The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century: Comprising Its Settlement, as the., Part 9

Author: Ramsey, J. G. M. (James Gettys McGready), 1797-1884
Publication date: 1853
Publisher: Charleston : J. Russell
Number of Pages: 776

USA > Tennessee > The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century: Comprising Its Settlement, as the. > Part 9

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The Cherokee tribe is closely identified with the settlement and history of Tennessee. Their nation, and some of their villages, are frequently mentioned in the accounts of De Soto's invasion, and the journals of other explorers and adventurers into the interior of the south-west. They were formidable alike for their numbers and their passion for war.

MARTIAL SPIRIT OF CHEROKEES.

The frontier of Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia, all suf- fered from their vigour and their enterprise ; and these pages will hereafter abound with instances of their revenge, their perfidy, and their courage. They were the mountaineers of aboriginal America, and, like all other mountaineers, adored their country, and held on to and defended it with a heroic devotion-a patriotic constancy, and an unyielding tenacity, which cannot be too much admired or eulogized.

-" Si Pergama dextra Defendi possent: etiam hac defensa fuissent."

The native land of the Cherokee was the most inviting and beautiful section of the United States, lying upon the sources of the Catawba and the Yadkin-upon Keowee, Tugaloo, Flint, Etowah and Coosa, on the east and south, and several of the tributaries of the Tennessee on the west and north.

This tribe, inhabiting the country from which the southern confluents of the Tennessee spring, gave their name, at first to that noble stream. In the earlier maps, the Tennessee is called the Cherokee river. In like manner, the name of this tribe also designated the mountains near them. Currahee is only a corruption of Cherokee, and in the maps and trea- ties where it is thus called, it means the mountains of the Cherokees.

Of the martial spirit of this tribe, abundant evidence will be hereafter given. In the hazardous enterprises of war, they were animated by a restless spirit which goaded them into new exploits, and to the acquisition of a fresh stock of mar- tial renown. The white people, for some years previous to 1730, interposed their good offices to bring about a pacifica- tion between them and the Tuscaroras, with whom they had long waged incessant war. The reply of the Cherokees was : " We cannot live without war. Should we make peace with the Tuscaroras, we must immediately look out for some other, with whom we can be engaged in our beloved occu- pation." Actuated by the restless activity of this sentiment, there have been but few intervals in the history of the Chero- kees, when they have permitted themselves to sink into the inglorious arms of peace, and to be employed only in the

ORREKS EXPELLED.

less perilous slaughter of the wild beasts of the wilderness. They have hardly ever ceased to sigh for danger, and to aspire to the rank which is attained by acts of heroic valour .* Under the promptings of this feeling, they have, at different times, been engaged in war against the colonists of England, of France, and of Spain, and also against other Indian tribes, with varied success. They assisted in the reduction of Fort Du Quesne ; they besieged and captured Fort Loudon ; they met the entire tribe of the Uchees, at the Uchee Old Fields, in what is now Rhea county, and, exterminating all its war- riors, compelled the surviving remnant of that brave race to retreat to Florida, where they became incorporated with the Seminoles.

The Cherokees have a tradition, that when their tribe first crossed the Alleghanies, and settled upon the Little Tennes- see river, some Creeks had previously occupied the country near the mouth of the Hiwassee river. Being near neigh- bours, the latter pretended to enter into alliance with the former, in a war which they were then carrying on against the Shawnees, but secretly abetted the common enemy. Their treachery became known to the Cherokees while cele- brating one of their national festivals at Chota, when they fell suddenly upon the unsuspecting Creeks, and cut them off. A general war between these two tribes succeeded, and was carried on with such vigour as to cause the Creeks to abandon all their settlements and villages on the waters of Tennessee, and to leave them in the undisturbed possession of the Cherokees. Indeed, the latter pushed their conquests as far as the great Creek Path, and then crossed over to Coosa, where, at a large settlement on an island, they by stratagem drew the Creeks from their towns, in a fleet of canoes, to a place on the bank of Coosa, where they lay in ambush, captured the canoes and all the Creek warriors, sacked their towns, and massacred the defenceless inhabi- tants. The English name of the leader of this excursion was Bullhead. Cherokee tradition abounds with instances of the exploits performed by this Brave against the Creeks.

These continued successes of the Cherokees made them . Haywood's Aboriginal History.

