USA > Tennessee > The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century: Comprising Its Settlement, as the. > Part 17
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Captain General of North-Carolina :
SIR : The many hostilities committed by the Cherokee and Creek In- dians on this frontier, since the departure of the gentlemen delegates from this county, merit your Excellency's consideration. I will give myself the pleasure to inform you of the particulars of this distressed place, and of our unhappy situation. There have been several murders committed lately, and on the 10th of this instant one Frederick Calvatt was shot and scalped, but is yet living ; and on the day following Capt. James Robertson pursued the enemy with nine men, killed one and re- took ten horses, and on his return in the evening was attacked by & party of Creeks and Cherokees, who wounded two of his men. Rob- ertson returned the fire very bravely, but was obliged to retreat on account of their superior numbers, still kept the horses and brought them in. On the 27th of March last, Col. Nathaniel Guess brought letters from the Governor of Virginia, which letters were sent by an Indian woman to the Cherokee nation, soliciting them to come in, in eighteen days, to treat for peace ; accordingly there came a party of about eighty-five fel- lows, (but none of the principal warriors that had first begun the war,) and at their arrival the commanding officer at Fort Patrick Henry sent for me to march some troops to that garrison, as a guard during the treaty. Accordingly I went, and on the 20th ult. the talks began, and the articles of the treaty were as follows : first, a copy of the governor's letter was read to them, promising them protection, such as ammuni- tion, provision, and men to build forts, and guard and assist them against any nation, white or red; and in return the Commissioners re- quired the same from them, to which the Indians replied, they could not fight against their Father, King George, but insisted on Col. Christian's promise to them last fall, that if they would make a peace they should lie neutral and no assistance be asked from them by the states. The Com- missioners then asked some of them to go to Williamsburgh, not as hos-
172
TREATY AT LONG ISLAND.
tages, but to see their goods delivered, to obviate any suspicion of false reports. A number of about ten agreed to go ; the Commissioners then told them that Virginia and South-Carolina gave them peace and pro- tection, and North-Carolina offered it : to which the Indians replied, they heard the talks from South Carolina, and they and the talks from Virginia were very good. The Indians then promised to try and bring in the Dragging Canoe and his party, (a party that lies out, and has refused to come in, but says they will hold fast to Cameron's talks,) and they still made no doubt but they could prevail on him, and said that he had sent his talk with them, and what they agreed to he would abide by. But the Little Carpenter, in private conversation with Capt. Thomas Price, contradicted it, and said that the Canoe and his party were fighting Capt. Robertson a few days before ; and the last day of the talks there arrived an express from Clinch River, informing us of two men being killed, to which the Indians replied, to keep a sharp look out, for there were a great many of their men out; and several of their women pre- sent declared that the talks was before the time to get guns and am- munition and continue the war as formerly. Accordingly they de- manded them, which was the finishing of the talk, and in sixty days they were to come in to treat and confirm the peace, and if they could not bring in the Dragging Canoe, they send word laying the blame of the late murder on the Creeks.
This, sir, is a true state of the whole proceedings of which I have the honour to inform your Excellency, conscious you will take every prudent method for our security.
I am, sir, your most obedient and most humble servant,
CHARLES ROBERTSON.
N. B. There has been to the number of about twelve persons killed, since the delegates departed.
X
But the Cherokee nation at large was reduced to great want and suffering. Their national pride being humbled and their martial spirit subdued, they made overtures of peace. Two separate treaties were made. The one at Dewitt's Corner with Commissioners from South-Carolina and Georgia, by which large cessions of country on the Sa- vannah and Saluda Rivers were made. The other was held, according to the agreement made between Col. Christain and several of the chiefs of the Over-hill Towns, at Long- Island. It was conducted by Waightstill Avery, Joseph Winton and Robert Lanier, Commissioners on the part of North-Carolina, and Col Preston, Col. Christian and Col. Evan Shelby on the part of Virginia, and the Head-men and warriors for the Cherokee Indians. By this treaty Brown's line was established as the boundary line between the con-
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173
CHICKAMAUGAS REFUSE TO SIGN THE TREATY.
tracting parties, and the Indians relinquished their lands as low down Holston as the mouth of Cloud's Creek.
