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TheChickamauga Cherokee are a Native American group who separated from theCherokee in March 1775 (at the beginning of theAmerican Revolutionary War) to the early 1800s,[1] when elderly chiefs sold more than 22 million square acres of their hunting grounds.[2] Most of the Cherokee people who lived on the Atlantic seaboard surrounded by settlers signed peace treaties with the Americans in 1776-1777, after theSecond Cherokee War. Followers of theskiagusta (war chief)Dragging Canoe who lived on the landward side of the Appalachian continental divide in proximity to Muscogees (formerly known as Creeks) moved with him down theTennessee River, away from their historicOverhill Cherokee towns. Relocated to a more isolated area, they established 11 new towns to distance themselves from encroaching colonists.
While frontier Americans associated Dragging Canoe and his band with their new town onChickamauga Creek, and began to refer to the band as the Chickamaugas, Wilma Mankiller, former Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation, referred to them as Chickamaugans, rather than Chickamaugas.[3] The Chickamauga moved further west and southwest into present-dayAlabama five years later, establishing five larger settlements. They were then more commonly known as the Lower Cherokee, a term closely associated with the people of thefive lower towns.
Dragging Canoe, the first Chicamauga chief, separated from the Upper Cherokee and accused the elderly chiefs of endangering the survival of their people. He never met with whites to negotiate a treaty again.[4] Division among the Cherokee is indicated by a May 4, 1808 letter from Thomas Jefferson to the "Chiefs of the Upper Cherokee" in which he says, "You propose My Children, that your Nation shall be divided into two and that your part the Upper Cherokees, shall be separated from the lower by a fixed boundary, shall be placed under the Government of the U.S. become citizens thereof, and be ruled by our laws; in fine, to be our brothers instead of our children."[5]
Dragging Canoe was a beacon of resistance to First Nations. Shawnees, Muscogees, and exiles from many other First Nations soon joined him. In 1772, four years before the beginning of the American Revolution, Lord Chief Justice Mansfield ruled that slaves could not be held against their will in Britain. Many slaves simply walked away from their owners and masters.[6]. Word spread like wildfire in the American colonies. While plantation and slave owners panicked in the American colonies, hundreds of slaves tried to make their way to the coast for ships sailing to Britain. Slaves too far from the coast headed for First Nations instead. Black Jack, a former slave, became Dragging Canoe’s trusted interpreter and spy. Nickajack was named in honor of “Nigger Jack”[7]
Likewise, twenty percent of the population in the American colonies did not want to exchange an absolute ruler, who was absent, for an aristocracy of rulers already living there. One fifth of the population was firmly set against the rebels/patriots. Many British loyalists joined loyalist units in their fight against the rebels before making their way to First Nations. Mitchell Sanders/Saunders was a Revolutionary War deserter from New Hampshire and the father of Alexander Sanders/Saunders and his well-known Cherokee siblings.[8]. Both William Childers and William Perdew deserted from the same loyalist unit in July 1779.[9]. And Theda Perdue, born in 1949 in McRae, Georgia and a possible descendant, is the author of numerous books related to Cherokee history:Cherokee removal: a brief history with documents;‘Mixed blood’ Indians: racial construction in the early south;Cherokee women, gender and culture change. Hundreds of names of British loyalists appear in Emmet Starr ‘sHistory of the Cherokee Indians geneological section between pages 303 and 466.[10]
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During the winter of 1776–77, the Cherokee followers of Dragging Canoe moved down theTennessee River and away from their Overhill Cherokee towns. They established nearly a dozen towns in this area to distance themselves from European-American encroachment.
Dragging Canoe and his followers settled where theGreat Indian Warpath crossed Chickamauga Creek, near present-dayChattanooga, Tennessee. They named their town "Chickamauga", after the creek, and the adjacent region was known as the Chickamauga area. American settlers referred to its militant Cherokee as "Chickamaugas."