CHOTA-A CITY OF REFUGE.

quarrelsome, arrogant and incautious. They took offence at the Chickasaws, with whom they had confederated in the expulsion of the Shawnees, and in prosecution of a hostile invasion of their country, had advanced as far as the Chicka- saw Old Fields. The inoffensive but brave owners of the country, there met the invaders with great spirit. A terrible conflict ensued. The Cherokees were defeated, and withdrew by the way of the Cumberland river and the Cany Fork, to their own villages. This signal overthrow of the flower of the Cherokee nation, took place about 1769-the period when the first white settlement was being formed on Wa- tanga, and, doubtless, contributed much to the pacific demea- nour manifested for some years by the neighbouring Indians to that infant, feeble and secluded community. The favoura- ble moment was lost, when the young Hercules might have been strangled in his cradle, by a slight exertion of the usual vigilance and enterprise of the Indian sachem and warrior. A germ of the Anglo-American family was permitted to take root and to grow for a time, unmolested by Cherokee opposi- tion, and unrestrained by savage wariness and caution.

Every Indian tribe, according to Adair, has a house or town of refuge, which is a sure asylum to protect a man-slayer, or the unfortunate captive, if he can once enter into it.

Among the Cherokees, Chota, five miles above the ruins of Fort Loudon, was their city of refuge. At this place an Englishman took refuge and found protection, after killing an Indian warrior in defence of his property. His dwelling- house being near to Chota, the English trader resolved, after remaining in the city of refuge some months, to return home ; but he was assured by the head men, that although perfectly safe where he then was, it would be not only dangerous but fatal to him, if he attempted to remove thence. The Indians will revenge blood for blood, unless in some particular case, where the eldest kinsman of the slain is allowed to redeem or pardon.

Among the distinguished Cherokees, was Oconostota. Of him Adair says : "Before the last war, Old Hop, who was helpless and lame, presided over the whole nation, as Archi- magus, and lived in Chota, their only town of refuge."

EUPHONY AND BEAUTY OF INDIAN NAMES .

Speaking of the Indian's passion for revenge, Adair says : "I have known them to go a thousand miles for the purpose of revenge, in pathless woods, over hills and mountains, through large cane swamps, full of grape-vines and briars, over broad lakes, rapid rivers and deep creeks; and all the way endan- gered by poisonous snakes, if not with the rambling and lurk- ing enemy-while, at the same time, they were exposed to the extremities of heat and cold, the vicissitudes of the season, to hunger and thirst-both by chance and their religious scanty method of living when at war-to fatigues and other difficul- ties. Such is their overboiling revengeful temper, that they utterly contemn all those things as imaginary trifles, if they are so happy as to get the scalp of the murderer or enemy, to satisfy the supposed craving ghosts of their deceased rela- tions."

Amongst the Cherokees, when first seen by the pioneers of Tennessee, there were no cities or fortresses-scarcely a con- siderable village. Their towns-settlements, rather-were rude huts and wigwams, scattered without order or regular- ity, along the banks of some stream abounding with springs, and convenient to a fishery, a hunting ground, or lands for pasturage. To each hut was attached a small patch of rich land, from which the cane had been removed. This was used as a garden, where the women cultivated beans, Indian corn, and, at a later period, apples, peaches and plums. These lots were often without fences-as the domestic animals which the Indians raised, were not kept near their houses, but roam- ed at large over the cane-breaks, or the more distant prairies or forests.

The Indians designated the mountains and streams of their country by names remarkable for their euphony and beauty. Many of these have been lost, or are now seldom heard. The loss is, we fear, irreparable. Bay's, Stone, Iron, Yellow, Smoky, Black, Grand-father Mountains, were once doubtless known by names as smooth and musical as Alleghanee, Unaca, Chil- howee and Chattanooga. Dumplin, Sandy Mush, Little Dis- mal, Bull Run, Calf Killer, Sweet Water, and High Tower, though sufficiently significant, would grate harshly upon the ears of a Cherokee, who had bathed in the waters, luxuriated

OF RIVERS IN TENNESSEE.

in the shades, formed his ambuscade and sung his war-song upon the banks of the Allejay, the Oustinalla and the Etowah.

ABORIGINAL NAMES OF THE RIVERS IN TENNESSEE. .