During the progress of the negotiation, the Commissioners toproached the Cherokees with a breach of good faith, on account of some massacres that had been perpetrated du- ring the suspension of hostilities. They excused themselves by ascribing these murders to the Chickamaugas, a tribe settled on a creek of that name, whose chieftain, the Dragging Ca- noe,, had refused to accept of peace on the terms offered by Col. Christian.
The whole treaty and the proceedings during the negotia- tion, are found in Haywood, Appendix, page 488, and onward. It is deemed to be sufficient here to give the boundaries as agreed upon between North-Carolina and the Cherokees, as found in Article V of the treaty.
ARTICLE V.
That the boundary line between the State of North-Carolina and the said Over-hill Cherokees shall forever hereafter be and remain as follows, (to wit :) Beginning at a point in the dividing line which during this treaty hath been agreed upon between the said Over-hill Cherokees and the State of Virginia, where the line between that state and North-Carolina (hereafter to be extended) shall cross or intersect the same, running thence a right line to the north bank of Holston River at the mouth of Cloud's Creek, being the second creek below the Warrior's Ford, at the mouth of Carter's Valley, thence a right line to . the highest point of a mountain called the High Rock or Chimney Top, from thence a right line to the mouth of Camp Creek, otherwise called Mc'Nama's Creek, on the south bank of Nolichucky River, about ten miles or thereabouts below the mouth of Great Limestone, be the same more or less, and from the mouth of Camp Creek aforesaid a south-east course into the mountains which divide the hunting grounds of the middle settlements from those of the Over-hill Cherokees.
The Commissioners of North Carolina appointed Captain James Robertson temporary agent for North-Carolina, and in written instruc- tions directed him to repair to Chota in company with the warriors re- turning from the treaty, there to reside till otherwise ordered by the governor. He was to discover if possible, the disposition of the Drag- ging Canoe towards this treaty, as also, of Judge Friend, the Lying Fish and others, who did not attend it, and whether there was any danger of a renewal of hostilities by one or more of these chiefs. He was also to find out the conversations between the Cherokees and the southern, western and northern tribes of Indians. He was to search in all the Indian towns for persons disaffected to the American cause, and have them brought before some justice of the peace, to take the oath of fidelity to the United States, and in case of refusal to deal with them as the law directed. Travellers into the Indian nation without passes, such as the
·174
WATAUGA DYNASTY TERMINATES, AND THE
third article of the treaty required, were to be secured. He was imme- diately to get into possession all the horses, cattle and other property, belonging to the people of North-Carolina, and to cause them to be re- stored to their respective owners. He was to inform the government of all occurrences worthy of notice, to conduct himself with prudence and to obtain the favour and confidence of the chiefs ; and in all matters with respect to which, he was not particularly instructed, he was to exercise his own discretion, always keeping in view the honour and interest of the United States in general, and of North-Carolina in particular. These instructions were dated on the same day the treaty was signed, the 20th of July, 1777. The commissioners addressed a letter to the chiefs and warriors of the Middle, Lower and Valley towns, on the 21st of July, in- forming them of the treaty of peace which they had just signed, and of the intention of the comimssioners to recommend to the governor the holding of a treaty with them, of which he should give due notice to them of the time and place. They promised protection and safety to the chiefs and warriors who should attend it, and a suspension of hostili- ties in the meantime, and they requested that the messengers who should be sent from North-Carolina to their towns, might be protected from insult, be permitted to perform their business, and to return in safety.
In April of this year an act was passed by the Legislature 1777 of North-Carolina, for the encouragement of the mili- ( tia and volunteers in prosecuting the war against that part of the Cherokees who still persisted in hostilities. At the same session an act was passed for the establishment of courts of pleas and quarter sessions, and also for appointing and commissioning justices of the peace and sheriffs for the several courts in the district of Washington, in this state.
No frontier community had ever been better governed than the Watauga settlement. In war and in peace, without legisla- tors or judicial tribunals, except those adopted and provided by themselves, the settlers had lived in uninterrupted har- mony-acting justly to all, offering violence and injury to none. But the primitive simplicity of patriarchal life, as exhibited by a small settlement in a secluded wilderness, uncontaminated by contact with the artificial society of older communities, was forced to yield to the stern commands of progress and improvement. The hunter and pastoral stages of society were to be merged into the agricultural and commercial, the civil and political. Hereafter, Watauga, happy, independent, free and self-reliant, the cradle of the Great West, is merged into and becomes a part of North-Caro- lina ! .
