between 30 and 40 of the Cherokee warriors. Later, the Virginians claimed bounties for the scalps, saying they were Shawnee. War While some Cherokee leaders still called for peace, others led retaliatory raids on outlying English pioneer settlements. The Cherokee finally declared open war against the British in 1759. A number of Muskogee under Big Mortar moved up to Coosawatie. These people had long been French allies in support of the Cherokee pro-French faction centered in Great Tellico. The governor of South Carolina, William Henry Lyttelton, embargoed all gunpowder shipments to the Cherokee and raised an army of 1,100 men which marched to confront the Lower Towns of the Cherokee. Desperate for ammunition for their fall and winter hunts, the nation sent a delegation of moderate chiefs to negotiate. The twenty-nine chiefs were taken prisoner as hostages and sent to Fort Prince George, escorted by the provincial army. Lyttleton thought this would ensure peace. Governor Lyttleton returned to Charleston, but the Cherokee were still angry, and continued to attack frontier settlements into 1760. In February 1760, they attacked Fort Prince George in an attempt to rescue their hostages. The fort's commander was killed. His replacement massacred all of the hostages and fended off the attack. The Cherokee also attacked Fort Ninety Six, but it withstood the siege. The Cherokee expanded their retaliatory campaign into North Carolina, as far east as modern day Winston-Salem. An attack on Fort Dobbs in North Carolina was repulsed by General Hugh Waddell. However, lesser settlements in the North and South Carolina back-country quickly fell to Cherokee raids. Governor Lyttleton appealed for help to Jeffery Amherst, the British commander in North America. Amherst sent Archibald Montgomerie with an army of 1,200 troops (the Royal Scots and Montgomerie's Highlanders) to South Carolina. Montgomerie's campaign razed some of the Cherokee Lower Towns, including Keowee. It ended with a defeat at Echoee (Itseyi) Pass when Montgomerie tried to enter the Middle Towns territory. Later in 1760, the Overhill Cherokee defeated the British colonists at Fort Loudoun and took it over. In 1761, Montgomerie was replaced by British army officer James Grant. He led an army of 2,600 men (the largest force to enter the southern Appalachians to date) against the Cherokee. His army moved through the Lower Towns, defeated the Cherokee at Echoee Pass, and proceeded to raze about 15 Middle Towns while burning fields of crops along the