ld rally and join Oconostota, they were in no
apprehension of immediate danger. Accordingly, they went about their
usual vocations, and so it happened that a number of the women ventured
outside the fort as usual to milk the cows on the morning of the 21st of
July. Among them was one who was destined to occupy for many years the
position of the "first lady in Tennessee."

Her name was Catherine Sherrell, and she was the daughter of Samuel
Sherrell, one of the first settlers on the Watauga. In age she was
verging upon twenty, and she was tall, straight as an arrow, and lithe
as a hickory sapling. I know of no portrait of her in existence, but
tradition describes her as having dark eyes, flexible nostrils, regular
features, a clear, transparent skin, a neck like a swan, and a wealth of
wavy brown hair, which was a wonder to look at and was in striking
contrast to the whiteness of her complexion. A free life in the open air
had made her as supple as an eel and as agile as a deer. It was said
that, encumbered by her womanly raiment, she had been known to place one
hand upon a six-barred fence and clear it at a single bound. And now her
agility was to do her essential service.

While she and the other women, unconscious of danger, were "coaxing the
snowy fluid from the yielding udders of the kine," suddenly the
war-whoop sounded through the woods, and a band of yelling savages
rushed out upon them. Quick as thought the women turned and darted for
the gate of the fort; but the savages were close upon them in a
neck-and-neck race, and Kate, more remote than the rest, was cut off
from the entrance. Seeing her danger, Sevier and a dozen others opened
the gate and were about to rush out upon the savages, hundreds of whom
were now in front of the fort; but Robertson held them back, saying they
could not rescue her, and to go out would insure their own destruction.
At a glance Kate took in the situation. She could have no help from her
friends, and the tomahawk and scalping-knife were close behind her.
Instantly she turned, and, fleeter than a deer, made for a point in the
stockade some distance from the entrance. The palisades were eight feet
high, but with one bound she reached the top, and with another was over
the wall, falling into the arms of Sevier, who for the first time called
her his "bonnie Kate," his "brave girl for a foot-race." The other women
reached the entrance of the fort in safety.

Then the baffled savages ope