175
RULE OF NORTH-CAROLINA BEGINS.
CHAPTER III.
TENNESSEE-AS PART OF NORTH-CAROLINA, AND THE PARTICIPATION OF HER PIONEERS IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.
THE general assembly of North-Carolina in November, seventeen hundred and seventy-seven, formed Washington dis- trict into a county of the same name, assigning to it the bound- aries of the whole of the present great State of Tennessee .* By an act passed at the same session, establishing Entry Ta- kers' offices in the several counties, " lands which have ac- crued or shall accrue to the state by treaty or conquest," are subject to entry, &o-t
At the same session of the assembly, provision was made for opening a land-office in Washington county, at the rate of forty shillings per hundred acres, with the liberal permission to each head of a family to take up six hundred and forty acres himself, one hundred acres for his wife, and the same quantity for each of his children. The law provided that the Watauga settlers should not be obliged to pay for their occu- pancies till January of 1779, and then for any surplus entered above the quantity before mentioned, the purchaser was re- quired to pay five pounds per hundred.#
The facility of taking up the choice lands of the country, induced great numbers of persons, principally those without means, to emigrate to the frontier. A poor man, with seldom more than a single pack-horse on which the wife and infant were carried, with a few clothes and bed-quilts, a skillet and a small sack of meal, was often seen wending his way along the narrow mountain trace, with a rifle upon his shoulder- the elder sons carrying an axe, a hoe, sometimes an auger
.For the boundaries of Washington county, and all counties subsequently erected out of it, see Appendix at end of volume.
+ Iredell's Revisal, page 292, chap. i., sec. 3.
+ Haywood.
176
CHARACTER OF PIONEERS.
and a saw, and the older daughters leading or carrying the smaller children. Without a dollar in his pocket when he arrived at the distant frontier, the emigrant became at once
. a large land-holder. Such men laid the foundation of society and government in Tennessee. They brought no wealth with them-but what was far better, they had industrious and fru- gal habits, they had hardihood and enterprise, and fearlessness · and self-reliance. With such elements in the character of its pioneers, any community will soon subdue the wilderness to the purposes of agriculture.
Hitherto emigrants had reached the new settlements upon pack-horses and along the old trading paths or narrow traces that had first been blazed by hunters. No wagon road had been opened across the mountains of North-Carolina to the West. The legislature of this year appointed commissioners to lay off and mark a road from the court-house of Washington county into the county of Burke. After that road was opened, emigrants of larger property began to reach the country, and some of the settlements assumed the appearance of greater comfort and thrift. The first house covered with shingles was put up this year. It stood a few miles east of the present Jonesboro', near "The Cottage," the residence of J. W. Deaderick, Esq.
Under the provisions of an act passed for encouraging the militia and volunteers to prosecute the war against the In- dians, the militia of Washington county was, for the greater part of this year, in the service of the state. This enabled every able-bodied man between eighteen and fifty years of age to secure the lands he wished to own. It had the fur- ther effect of keeping the frontier well guarded. Companies of rangers were kept upon the most exposed points to scour the woods and cane-brakes, and to pursue and disperse small parties of ill-disposed Indians who, hovering about the settle- ments, occasionally killed and plundered the inhabitants. Under the protection of these rangers, the settlements were widened and extended down Nollichucky below the mouth of Big Limestone, and down Holston to the treaty line. Indeed, the frontiers were so well guarded that the Indians consi- dered their incursions as perilous to themselves as they could
177
REINFORCEMENT FROM HOLSTON TO BOONESBOROUGH.
be to the white inhabitants, and for a great part of the year forbore to make them .*
John Carter was appointed Colonel of Washington county,
§ and in the execution of his duties as commandant, his 1777 authority had been interfered with by men acting under the orders of General Rutherford. Bringing this subject to the notice of Governor Caswell, Col. Carter uses this inde- pendent language: "Your Excellency may be assured that I will do everything in my power for regulating the militia, for the defence of our frontier, and for the benefit of the United States, but if my dignity is to be sported with under those circumstances, I have no need of your commission as commanding officer for Washington District.
