[The Scouts of the Valley by Joseph A. Altsheler]@TWC D-Link book
The Scouts of the Valley

CHAPTER XI
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The other three now had double-barreled pistols, too.

In addition they resupplied themselves with as much ammunition as scouts and hunters could conveniently carry, and toward morning left the fort.
Sunrise found them some distance from the palisades, and upon the flank of a frightened crowd of fugitives.

It was composed of one hundred women and children and a single man, James Carpenter, who was doing his best to guide and protect them.

They were intending to flee through the wilderness to the Delaware and Lehigh settlements, chiefly Fort Penn, built by Jacob Stroud, where Stroudsburg now is.
When the five, darkened by weather and looking almost like Indians themselves, approached, Carpenter stepped forward and raised his rifle.
A cry of dismay rose from the melancholy line, a cry so intensely bitter that it cut Henry to the very heart.

He threw up his hand, and exclaimed in a loud voice: "We are friends, not Indians or Tories! We fought with you yesterday, and we are ready to fight for you now!" Carpenter dropped the muzzle of the rifle.


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