What happened in western NC in the fall of 1776?

In the fall of 1776, in the western part of North Carolina, it was witnessed a retaliatory expedition taken against the Cherokee. A large force of North Carolina militia led by Brigadier General Griffith Rutherford and supported by a secondary force of South Carolina militiamen marched into the far southwestern counties of North Carolina laying waste to Cherokee villages. This action was officially sanctioned by the Continental Congress in retaliation for Cherokee raids that previous summer in the Catawba and Yadkin River valleys. Nevertheless, many western North Carolina militiamen probably saw the operation as a potential land grab.