"N. B. I have just received intelligence of the Little Carpenter being at the Long Island, with twenty-five or thirty young warriors. They declare the greatest friendship, and say they have five hundred young warriors ready to come to the assistance of Virginia and North-Carolina when called for, if to fight the English or any Indiaus that want war with the white people of these two states."
During the summer of this year the Indians invaded the Kentucky settlements. On the 4th of July two hundred of them appeared before Boonesborough and commenced one of the most memorable sieges in the annals of border war- fare. It continued till September, although relieved by a reinforcement of forty riflemen from 'Holston. During the siege an Indian was killed, and upon his body was found a proclamation by Henry Hamilton, British Lieutenant-Go- vernor and Commandant at Detroit, in which he offered pro- tection to such of the inhabitants as would abandon the cause of the revolted colonies, but denounced vengeance against those who should adhere to them. Captain Logan, with a select party of woodsmen, left the fort by night and set out for Holston to procure further supplies and reinforcements. With a sack of parched corn for their fare, Logan's party, travelling by night, on foot, by unfrequented ways, and con- cealing themselves in secluded vallies by day, eventually
. Haywood.
12
178
WARM SPRINGS DISCOVERED.
succeeded in making the journey of two hundred miles, appealed to the patriotism of the pioneers of Tennessee, and returned to the relief of the beleaguered forts with supplies and one hundred riflemen .*
During this summer two of the spies that were kept out in
1778 ( advance of the settlements, viz, Henry Reynolds and Thomas Morgan, discovered the Warm Springs on French Broad. They had pursued some stolen horses to the point opposite, and leaving their own horses on the north bank, waded across the river. As they reached the southern shore they passed through a little branch, the tepid water of which attracted their attention. The next year the Warm Springs were resorted to by invalids.
The frontier people had been so far relieved from appre- hension of Indian hostility, as to dispense during the summer of this year, with a portion of the guards heretofore main- tained for their protection. These were disbanded and re- turned to the quiet pursuits of planting and working their crops. They were lulled into a false security and had neg- lected to take the usual measures of protection and defence, which the exposed condition of the border settlements de- manded. This relaxation of their ordinary watchfulness and care, invited aggression and a renewal of the outrages and massacres which had been before experienced. The settle- ments being thus thrown off their guard, a portion of the militia discharged and little or no regular armed force being at hand, another source of annoyance and injury presented itself. The tories from the disaffected counties of North- Carolina and other states, had come in great numbers to the frontier, and there combining with thieves and robbers, prowled around the feebler neighbourhoods, and for a time committed depredation and murder with impunity. Their number was considerable, and they boasted that they were able to look down all opposition and to defy all restraint.
In this emergency we have again to mention another in- stance of self-reliance, so characteristic of the pioneer people. A combination of lawless men had been formed, formidable alike for their number and for their desperate character. The
* Monette.
179
SUMMARY PUNISHMENT OF TORIES.
laws could not reach ; them they escaped equally detection and punishment.
The law-abiding and honest people of the country took the affair into their own hands, appointed a committee, invested it with unlimited power, and authorized it to adopt any mea- sure necessary to arrest the growing evil. The names of this committee of safety are not given, but it is known that under its direction and authority two companies of dragoons, num- bering about thirty each, were immediately organized and equipped, and were directed to patrol the whole country, capture and punish with death all suspected persons, who refused submission or failed to give good security for their appearance before the committee. Slighter offences were atoned for by the infliction of corporeal punishment; to this was superadded, in cases where the offender was able to pay it, a heavy fine in money. Leaders in crime expiated their guilt by their lives. Several of these were shot ; some of them at their execution disclosed the names and hiding places of their accomplices. These were in their turn pursued, arrested and punished, and the country was in less than two months restored to a condition of safety, and the disturbers of its quiet preserved their lives only by secrecy or flight.
