T. S. Phelps's memoir of the time described the settlement as: …on a point, or rather a small peninsula, projecting from the eastern shore, and about two miles (3 km) from the mouth of Duwamish River, debouching at the head of the bay.

The northern part of this peninsula is connected with the mainland by a low neck of marshy ground, and about one-sixteenth of a mile from its southeastern extremity a firm, hard sand-pit nearly joined it to the adjacent shore, severed only by a narrow channel through which the surplus waters of an inclosed swamp escaped into the bay.

The south and west sides rose abruptly from the beach, forming an embankment from three to fifteen feet high; and proceeding thence northerly, the ground undulated for an eighth of a mile, when it gradually sloped towards the swamp and neck.At the intersection of the latter with the main, and overlooking the water, rose a mound about thirty feet above the level of the bay; and to the eastward through a depression in the hills, and passing the head of the swamp, was a broad Indian trail leading to Lake Duwamish [now Lake Washington], distant two and a half miles.

[3]Phelps remarks that the tailings from Henry Yesler's recently erected mill were steadily filling in the marshy land at the north of the head or peninsula where the settlement was located.

The third division, Lieutenant Phelps, occupied that portion of the neck lying between the swamp and mound east of Yesler's place, to secure the approaches leading from the lake, and the marines, under Sergeant Carbine, garrisoned the block-house.The divisions, thus stationed, left a gap between the second and third, which the width and impassable nature of the swamp at this place rendered unnecessary to close, thereby enabling a portion of the town to be encompassed which otherwise would have been exposed.The distance between the block-house and Southeast Point, following the sinuosities of the bay and swamp shores, was three-quarters of a mile, to be defended by ninety-six men, eighteen marines, and five officers, leaving Gunner Stocking, Carpenter Miller, Clerks Francis and Ferguson, and fifteen men with Lieutenant Middleton, to guard the ship.

[3]Washington Territory Governor Isaac Ingalls Stevens' ambitious treaty-making during 1854 and 1855 has been held to be the cause of the Puget Sound War.

The battle was part of a Native American uprising in resistance to the pressure to cede land for reservations determined by territorial officials.

[6] The sloop Decatur had been called to Puget Sound both because of the trouble with local natives and to deter frequent raids by an alliance of the northern Haida from the Queen Charlotte Islands and the Tongass group of the Tlingit, from what was then Russian America.

[3] Decatur lay at anchor in deep water, in a position from which it had total command of the settlement with 16 shipborne 32-pounder cannons firing fused shells.

On the evening of January 22, with Decatur having taken a commanding position, the militia leaders declared that "they would not serve longer while there was a ship in port to protect them".

Phelps writes that "a more reckless, undisciplined set of men has seldom been let loose to prey upon any community than these eighty embryo soldiers upon Seattle… after much rough argument about thirty of their number became partially convinced that their individual safety depended upon unity of action under a competent leader, and they finally consented to form a company, provided Mr. Peixotto would consent to serve as captain.

[3] Phelps lists the hostile natives as including the "Kliktat" (Klickitat and Spokane), "Palouse" (Palus), Walla-Walla, "Yakami" (Yakama), Kamialk, Nisqually, Puyallup, "Lake" (Duwamish-related, living near Lake Washington), "and other tribes, estimated at six thousand warriors, marshaled under the three generals-in-chief Coquilton, Owhi, and Lushi, assisted by many subordinate chiefs."

They set out a plan to kill all of the settlers and U.S. military; Curley requested that his friend Henry Yesler be allowed to live, but accepted being overruled in the matter.

But Yark-eke-e-man convinced the raiders to try a mid-morning attack, using a small decoy force to draw the Decatur's men out of the well-defended areas to do battle on First Hill.

Curley's sister (and Yark-eke-e-man's mother) Li-cu-mu-low ("Nancy"), whom Phelps describes as "short, stout, and incapable of running," warned as she headed for her canoe that the Kliktat were gathered around Tom Pepper's house, which was in the forest, near the crest of First Hill.

There "Sergeant Carbine several times charged them out of one door, to return as often by the other, till, wearying of the trouble, he left them to cower behind the wooden bulwarks, protected from the bullets of the foe.

Phelps describes "the incessant rattle of small-arms, and an uninterrupted whistling of bullets, mingled with the furious yells of the Indians," but there were few casualties.

A settler was killed when he ducked from behind a stump to get some drinking water;[3] Clarence Bagley, quoting William Bell two days after the event, says the casualty was Christian White; Phelps, writing 17 years later, says it was Robert Wilson.

[3] Two days after the battle, Coquilton threatened, through a messenger, "that within one moon he would return with twenty thousand warriors, and, attacking by land and water, destroy the place in spite of all the war-ship could do to prevent."

Henry Yesler volunteered ship's cargo of house lumber, and on February 1 Decatur's divisions began a two-week project to erect a defensive palisade: two fences five feet high, placed eighteen inches apart, and filled in with well-tamped earth, 1,200 yards (1,100 m) long, and enclosing a large portion of the town.

[3] Trees and undergrowth were removed (variously attacked with levers, axes, and shovels, or burned in place) to provide an esplanade and enable Decatur's howitzer to sweep the shores.

Furthermore, Governor Stevens had convinced Patkanim and his men to take on the role of bounty hunters, paying them handsomely for collecting the scalps of leaders of the hostile tribes.

Rather, he writes that "both sides were dismayed, the whites by the realization that the enemy really would attack a town, the Indians by their first experience with exploding shells rather than cannonballs.

[6] Jack Drew, a deserter from the Decatur, was shot and killed by young Milton Holgate, a settler's son, when he tried to enter the latter's cabin.

Phelps characterizes the low casualties as "incredible" and "miraculous", given that "one hundred and sixty men were for seven hours exposed to an almost uninterrupted storm of bullets".