From information derived from all the sources within his reach, this writer believes that the Tennessee river was called by the first explorers and geographers, Reviere des Cheraquis, or Cosquinambeaux-but by the aborigines, Kallamuchee ; which I take to be the aboriginal name of the stream, from its confluence with the Ohio to the mouth of Little Tennessee. From this point to the mouth of the French Broad, it was called Cootela ; and from there to the mouth of Watauga, and per- haps to its source in Virginia, the Holston was known to the Indians as Hogohegee. The French Broad, throughout its whole length, was the Agiqua, and received, on its northern bank, the Swannanoah and the Nonachunheh (now Nolli- chucky). The present barbarous Clinch, had the more eupho- nious name, Pellissippi. Little River was the Canot ; Little Tennessee was the Tannassee ; and its confluent, Tellico, has been changed from Ptsaliko, or Saliko ; Hiwassee, was pro- nounced Euphasee ; Cumberland, was called by the Indians, Warioto -- but by the French, Shauvanon ; Wolf River was the Margot ; Loushatchee, Hatchee, Sequatchee, Ocoee, Conesauga and Watauga have, happily, escaped the Vandal mutilation or corruption which the unfortunate Holston, French Broad, Clinch, Wolf and Forked Deer have suffered.

When the pioneers of Tennessee settled in the south- western part of Virginia, and the coterminous portions of North-Carolina, the country had ceased to be, perhaps had never been, the settled residence of any of the more modern aboriginal tribes. At this time it was the common hunting grounds of the Shawnees, Cherokees and other southern In- dians. But east and north of the Tennessee river, there was not a single Indian hut. Still, along the vallies of what is now East Tennessee and South-western Virginia, lay the great route and thoroughfare between the northern and southern Indians, in their intercourse with distant tribes, in their hunt- ing excursions, in their hostile expeditions and in their em-

GREAT INDIAN PATH.

bassies of peace ; this was the path of migration, the chase, the treaty and savage invasion. Besides its central position and its direct bearing, the great Apalachian chain could no where else be so easily ascended and crossed. Abundance of game, water and fuel, a healthful and moderate climate, an unoccupied territory, no impracticable swamps, or deep and wide streams to retard their journeyings, were all considera- tions that led to the selection of this path. One branch of it was nearly the same as the present stage route passing the Big Lick, in Bottetourt county, Viginia ; crossing New River at old Fort Chissel, near Inglis' Ferry, Holston at the Seven Mile Ford, thence to the left of the present stage road and near to the river, to the North Fork, crossing as at present ; thence to Big Creek and crossing the Holston at Dodson's Ford, to the Grassy Springs, near the residence of the late Micajah Lea ; thence down the waters of Nollichucky to Long Creek, ascending that stream to its source, and descending Dumplin Creek to a point a few miles from its mouth, where the path deflected to the left and crossed French Broad near Buckingham's Island. Near this, the path divided. One branch of it went up the west fork of Little Pigeon, and crossed some small mountains to the Tuckalechee towns, and so on to the Over-hill villages of the Cherokees. The other and main fork, went up Boyd's Creek to its source, and falling upon the head branches of Allejay, descended its valley to Little River, and crossing near Henry's, went by the present town of Maryville, to the mouth of Tellico, and passing through the Indian towns and villages of Tellico, Chota and Hiwassee, descended the Coosa, where it connected with the Great War Path of the Creeks. Near the Wolf Hills, now Abingdon, another path came in from the north-west, which pursued nearly the same route now travelled from the latter place to Kentucky, and crossing the mountain at that remark- able depression called Cumberland Gap. It was along this path that the earlier English explorers and hunters first passed to Kentucky, and through it the Rockcastle and Ohio savages often penetrated, to molest and break up the early settlements upon New River and Holston.

Dr. Hardy, of Asheville, North-Carolina, believes that the

TUMULI AND OTHER REMAINS.

Cherokees used the country, near and around the sources of the French Broad, more as hunting grounds than as a place of resi- dence. This opinion is sustained by the fact, that the streams and mountains of that region do not bear aboriginal names. French Broad, Pigeon, Sandy Mush, Ivy, &c., are the water courses. Blue Ridge, Pisgah, Glass, Smoky and Bald, are the mountains, all English names. No considerable war path or Indian trace passed through those elevated and almost inaccessible regions, and it was not till after 1787 that emigrants passed through them.

Little of the former history of the Cherokee tribe can be ascertained from their traditions. These extend little further back than the early days of O-ka-na-sto-ta, the distinguished chief who visited England in the days of George Il. From his time they date the declension of their nation; he was king or principal chief. His seat of government was one of the Over-hill towns, Echota, more properly E-tsaw-ty, on Tellico river, since the property of the late John McGhee, Esq.

