Long ago a powerful unknown tribe invaded the country from the
southeast, killing people and destroying settlements wherever they
went. No leader could stand against them, and in a little while
they had wasted all the lower settlements and advanced into the
mountains. The warriors of the old town of Nikwasi', on the head
of Little Tennessee, gathered their wives and children into the
townhouse and kept scouts constantly on the lookout for the presence
of danger. One morning just before daybreak the spies saw the enemy
approaching and at once gave the alarm. The Nikwasi' men seized
their arms and rushed out to meet the attack, but after a long,
hard fight they found themselves overpowered and began to retreat,
when suddenly a stranger stood among them and shouted to the chief to
call off his men and he himself would drive back the enemy. From the
dress and language of the stranger the Nikwasi' people thought him a
chief who had come with reinforcements from the Overhill settlements
in Tennessee. They fell back along the trail, and as they came near
the townhouse they saw a great company of warriors coming out from
the side of the mound as through an open doorway. Then they knew that
their friends were the Nûñne'hi, the Immortals, although no one had
ever heard before that they lived under Nikwasi' mound.
The Nûñne'hi poured out by hundreds, armed and painted for the fight,
and the most curious thing about it all was that they became invisible
as soon as they were fairly outside of the settlement, so that although
the enemy saw the glancing arrow or the rushing tomahawk, and felt
the stroke, he could not see who sent it. Before such invisible foes
the invaders soon had to retreat, going first south along the ridge
to where joins the main ridge which separates the French Broad from
the Tuckasegee, and then turning with it to the northeast. As they
retreated they tried to shield themselves behind rocks and trees,
but the Nûñne'hi arrows went around the rocks and killed them from
the other side, and they could find no hiding place. All along the
ridge they fell, until when they reached the head of Tuckasegee not
more than half a dozen were left alive, and in despair they sat down
and cried out for mercy. Ever since then the Cherokee have called the
place Dayûlsûñ'yi, "Where they cried." Then the Nûñne'hi chief told
them they had deserved their punishment for attacking a peaceful tribe,
and he spared their lives and told them to go home and take the news
to their people. This was the Indian custom, always to spare a few
to carry back the news of defeat. They went home toward the north
and the Nûñne'hi went back to the mound.
And they are still there, because, in the last war, when a strong
party of Federal troops came to surprise a handful of Confederates
posted there they saw so many soldiers guarding the town that they
were afraid and went away without making an attack.
There is another story, that once while all the warriors of a certain
town were off on a hunt, or at a dance in another settlement, one
old man was chopping wood on the side of the ridge when suddenly
a party of the enemy came upon him--Shawano, Seneca, or some other
tribe. Throwing his hatchet at the nearest one, he turned and ran for
the house to get his gun and make the best defense that he might. On
coming out at once with the gun he was surprised to find a large
body of strange warriors driving back the enemy. It was no time for
questions, and taking his place with the others, they fought hard
until the enemy was pressed back up the creek and finally broke and
retreated across the mountain. When it was over and there was time
to breathe again, the old man turned to thank his new friends, but
found that he was alone--they had disappeared as though the mountain
had swallowed them. Then he knew that they were the Nûñne'hi, who
had come to help their friends, the Cherokee.