In 1782, militias underJohn Sevier andWilliam Campbell destroyed the eleven Cherokee towns. Dragging Canoe led his people further down the Tennessee River, establishing five Lower Cherokee towns. After the Revolutionary War, westward migration increased from the new states ofVirginia,North Carolina,South Carolina, andGeorgia.
In April 1779 Evan Shelby and troops from Virginia and North Carolina destroyed Chickamaugan towns. As Dragging Canoe had many Muscogee followers and supporters, he sent his brother, Little Owl, to request permission from Muscogee chief Alexander McGillivray to live on Muscogee land. McGillivray gladly gave his consent and Dragging Canoe and his followers then established five new towns in Muscogee territory. The towns centered on Running Water CreekWhiteside, Tennessee. The other towns founded at this time were Nickajack (near the cave of the same name), Long Island (on the Tennessee River), Crow Town (at the mouth of Crow Creek), andLookout Mountain (Lookout Mountain Town, present-dayTrenton, Georgia). A sixth town was added later, founded by red-headed "half-breed" chief, Will Webber (Willstown).[11] More towns developed to the south and west, and were also known as the Lower Towns.[citation needed]
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The Chickamauga Cherokee became known for their uncompromising enmity withUnited States settlers who pushed them out of their traditional territory. They signed treaties with Great Britain and Spain.[12] From the town of Running Water, Dragging Canoe led attacks on white settlements throughout theAmerican Southeast.
The Lower Cherokee and the frontiersmen were at war until 1794. Chickamauga warriors raided as far as Indiana, Kentucky, and Virginia with members of theNorthwestern Confederacy, which they helped establish). Because of a growing belief in the Chickamauga cause and US destruction of homes of otherNative Americans, most of the Cherokee became allied against the United States.
After the 1792 death of Dragging Canoe, his hand-picked successorJohn Watts assumed control of the Lower Cherokee. Under Watts's lead, the Cherokee continued their policy of Indian unity and hostility toward European Americans. Watts moved his base of operations toWillstown to be closer to hisMuscogee allies, and had concluded a treaty inPensacola with SpanishWest Florida governorArturo O'Neill de Tyrone for arms and supplies to continue the war.
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The Chickamauga and later Lower Towns were no different from the rest of the Cherokee than other groups of settlements known as the Middle Towns, Out Towns, (original) Lower Towns, Valley Towns, or Overhill Towns, which were established along theAppalachian Mountains by the time of European contact. The groupings were geographic rather than political, and residents of the Overhill and Valley Towns spoke a similar dialect. The people based their government in theclan and town, and townhouses were built for communal gatherings. Some of the towns were associated with smaller nearby villages, and regional councils had no binding powers.
The groups of towns developed differing ideas about relations with European Americans, partially based on interaction, intermarriage, and trading and other partnerships. While Cherokees on the Atlantic seaboard were surrounded by settlers and began to adapt to farming, Chickamaugans lived among Muscogees and on Muscogee land. The only Cherokee "national" role before 1788 was that of First Beloved Man, a chief negotiator from the towns most isolated from European settlers. The Cherokee established a national council after that year, but it met irregularly and had little authority.
Dragging Canoe addressed the national council atUstanali and acknowledgedLittle Turkey as his successor; he was memorialized by the council after his death in 1792. Chickamauga leaders frequently communicated with the Cherokee from other regions. They were supported in warfare against the colonists and later pioneers by warriors from the Overhill Towns. A number of Chickamauga chiefs signed treaties with the federal government, along with other Cherokee Nation leaders.
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After the Treaty ofTellico Blockhouse in late 1794, leaders of the Lower Cherokee dominated national tribal affairs. When the national government of theCherokee Nation was organized, the first three people to hold the office ofPrincipal Chief were Little Turkey (1788–1801),Black Fox (1801–1811), andPathkiller (1811–1827). All three had been warriors under Dragging Canoe.Doublehead andTurtle-at-Home, the first two speakers of the Cherokee National Council, had also served with Dragging Canoe. Domination of the Cherokee by former warriors from the Lower Towns continued well into the 19th century; after the revolt of the young Upper Towns chiefs (who had also served with Dragging Canoe andJohn Watts), representatives of the Lower Towns remained a major voice.