Of the tumuli scattered every where through the country, and of other remains occasionally found in and near them, the Cherokees know nothing, only that when their fathers first took possession of the country, they considered them as the vestiges of an ancient and more numerous population, further advanced in the arts of civilized life than their own people. For these relics they seemed to entertain some peculiar vene- ration, and never appropriated them to any secular purpose or use.

The piles or heaps of rocks, so often met with in the gaps or crossing places of mountains or ridges, are structures very different from the tumuli proper. They are believed to be more modern, and it is not improbable that they owe their origin to a superstition not uncommon, if not general, in all heathen countries. The Rev. Mr. Winslow, American missionary at Oodooville, in the district of Jafna, makes the following statement in a journal under date of May 19, 1832 : "In coming over a tract of land which would be called in America ' barrens,' where there was no forest and but little cultivation, I saw in several places, near the foot paths lead- ing to the principal bazaar, large piles of stones ; and en-

ABORIGINAL STRUCTURES.

quiring into the cause, was told that the people, in passing over such places, are in the habit, each one, of casting a stone upon heaps begun in some particular spot, as an offering to an evil spirit, who would otherwise afflict them and their families."

We may not here indulge in further remarks upon the aborigines of America. Were it otherwise proper, the theme would invite us to inquire into and examine their physical, domestic, political, social and religious history ; their manners, rites, arts, traditions, religion, government and laws. The analogies which are found betwen these and those of some Asiatic tribes, not less than their physical affinities, furnish, if not the foundation of legitimate info- rence, certainly ground for plausible conjecture and specu- lation. In their language or dialects, is presented a subject for philological research that may illustrate the connection which, at some former time, existed between the aboriginal population of America and the rest of the world. But upon these topics we dare not enter. It must be sufficient here, only to say that every where in the West, we find ourselves surrounded with vestiges of different nations who have lived here before us; and that we may infer from these relics, very different degrees of progress and improvement in the people who constructed them. Of these there are three classes. First :- those belonging to the modern Indians ; these are ner ther numerous nor interesting-such as rude axes of stone, pestles and mortars, arrow heads, earthen vessels, pipes, war clubs, musical instruments and idols, carved out of a spe- cies of serpentine, calumets, &c. Second :- those belong- ing to or constructed by a people of European or foreign descent ; such as medals, coins, beads, crucifixes, furnaces, &c. Third :- those belonging to or made by a people evidently demi-civilized, who anciently inhabited the coun- try ; such as forts, cemeteries, tumuli, temples, altars, camps, towns, videttes, fortifications, &c. These structures fur- nish unquestionable evidence, that a dense population, at a remote period, occupied this country, and had made some advance 'in the arts of civilized life. These, though they may not awaken in the beholder the same associations as

TRADITIONS OF TENNESSEE TRIBES.

the ruins of Rome, or the majestic desolations of Greece, are certainly not entirely devoid of interest, but excite a feeling of veneration for the memory of those mighty em- pires which once flourished where these vestiges of their former greatness are yet found. And the inquiry forcibly presents itself, who were these unknown people ? How and when have these nations become extinct ? Did some swarm of ruthless invaders from our northern hive, at some far dis- tant period of time, seeking a more genial climate, descend the vallies of the West, and, carrying devastation in their march, Vandal-like, consign them to oblivion ? Tradition, a medium of communication between remote ages too much undervalued, is not altogether silent on this subject. At a very noted congress or treaty, held early in the last century, at Lancaster, Pa., Indian delegates in attendance, said their. ancestors had conquered several nations on the west side of the Great Mountains, viz: "The Cony-uch-such-roona, the Coch-now-was-roonon, the Tohoa-nough-roonaw, and the Conutskin-ough-roonaw."

The traditions of the Tennessee tribes on the subject, are indistinct and conflicting. They agree in this, that their forefathers found these vestiges here, or that they were always here, meaning, thereby, to assign to these ancient relics an indefinite antiquity. The several Indian families in America have been well compared to the fragments of a vast ruin. Certain is it, that these remains imply the former existence of a population so dense as to prove that it was incapable of existing in a country of hunters only, and that, possibly, Tennessee and the West were once the theatre upon which agriculture, civilization and peace exhibited their benign influence, or the dreadful battle field, where the lust of dominion, the bad passions of man and his unhallowed ambition, consigned to the grave and to oblivion hecatombs of human victims, and made the fairest part of God's crea- tion a desert and a waste. Turning from the contemplation of this gloomy picture, we hasten to trace the progress of .

civilized man, of enlightenment and art over the wilds of Tennessee.

