"Daniel Boone" Cain's Birthday: Part 2 (TV Episode 1965) Poster

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8/10
Defending the Fort
gordonl5626 April 2014
Warning: Spoilers
DANIEL BOONE – Cain's Birthday – Part two -1965

This is the 26th episode of the long running 1964-70 series about the life of American frontiersman and explorer, Daniel Boone. The lead is played by Fess Parker. Also in the mix are Albert Salmi, Ed Ames, Patricia Blair, Veronica Cartwright and Darby Hinton.

This particular episode is the second of a two part story arc. I am including both parts in the write-up.

Fess Parker and a group of men from Fort Booneborough are out at the salt lick. They are there to boil up enough salt to get them through the winter. Boone (Fess Parker) is scouting around the site with Cherokee scout, Ed Ames. A French officer, Cesare Davona comes out of woods with a large group of natives. He calls on the men to surrender.

The men are most reluctant to do so despite the long odds. Danova now shoves a prisoner out into view. It is Parker. The Indians had captured him a bit earlier. Parker tells the Boonesborough men to lay down their arms. This, the group does, and are lead off to a camp. Watching from the woods is scout Ames, who had escaped capture when Parker had been grabbed up.

It appears that Davona is out trying a bit of Empire building. He is building an alliance of various tribes to chase the white folks off. He is supplying weapons and gunpowder to all who join. He already has 2-3 tribes with him. He just needs the big war chief of the Creeks to join him. The man, Ted De Corsia, is not sure the alliance would work. He tells Davona that he needs proof it will work.

Davona tells De Corsia he will now take Fort Booneborough and put everyone to the sword. Mingo, Ed Ames hotfoots it back to the Fort to warn the remaining settlers. There is hope help will come soon because a request for soldiers had been sent out the week before.

The help, when it arrives, turns out to be two men, British officer, Alan Napier and his aide. The local women folk are soon all put through some quick weapons training. They will need to man the fort walls if an attack comes.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, err, Indian camp, Parker has pulled a fast one and escaped. He also hotfoots to the fort to join in the defence. He immediately clashes with British officer, Napier, about the fort defence. Napier is all for surrendering when Davona offers terms. Parker knows better and tells Napier that would lead to a massacre.

Boone (Parker) then has an idea on how to equal the odds against the horde of natives outside the fort. They fashion a cannon out of a stout log wrapped in bands of iron. The natives under Davona attack, the fort gate is opened and the Indians jam up at the fort entrance. The cannon, loaded with chunks of glass, metal and rocks, is fired point blank into the attacking force, decimating it.

The surviving Indians decide they have had more than enough strife for the day. The alliance breaks up and Davona is left alone. So much for building his empire.

By no means is this a complete review. I left out quite a bit of the story and just threw together a general outline of the story.

(B/W)
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Good, and a heart warming B-plot .
oscar-3526 August 2013
Warning: Spoilers
*Spoiler/plot- Daniel Boone, Cain's Birthday- Part 2, 1965. A french officer wishes to capture Boonesborough and it's valley by using many American Indian tribes to supply the army. He doesn't count on Daniel Boone and his neighbors craftiness and resolve. He loses.

*Special Stars- Fess Parker, Albert Salmi, Ed Ames, Patricia Blair, Darby Hinton, Veronica Cartwright. Guest Star- Cesare Danova, Alan Napier *Theme- Standing up to tyrants is everyones decision.

*Trivia/location/goofs- TV show episode. The first eps of a two part story. Locations: 20th Century Fox Ranch, Las Virgenes Blvd or Malibu Canyon park is where these stream and rocky out cropping shots took place. That is where many famous 20th Century Fox shows: shot TV's 'MASH' and the TV show & feature film 'Planet of the Apes'. That rocky outcropping of geological 'conglomerate' materials is famous with university geology academics and goes through the Santa Monica Mts chain. The fort was on the sound stage and wide Fort outdoors shots at the Iverson Ranch in Chatsworth, Calif. When they open the fort doors too WIDE, you can clearly see into an empty fort. The wall was a facade with nothing in back of it, just wide landscapes and tree topped oak hills miles beyond.

*Emotion- A highly dramatic story involving a foreign attack on Booneborough accompanied by many differing Anmerican Indian tribes of the time. Some fine script writing with Daniel Boone using his cunning and guile to keep the town safe until help arrives by the British. A heart warming B-plot involving the female town citizens and their issues are delightful to see in this male dominated TV show. Also there's a small scene of Isreal Boone playing his bedtime prayers to God that is charming.

*Based On- Daniel Boone legends during the 1700's.
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10/10
Kentucky Thermopylae
militarymuseu-883998 January 2024
In Part 2 of Season 1's mini-action epic, Daniel and a reduced Boonesborough garrison are besieged by the Comte de Michelet's tribal coalition, and a gunpowder shortage plus lack of reinforcements have left the issue in doubt.

Joining the fight is not Batman, but Alfred - in particular Alan Napier as British Colonel Hubert Crater, Napier being the Dark Knight's consigliere in the 1960's ABC series. He does a courtly turn as a tea-sipping but formidable Empire warrior. Assisting him is TV journeyman Booth Colman as Private Simpsey, who will go on to two more DB appearances. Unfortunate that Cesar Danova's Comte de Michelet could not be brought back as a returning character, but this and the previous are the only DB episodes in which the French Bourbons are portrayed as adversaries.

The playbook from John Wayne's "The Alamo" is liberally borrowed from here, incorporating palisade fighting (Rebecca gets a coonskin cap and musket!) , midnight raids, and a desperate wait for reinforcements. But the historical backdrop is the core of the story, dissected as follows:

* Boone is referenced as a captain of militia. The real Boone was a captain by 1774, and a lieutenant colonel by 1780.

* Colonel Crater arrives from British-held Fort Detroit, not a Crown bastion until after the French and Indian War.

* But Michelet refers to "allegiance to the French crown," implying some form of the Anglo-French contest is still underway. Michelet gives Boonesborough a Bourbon banner as a temporary flag of truce.

* Boone notes Michelet was at the siege of Fort William Henry, New York, in which a British surrender turned into a partial Indian massacre.

* Yadkin builds a one-shot cannon out of a hollowed oak log wrapped by iron wagon rims. No historical precedent I am aware of, but intriguing- it might work if you kept the powder charge minimal.

Redcoat report - Crater and Simpsey are said to be Royal Welch Fusiliers, but the regiment was on European service in the 1760's. Again impossible to tell uniform color in black and white, but a reasonable assumption can be made that they are wearing red with blue facings - RWF-correct, and these colors will show up frequently in later DB episodes.

The hour sports well-paced action throughout, and a rousing matinee denouement. The episode takes the crown as the best DB outing of Season 1.
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