She moved up to a little attic room whose windows looked out toward his grave, and beyond to the waters of the Potomac which he had so loved. Surrounded by her grandchildren and great-grandchildren, cheerful in her sorrow and loneliness, she survived him two years, and when she died, was buried beside him in the simple brick tomb at Mount Vernon. A woman not wise nor great perhaps in any worldly sense, Martha Washington had those qualities of heart that make a noble rounded character. A devoted and loyal wife, a tender mother, an earnest Christian, she was fitted to be the chosen companion of “the greatest of our soldiers and the purest of our patriots.” Serene and kindly, in the familiar white cap and kerchief, she has become the nation’s ideal of the president’s wife, our country’s first hostess. CHAPTER VII JEMIMA JOHNSON 1753-1814 Of Jemima Johnson, pioneer and volunteer, I can tell you very little. Just this one incident has come down to us, but you are surely right in thinking that the rest of her life was in harmony with this day’s heroism. It happened in Kentucky, when the Revolutionary fighting was almost ended, but before peace had come to the frontier. Raid after raid on isolated settlements was made by the Indians, stirred up continually by the British in Canada. People were murdered and tortured with shocking barbarity, for once started the red men could not be controlled. Chief among them were the Wyandottes, a tribe that stood first for military skill and ferocious valor, and with them was the notorious renegade, Simon Girty, whose name was a byword and a hissing along the frontier. Bryan’s Station was a Kentucky settlement of forty cabins connected by strong palisades, set in a clearing with thick woods all around. One August day in 1782 messengers arrived, saying that the Indians were threatening to attack a neighboring fort and asking for aid. The men at Bryan’s made ready to go and at dawn Captain Craig had finished his preparations when he discovered a group of savages in full view, just on the edge of the woods. There were only a few of them, and being out of rifle range they were exposing themselves carelessly and indifferently. “They’re trying to attract our attention,” Craig immediately said to himself. “Do they think that because they’re few we’ll leave the fort and pursue them?” Their actions made him suspicious, for he had been trained in Indian fighting in the school of Daniel Boone. He ordered the relief party to wait while he called the principal men of the station to a council. They agreed that it was only a feint on the part of the savages to invite an attack, and that the main fight would come from the other side. They would meet one trick with another and beat the Indians at their own game.