Blood and Treasure: Daniel Boone and the Fight for America’s First Frontier

Clavin and Drury return (after Valley Forge) with an enlightening biography of Daniel Boone set against the backdrop of 18th-century America’s conflicts with England and Native tribes. Born in 1734 to English immigrants in Pennsylvania, Boone was drawn “to the backcountry’s contours and creatures,” and became a proficient hunter at a young age. As a husband and father, Boone’s restlessness and need for adventure caused him to relocate his family several times, and in 1773 he led a group of colonists in the first attempt to establish a British settlement in present-day Kentucky. The immigrants met with fierce resistance from the Shawnee and other local tribes; Boone’s 16-year-old son, James, was killed in an ambush. Clavin and Drury detail numerous atrocities committed by colonists and Natives during the settling of Kentucky and describe how Boone rescued his kidnapped daughter and her two friends from a Shawnee camp in 1776. The authors also pay close attention to Boone’s June 1778 escape from the Shawnee after months of captivity; his four-day, 160-mile journey to warn his namesake settlement, Boonesborough, of an impending attack; and successful leadership of the outpost’s defenses during the siege. Clavin and Drury successfully separate fact from fiction while keeping the pages turning. History buffs will be entertained. (Apr.)