In an angry memorial to the Board in December, 1716,47 Boone and Berresford roundly charged the Virginians with encouraging the war on South Carolina. [Note 47 C.O.] Else why were the Virginians buying Indian trading-guns, which they never before had required? The custom house books, they declared, showed large quantities of deerskins recently imported from Virginia 'which must be bought of Indians that are at Warr with Carolina, their trade with Their Neighbour Indians never having produced such Quantities, and can be no other than the Stores the Indians plundered from the Carolina traders and sold to them.' The special object of their attack was Spotswood's Indian trading company of 1716. Through this enterprise the ambitious royal governor was suspected of seeking to wrest from Carolina, in her extremity, the remnants of her great southern Indian trade. Moreover, Spotswood's exploring efforts in 1716 to open a route through the Blue Ridge were thought to be aimed specifically at the acquisition of the Cherokee trade. 48 [Note 48 C.O.]