They moved up the three sides of the hill. Ferguson was famous for his bayonet charges, and the patriots had no bayonets. So when the British rushed down on the center of the advancing line the mountaineers gave way and the enemy pursued them down the hill. Then the backwoodsmen on the flanks rushed in and poured shot into the backs of the British. Turning to meet these new foes, the regulars were again chased up the hill and shot by the men who had fled from their bayonets. Thus shrewd tactics took the place of weapons. At length the gallant Ferguson was killed, the white flag was hoisted, and the firing stopped. Many British were slain, and all the rest, save a very few who escaped in the confusion, were made prisoners. [Illustration: FIG. 62. JOHN SEVIER] It was a wonderful victory for the men from the valley. They had come from a region of which Cornwallis had hardly dreamed, and they had destroyed one of his armies and killed one of his best commanders. The battle turned the tide of the Revolution in the South, but the victors hurried back as quickly as they had come. They were not fitted for a long campaign, and, besides, they had left their homes dangerously open to attacks from savages. It was, however, the one battle of the Revolution against white foes alone that was planned, fought, and won by the men of the frontier. As soon as John Sevier returned to the valley he found plenty of Indian fighting to do. He was skilled in this, and with the Watauga men, who called him “Chucky Jack” and were devoted to him, he was a terror to the red men of the southern mountains. He knew all their tricks and how to give them back what he called “Indian play.” At one time he took a band of his followers and made a daring ride into the wildest of the Great Smokies, to attack some hostile tribes. He burned their villages, destroyed their corn, killed and captured some of their warriors, and got away before they could gather their greater numbers to crush him. We must not forget James Robertson, who all this time was doing his part of the farming and the fighting and the planning for the new settlements. Already the Watauga country began to have too many people and was too thickly settled to suit his temper, and he was thinking much about the wilderness beyond, near the lower part of the Cumberland river. In a great bend on the south bank of that stream he founded Nashborough in 1779, naming it in honor of Oliver Nash, governor of North Carolina. Five years later it became Nashville, and now we do not need to explain where it was. Robertson went out by the Cumberland Gap, but soon left Boone’s road and went toward the west, following the trails. When he and his followers reached the place and decided upon it as suitable for settlement, they planted a field of corn, to have something to depend on for food later.