WATAUGA -ITS SETTLEMENT AND GOVERNMENT.

CHAPTER IL

WATAUGA-ITS SETTLEMENT AND GOVERNMENT.

IN the meantime, the treaty of Fort Stanwix had given a pretext for a general disregard of the king's proclamation, prohibiting settlements of his subjects west of the mountains, and had excited afresh the spirit of emigration and explora- tion westward. Land-mongers penetrated fearlessly into the wilderness, while masses of emigrants had accumulated along the boundary, and concentrating themselves at the leading avenues from the Atlantic to the western watert, stood for a moment impatient of longer restraint, and cast- ing a wishful look upon the inviting country before them; Tennessee was yet without a single civilized inhabitant. We have traced the approaches of the Anglo-American popu- lation to her eastern boundary. The genius of civilization, in her progress from the east, had passed the base of the great Apalachian range. She stood upon its summit, proud of past success-and, ambitious of further and greater achievement, surveyed from that height the wide field before and around her. On her right, are the rich vallies and luxu- riant plains of Kentucky and Ohio, as yet imperfectly known from the obscure report of the returning explorer or the Shawnee prisoner. On the left, her senses are regaled by the luxuriant groves, the delightful savannas, and the en- chanting beauties of the sunny south. Far in the distance and immediately before her, she contemplates the Great West. Ils vastness at first overwhelms and astounds her, but at the extreme limit of her vision, American adventure and western enterprise are seen beckoning her to move for- ward and to occupy the goodly land. She descends to the · plains below, and on the prolific soil of the quiet Watauga, in the lonely seclusion of one of its ancient forests, is de- posited the germ of the future State of Tennessee. In that germ were contained all the elements of prospective great-

FIRST SETTLEMENT IN TENNESSEE.

ness and achievement. What these elements were, succeed- ing pages will but feebly develope and illustrate. Toil, enterprise, perseverance and courage, had planted that germ in a distant wilderness. The circumstances that surrounded it, required for its growth, culture and protection, wisdom, virtue, patriotism, valour and self-reliance. American was to become Western character, and here was the place and this the time of its first germination.

The news of the great grant from the Six Nations reached 1769 Frontier settlement soon after the treaty of No- ber, 1768. Dr. Walker, the Commissioner from Virginia, had returned from Fort Stanwix, and brought with him an account of the cession. He is the same gentleman who, as has been already narrated, had twice explored the new country, and now bore with him one form of authority for an indefinite extension of the white settlements west- ward. The Indian boundary, as adjusted at Hard Labour, in October of the same year, had given the assent of the Cherokees to a further expansion of the Holston settlements ; and 'late in December, 1768, and early in January of 1769, was formed the nucleus of the first permanent establishment of the white race in Tennessee. It was merely an enlarge- ment of the Virginia settlement near it, and at the time was believed to be upon the territory of that province,-the line dividing Virginia and North-Carolina not having been yet run west of Steep Rock. The settlers were principally from what is now Wake county, in North-Carolina. Some of them had been among the troops raised by that province, and sent, in 1760, for the relief of the garrison at Fort Loudon- others of them had wintered, in 1758, at the Long Island Fort, around which a temporary settlement had been made, which was soon after broken up and its members forced to retire east of Kenhawa.

Early in this year further explorations were made. One of them originated with Gilbert Christian and William Anderson. They had accompanied the regiment com- manded by Colonel Bird, and were so pleased with the country through which they had marched, that they deter- mined to explore it more fully. They were joined by the

CHRISTIAN ANDERSON AND SAWYERS.

late Colonel John Sawyers, of Knox county, and four others. They crossed the north fork of Holston at the present ford, and penetrated as low down that stream as Big Creek, in the present county of Hawkins, where they met a large party of Indians. "They turned about and went back up the river ten or fifteen miles, and concluded to return home About twenty miles above the North Fork, they found, upod their return, a cabin on every spot where the range was good, and where only six weeks before nothing ras to be seen but a howling wilderness. When they passe before, on their outward destination, they found no settlers on Hol- ston, save three families on the head springs of that river."" So impetuous was the current of population westward. 1

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The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century: Comprising Its Settlement, as the., Part 9

Author: Ramsey, J. G. M. (James Gettys McGready), 1797-1884 Publication date: 1853 Publisher: Charleston : J. Russell Number of Pages: 776

Author: Ramsey, J. G. M. (James Gettys McGready), 1797-1884
Publication date: 1853
Publisher: Charleston : J. Russell
Number of Pages: 776