Uncle Rick Reads Nolichucky Jack [Audio download]

What a hero! John Sevier was a tough frontier boy who grew up fast. Married at sixteen, “Jack” ran a store, worked a farm, and started a family in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. But an ambition for greater things and a longing for new places led him and his young family over the mountains into what is now the state of Tennessee. There, on the banks of the Watauga River, Sevier led in the establishment of a settlement and rose to leadership among his fellow pioneers.

The rough life on the frontier was full of adventure and peril. By the time his exciting career ended, Nolichucky Jack had served as a militia leader, a congressman, the first governor of Tennessee, and a veteran of thirty-five battles with Indians and the British. When redcoat general Ferguson threatened to cross the mountains and burn the settlers’ homes unless they swore allegiance to King George, they turned to Nolichucky Jack to lead them. Sevier accepted the call and led them over the mountains to silence the threats of Ferguson in the bloody Battle of Kings Mountain.