While on a hunting trip with Mingo, Chief White Cloud of the Cherokee is assassinated and killed. Mingo is charged with keeping the peace between the Cherokee and the settlers, and must find the murderer to do so. But the killer may have befriended an unknowing Daniel.
An overdue Mingo-centered episode for the series. Ed Ames' character appears fairly frequently in seasons 1-2, and less so in 3-4; by the end of 4 Ames said he had done what he wanted with the role and left the show. Here he is given more of a protagonist's role for the hour, and the issue of tribal vs. Settler justice is litigated. Dan and Mingo had clashed on this before when Dan wanted a suspected Mingo to defend himself in a Boonesborough court. Villain/authority figure character actor John Larch is a believable trapper-interloper, and steel-eyed TV journeyman Michael Forest (Apollo in "Star Trek: TOS") is the requisite angry young tribesman.
No real historical backdrop here, but its the Cherokees' turn to undergo forced utilization of whatever Great Plains regalia was in the NBC prop warehouses. Clearly it was easier to fob off buffalo headdresses and prairie burial scaffolds than to depict mid-South Indians who in the late 18th century were taking on advanced agrarian practices and becoming known as one of the Five Civilized Tribes. (Which counted for little by the 1820's, when Andrew Jackson told them to pack up civilization and depart at bayonet point to Oklahoma.) And, lest we regret an absence of gratuity, the Shawnee show up for supplementary bad-guy duties in less than one dimensional form.
An assembly line around-the-fort episode with some enhanced production levels, and plenty of brawls at the tavern, the fort, and the tribal village. To that end the brawny physiques of Ames, Larch, and Fess Parker are used to good effect, but the hour is a missed opportunity to show some deeper tribal interaction.
