Ella Barnwell

Ella Barnwell

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Ella Barnwell, by Emerson Bennett
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Title: Ella Barnwell A Historical Romance of Border Life
Author: Emerson Bennett
Release Date: March 21, 2005 [EBook #15424]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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BARNWELL ***

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ELLA BARNWELL:
A Historical Romance of Border Life
BY EMERSON BENNETT,
AUTHOR OF "PRAIRIE FLOWER," "LENI LEOTI," "FOREST
ROSE," "MIKE FINK," "VIOLA," "CLARA MORELAND,"
"FORGED WILL," "TRAITOR," "FEMALE SPY," "ROSALIE DU
PONT," "FAIR REBEL," ETC., ETC.
CINCINNATI: PUBLISHED BY U.P. JAMES, No. 177 RACE
STREET.
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1853, BY J.A. &

U.P. JAMES, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United
States, for the District of Ohio.

PREFACE.
In putting to press a new and revised edition of the following story, the
author would state, that his original design was to combine fact and
fiction, in such a way, as, while making his story move forward to a
proper denouement, to give the reader a correct picture of the dress,
customs, and social and war-like habits of the early pioneers of the west;
and also embody a series of historical events which took place on the
frontiers during that revolutionary struggle by which we gained our
glorious independence. For this purpose, Kentucky, in her infancy, was
selected as the scene of action; and most of the existing records of her
early settlements were read with care, each compared with the others,
and only the best authenticated accounts presented to the reader. So
much in fact did the author labor to make the present story historical,
that there is scarcely a scene or character in its pages that had not its
counterpart in reality.
He would only add, that, for important reasons, the original title has
been changed to that which now heads its title-page. "What's in a
name?" queried the great bard. Had he lived in our day, and been a
novelist instead of a poet, he would either not have asked the question,
or answered it very differently than he did.

ELLA BARNWELL.

CHAPTER I.
THE STRANGER.
That portion of territory known throughout Christendom as Kentucky,
was, at an early period, the theatre of some of the wildest, most hardily
contested, and bloody scenes ever placed on record. In fact its very
name, derived from the Indian word Kan-tuck-kee, which was applied
to it long before its discovery by the whites, is peculiarly significant in
meaning--being no less than "the dark and bloody ground." History

makes no mention of its being inhabited prior to its settlement by the
present race; but rather serves to aid us to the inference, that from time
immemorial it was used as a "neutral ground," whereon the different
savage tribes were wont to meet in deadly strife; and hence the
portentious name by which it was known among them. But
notwithstanding its ominous title, Kentucky, when first beheld by the
white hunter, presented all the attractions he would have envied in
Paradise itself. The climate was congenial to his feelings--the country
was devoid of savages--while its thick tangles of green
cane--abounding with deer, elk, bears, buffaloes, panthers, wolves and
wild cats, and its more open woods with pheasant, turkey and
partridge--made it the full realization of his hopes--his longings. What
more could he ask? And when he again stood among his friends,
beyond the Alleghanies, is it to be wondered at that his excited feelings,
aided by distance, should lead him to describe it as the El Dorado of the
world? Such indeed he did describe it; and to such glowing descriptions,
Kentucky was doubtless partially indebted for her settlement so much
in advance of the surrounding territory.
As it is not our purpose, in the present instance, to enter into a history
of the country, further than is necessary to the development of our story,
the reader will pardon us for omitting that account of its early
settlement which can readily be gleaned from numerous works already
familiar to the reading public. It may not be amiss, however, to remark
here, what almost every reader knows, that first and foremost in the
dangerous struggles of pioneer life, was the celebrated Daniel Boone;
whose name, in the west, and particularly in Kentucky, is a household
word; and whose fame, as a fearless hunter, has extended not only
throughout this continent, but over