Isam Yearley, a loyalist on Nollichucky, was driven out of the country by a company of whigs, of which Captain Wm. Bean, Isaac Lane, Sevier and Robertson, were members. The same company afterwards pursued a party of tories, who under the lead of Mr. Grimes, on Watauga, had killed Millican, a whig, and attempted to kill Mr. Roddy and Mr. Grubbs. The latter they had taken to a high pinnacle on the edge of the river, and threatened to throw him off. He was respited under a promise that they should have all his property. These tories were concealed high up Watauga in the mountain, but Captain Bean and his whig comrades fer- retted them out, fired upon and wounded their leader, and forced them to escape across the mountain. Capt. Grimes was hung after King's Mountain battle, in which he was taken prisoner .*
* Others of Bean's company were Joseph Duncan, John Condley, Thomas Hardi- man, Wm. Stone, Michael Massingale, John and George Bean, Edmond Bean, Aquilla and Isaac Lane, James Roddy, and Samuel and Robert Tate.
180
COURTS CONFISCATE THE PROPERTY OF TORIES.
The occasion for this summary mode of preserving order and promoting the welfare of the people, having thus been removed, the committee laid down its functions and ceased to exist. It had accomplished the purposes for which it had been created, and the extraordinary powers with which the sovereign people had invested it, were surrendered, and jus- tice was again administered through the regular channels.
The exercise of these rigorous and sanguinary measures may be, at this day, viewed by some with a degree of disap- probation and regret. This feeling, however, will be quali- fied by a recollection of the peculiar condition of the new community in which they transpired, and the circumstances of the general country at the period of their adoption. :Wicked and unprincipled men had chosen to commit their outrages and depredations upon infant settlements, feeble, immature and just germinating into political life. They had selected, too, a period for perpetrating their crimes, when the whole energies of their patriotic countrymen across the mountain were called into requisition in support of the con- flict for Independence ; and it is a proud reflection, that in these times of trial and embarrassment, patriotism, enlarged and lofty, was the sentiment of the pioneers of Tennessee. Their courage never quailed, and their energies never faltered amid the gloom that enveloped their Atlantic coun- trymen. Under these difficulties at home, under such dis- couragements abroad, did the patriots of Nollichucky and Watauga discharge their high duties to themselves and to their bleeding country. The tories were hunted up and pun- ished or drivent from amongst them, while the refugee whigs were cordially welcomed, and found shelter and protection in these distant retreats.
The energetic conduct of the people and the patriotic impul- ses that engendered it, received also the cordial sanction and concurrence of the legal tribunals of the country. In some instances the action of the county courts may have assumed or encroached upon the legislative prerogative. Some ex- tracts from the Journals of the first courts held in the country, may not be uninteresting to the curious, and are here pre- served :
.
181
FIRST RECORDS OF WASHINGTON COUNTY.
" WASHINGTON COUNTY, Feb. 23 .- COURT JOURNALS .- At a court begun and held for the county of Washington, Feb. 23, 1778, Present, John Carter, Chairman, John Sevier, Jacob Womack, Robert Lucas, Andrew Greer, John Shelby, George Russell, Wm. Been, Zachariah Isbell, John McNabb, Thomas Houghton, William Clark, John McMahan, Ben- jamin Gist, John Chisholm, Joseph Willson, Wm. Cobb, James Stuart, Michael Woods, Richard White, Benjamin Willson, James Robertson and Valentine Sevier, Esqs. On Tuesday, next day, John Sevier was chosen Clerk of the county ; Valentine Sevier, Sheriff; James Stuart, Surveyor; John Carter, Entry-Taker ; John McMahan, Register, ; Jacob Womack, Stray-Master and John McNabb, Coroner.
" Wm. Cocke, by W. Avery, moved to be admitted Clerk of Washing- ton county, which motion was rejected by the Court, knowing that John Sevier is entitled to the office.
"THE STATE U8. - IN TORYISM. defendant be imprisoned during the pre- sent war with Great Britain, and the Sheriff take the whole of his estate into custody, which must be valued by a jury at the next court-one half of said estate to be kept by said Sheriff for the use of the State, and the other half to be remitted to the family of defendant."
It is the opinion of the court that the
The court thus exhibited a marked instance of judgment and mercy in the same Order-combining patriotism with justice and humanity.
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