The Story of David Crockett

"Be sure you are right, then go ahead," was Davy Crockett's famous motto. Davy himself lived up to it to the best of his ability, although in those rough-and-ready pioneer days it was not always easy to discover what was "right." Crockett was born in East Tennessee, over a century ago, when the country was little more than a wilderness. His father was a tavern keeper, and the boy early came in contact with the roving characters who passed by. He was bound out to a cattle drover headed for Virginia, and as a boy of twelve made his way back home across hundreds of miles of wild country. He grew up as a crack shot and a fearless hunter, either of wild game or of Indians. He was elected to Congress, where he made a picturesque figure, but soon returned to the frontier, his natural habitat. Then he went down to Texas to help that State achieve its independence. The whole world is familiar with the story of the Alamo—how a handful of men braved the Mexican Army until the last defender was slain. One of the very last to fall was Davy Crockett—facing the enemy to the last. No hero in fiction ever led a more colorful life—as the present writer shows. The story is replete with adventure from first to last, but is founded closely on fact.