If we search the annals of both ancient and modern times we can find no record that shows greater fidelity from slave to master than was exhibited by a negro to one of Kentucky's most noted pioneers.

In 1782, March 19, people living in the vicinity of Boonesborough discovered some empty rafts floating down the river. They at once knew that Indians had used them to cross the stream so as to attack the unprotected settlements. News was sent to the various stations warning the settlers. Colonel Logan dispatched fifteen men to Estill's Station, where they were joined by twenty-five from that fort. Under the command of Captain James Estill, they started to pursue and punish the invaders.

Early in the morning of the 20th, Miss Jennie Gass, with a slave, Monk, as protector, went just outside the fort at Estill's Station to milk the cows. Her mother, seeing the savages approaching, called loudly for her to run, but the warning came too late. Ere her daughter could reach the gate, her mother saw her tomahawked and scalped.

Monk was captured and asked about the force of the fort. Like the half-witted boy who was questioned by the Tories, Monk exaggerated the situation, saying there were forty men in the fort then molding bullets in anticipation of an attack. The truth is that aside from the women and children, there were only four men, who were too disabled to march. The savages accordingly thought it best to retreat.

No sooner had they withdrawn from the vicinity of the fort than two boys were dispatched to find Captain Estill's band and tell them of the tragedy. In a few hours the messengers found the men, and so uneasy were some of the party for their families that five returned to help protect the fort, while the other thirty-five began to search for the trail of the Indians. A part of the horses became so jaded that ten more dropped from the ranks, while the remaining twenty-five pushed forward with a grim determination to find the savages.

About an hour before sunset they discovered some Indians preparing a meal from a buffalo. When Captain Estill fired his gun, the Indians fled, and had it not been that their leader was wounded, the retreat would have been permanent and the battle of Little Mountain would never have been fought. With almost superhuman strength the chieftain dragged himself to a place of safety and with a defiance that meant death he commanded his warriors who were too loyal to retreat without their wounded leader. There, in a space not more than two hundred yards in diameter, was fought one of the world's fiercest battles.

On the one hand there were twenty-five Wyandot warriors who defied death. On the other side there were twenty-five pioneers, aroused to vengeance by the cruelties the red men had visited upon them. Well did they obey the command of Estill, "Every man to his man, and every man to his tree." At one time in the fiercest of the fight, the rallying tones of confidence rang out above the crack of the rifles as Monk, who was still held prisoner by the savages, shouted, "Don't give way, Massa Jim, you can whip the redskins."

For nearly two hours the combat lasted, neither side advancing nor retreating. But when Captain Estill sent Lieutenant William Miller with six men to gain the rear of the enemy, that seven ingloriously fled and then the savages began to gain on the whites. Finally Captain Estill and a brawny Indian clutched in mortal combat. For a time their strength seemed equal, but Estill's broken arm giving way, the savage instantly plunged a knife into his breast and a moment later, pierced by a bullet from Joseph Proctor's unerring gun, fell dead across his victim's body.

There the battle ended, the pioneers taking their wounded comrades and leaving the dead upon the field. Proctor carried one, a Mr. Irvine, a great distance of forty miles upon his back, while the faithful Monk carried another. A few days later a party of whites visited the scene and buried their dead. The Indians had carefully removed their slain but left the whites unmolested. Wallace Estill, Monk's young master, gave him his freedom and cared for him the remainder of his life. He lived to a ripe old age and was the father of thirty children.

The little city of Mount Sterling is near the battleground where such heroism was displayed by both savage and civilian.