Benjamin Samson Carpenter

http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:2946925&id=I33377 A man by the name of O'BRIEN blazed a trail from the Ohio by way of the Trace Fork of Steer Creek to the mouth of the Holly. It is not known at what point he settled, but he marked the way because he did not know woodcraft well enough to travel without some other guide besides what nature provided. The CARPENTERs having spent most of their lives in the woods could travel for days in any given direction without either a compass or marks made upon trees with an axe or hunting knife. When they could not see the sun, they traveled in the proper direction by frequent examinations of the moss on the tree trunks near the ground. White men learned from the Indians that the moss grew in the greatest profusion on the side facing the north. It appears that the Indians did not know of the Elk settlement until they found O'BRIEN trail & followed it eastward. They came to the house of Benjamin CARPENTER & finding his wife & small child at home both were tomahawked & scalped. The husband was down under the bank of the river graining a deer skin. He was soon found & shot at by one of the four Indians in the marauding party, but the bullet flew wide of its intended mark. CARPENTER ran to the house for his gun. He reached the door & was in the act of getting his rifle from its rack above the door when he was killed by one of the party concealed in the house by a bullet from his own gun, which the Indian had obtained when the cabin was entered. Nancy, a sister of the brothers, was taken prisoner & the party soon began their homeward journey after the cabin had been set fire.