Word had come that Colonel Benjamin Logan was en route from Logan's Station (present-day Standford, Ky.) with 400 more Long Knives. Even in Logan's absence, upon finding the enemy gone, Todd and the other officers began laying a plan of pursuit. During their conference, Major McGary suggested that they remain at Bryan's until Logan came up. McGary was known to be unstable and hotheaded, but he was an intrepid Indian fighter. Cautious advice from him may have struck Colonel Todd as being out of character. In any case, Todd called McGary's suggestion 'timid' and proposed that the force set out at once, lest the Indian raiders escape. It was not the militia's habit to permit raiders to escape unharried, Todd reminded the officers. The reinforcements on hand, together with men from Bryan's, rode in pursuit. In all, they numbered fewer than 200. No one seems to have noticed that Todd's mild rebuke had stuck in McGary's craw, and as the pursuit advanced, the major's mercurial temper continued to rise.

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When retreating, the Indians usually broke up into small parties and took measures to hide their trails. Yet this group was traveling together and leaving a clear trail. They were, however, trying to conceal their numbers by walking in each other's footprints–indications that should have alarmed seasoned Indian fighters. As it happened, only Boone caught on. He warned the rest of the group that they were being lured into a trap. Boone, who was then 48, had earned a reputation as a keen woodsman and an uncannily accurate forecaster of Indian intentions. Unfortunately, this was one of those unaccountable times when experience and good sense–even the instinct for self-preservation–counted for naught in the heat of the moment. In any case, Boone's warning was disregarded by his comrades.

As the march progressed, the trail grew fresher. Early on August 19, two days after they had set out, the militiamen approached the salt deposits in northeastern Kentucky known as the Upper Blue Licks, in present-day Robertson County, some 48 miles northeast of Lexington (via U.S. 68). On a hilltop a half-mile beyond a ford over the Licking River, the pioneers spotted two warriors lounging in the open. The officers dismounted and conferred. Some concluded that the braves were stragglers lagging in the wake of the fleeing warriors, but Boone thought they were decoys. He was closely acquainted with the tangled landscape and knew danger lay ahead. The crest of the hill was, he warned, cut by gullies large enough to conceal the host of braves that was no doubt lurking there. The pursuers would do well to wait for Logan, he advised. Failing that, he added, they should at least send half their force upriver and take the Indians in a pincers movement.

Colonel Todd agreed with Boone. So did some of the junior officers, but not Major McGary, who truculently called Boone's courage into question. While Boone was angrily protesting, 'I guess I can go as far in an Indian fight as any man,' McGary remounted, brandished his rifle and spurred his horse into the water. 'Them that ain't cowards follow me,' he yelled, 'and I'll show where the yellow dogs are!'

In a regular army McGary would immediately have been placed under arrest. But the Long Knives were irregulars, militiamen typically short on discipline and long on impulse and dash. This, together with the high worth the militia set on their reputation for valor, may explain why McGary's challenge overpowered the irregulars' good sense. First the men at large, then the officers–including Boone–fell in behind the insubordinate major.

On the far bank the officers succeeded in forming the men into columns under Trigg, Todd and Boone. Then, except for a few officers who remained mounted, they left their horses at the river and pressed quickly up the hill on foot. The moment McGary and a score of Harrodsburg men in the van reached the crest, the 'yellow dogs' sprang the trap. Braves concealed behind rocks and trees on both flanks and in their front raised the war cry and opened fire. Of the entire van, only three men escaped the sudden fusillade.

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