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Immediately upon his return in 1771 from the extended exploration of Kentucky, Daniel Boone as already noted was engaged as secret agent, to treat with the Cherokees for the lease or purchase of the trans-Alleghany region, on behalf of Judge Henderson and his associates. Embroiled in the exciting issues of the Regulation and absorbed by his confining duties as colonial judge, Henderson was unable to put his bold design into execution until after the expiration of the court itself which ceased to exist in 1773. Disregarding the royal proclamation of 1763 and Locke's Fundamental Constitutions for the Carolinas, which forbade private parties to purchase lands from the Indians, Judge Henderson applied to the highest judicial authorities in England to know if there was any law in existence forbidding purchase of lands from the Indian tribes. Lord Mansfield gave Judge Henderson the "sanction of his great authority in favor of the purchase." Lord Chancellor Camden and Mr. Yorke had officially advised the King in 1757, in regard to the petition of the East Indian Company, "that in respect to such territories as have been, or shall be acquired by treaty or grant from the Great Mogul, or any of the Indian princes or governments, your Majesty's letters patent are NOT NECESSARY; the property of the soil vesting in the company by the Indian grant subject only to your Majesties right of sovereignty over the settlements, as English settlements, and over the inhabitants, as English subjects, who carry with them your Majesties laws wherever they form colonies, and receive your Majesties protection by virtue of your royal charters." This opinion, with virtually no change, was rendered in regard to the Indian tribes of North America by the same two authorities, certainly as early as 1769; and a true copy, made in London, April 1, 1772, was transmitted to Judge Henderson. Armed with the legal opinions received from England, Judge Henderson was fully persuaded that there was no legal bar whatsoever to his seeking to acquire by purchase from the Cherokees the vast domain of the trans-Alleghany. A golden dream of empire, with its promise of an independent republic in the form of a proprietary colony, casts him under the spell of its alluring glamour. In the meantime, the restless Boone, impatient over the delay in the consummation of Judge Henderson's plans, resolved to establish himself in Kentucky upon his own responsibility. Heedless of the question of title and the certain hazards incident to invading the territory of hostile savages, Boone designated a rendezvous in Powell's Valley where he and his party of five families were to be met by a band under the leadership of his connections, the Bryans, and another company led by Captain William Russell, a daring pioneer of the Clinch Valley. A small detachment of Boone's party was fiercely attacked by Shawanoes in Powell's Valley on October 10, 1773, and almost all were killed, including sons of Boone and Russell, and young John and Richard Mendenhall of Guilford County, North Carolina. As the result of this bloody repulse, Boone's attempt to settle in Kentucky at this time was definitely abandoned. His failure to effect a settlement in Kentucky was due to that characteristic disregard of the territorial rights of the Indians which was all too common among the borderers of that period. This failure was portentous of the coming storm. The reign of the Long Hunters was over. Dawning upon the horizon was the day of stern adventurers, fixed in the desperate and lawless resolve to invade the trans-Alleghany country and to battle savagely with the red man for its possession. More successful than Boone was the McAfee party, five in number, from Botetourt County, Virginia, who between May l0th and September 1, 1773, safely accomplished a journey through Kentucky and carefully marked well-chosen sites for future location." An ominous incident of the time was the veiled warning which Cornstalk, the great Shawanoe chieftain, gave to Captain Thomas Bullitt, head of a party of royal surveyors, sent out by Lord Dunmore, Governor of Virginia. Cornstalk at Chillicothe, June 7, 1773, warned Bullitt concerning the encroachments of the whites, "designed to deprive us," he said, "of the hunting of the country, as usual . . . the hunting we stand in need of to buy our clothing." During the preceding summer, George Rogers Clark, an aggressive young Virginian, with a small party, had descended the Ohio as low as Fish Creek, where he built a cabin; and in this region for many months various parties of surveyors were busily engaged in locating and surveying lands covered by military grants. Most significant of the ruthless determination of the pioneers to occupy by force the Kentucky area was the action of the large party from Monongahela, some forty in number, led by Captain James Harrod, who penetrated to the present Miller County, where in June, 1774, they made improvements and actually laid out a town.
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