow Mountain and looked
down on Burke County overrun by Ferguson's Tories, and beyond, to
Charlotte, where lay Cornwallis.

The North Carolina Assembly did not confine itself to impolite remarks.
It proceeded to get rid of what it deemed western rapacity by ceding the
whole overmountain territory to the United States, with the proviso that
Congress must accept the gift within twelve months. And after passing
the Cession Act, North Carolina closed the land office in the undesired
domain and nullified all entries made after May 25, 1784. The Cession
Act also enabled the State to evade its obligations to the Cherokees in
the matter of an expensive consignment of goods to pay fo