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Many former warriors returned to the original settlements in the Chickamauga area, some of which had been reoccupied. They also established new towns in the area and several in north Georgia. Others moved into towns which were established after the earlier migration.
Brother Steiner, a representative of theMoravian Brethren, met with Lower Cherokee former warrior Richard Fields in 1799 at Tellico Blockhouse. Steiner hired him as guide and interpreter, since he had been sent south by the Brethren to find an appropriate location for a mission and school in Cherokee territory. It was found atSpring Place on land donated byJames Vann, who supported a European-American education for his people. When Steiner asked Fields, "What kind of people are the Chickamauga?" the guide laughed and replied, "They are Cherokee, and we know no difference."[13] Neither the Chickamauga nor other Cherokee considered them distinct from the 18th-century Cherokee.[14]
Others joined the remnant populations from the former Overhill towns on the Little Tennessee River known as the Upper Towns, centered on Ustanali in Georgia. Vann and his protégés,The Ridge andCharles R. Hicks, became leaders. They were the most progressive of the Cherokee, favoringacculturation, formal European-American education, and modern agricultural methods.[15]
For a decade or more after the end of hostilities, the northern section of the Upper Towns had its own council and acknowledged the chief of the Overhill Towns as its leader. They moved south after ceding their land to the United States.
John McDonald returned to his home on the Chickamauga River, across from Old Chickamauga Town, and lived there until he sold it in 1816. It was purchased by theBoston-based American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions for use as theBrainerd Mission, which served as a church (the Baptist Church of Christ at Chickamauga) and a school with academic and vocational training. His daughter, Mollie McDonald, and son-in-law Daniel Ross developed a farm and trading post near the old village of Chatanuga (Tsatanugi) in the early days of the wars. Settled near them were sons Lewis and Andrew Ross and a number of daughters. Their sonJohn Ross, born inTurkey Town, became a principal chief who guiding the Cherokee through the 1830sIndian removal and relocation toIndian Territory west of the Mississippi River.
Most of the Lower Cherokee remained in the towns they inhabited in 1794 (known as the Lower Towns), with their seat atWillstown. Former Lower Towns warriors dominated Cherokee political affairs for the next twenty years. They were more conservative than the Upper Towns leaders, assimilating but keeping as many old ways as possible.[15]
The Lower Towns were roughly south and southwest of theHiwassee River, along the Tennessee to the north border of the Muscogee nation, and west of the Conasauga and the Ustanali in Georgia. The Upper Towns were north and east of the Hiwassee, between theChattahoochee River and the Conasauga, about the same area as the later Amohee, Chickamauga, and Chattooga districts of the eastern Cherokee Nation.[16]
Traditional Cherokee settlements in the highlands of western North Carolina became known as the Hill Towns, with their seat atQuallatown. The lowland Valley Towns, with their seat at Tuskquitee, were more traditional; so was the Upper Town of Etowah, inhabited primarily by full-bloods (many Cherokee in other towns were of mixed race but identified as Cherokee) and the nation's largest town. The Overhill towns along the Little Tennessee remained more or less autonomous, and kept their seat atChota.
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John Watts remained head of the Lower Cherokee council at Willstown until his death in 1802. Doublehead, already a member of the triumvirate, then moved into that position and held it until his 1807 assassination by Alexander Saunders (the Ridge,James Vann's best friend) andJohn Rogers. Rogers was succeeded on the council bythe Glass, who was also assistant principal chief of the nation under Black Fox. The Glass was head of the Lower Towns' council until the unification council of 1810.
By the timeJohn Norton (aMohawk of Cherokee and Scottish ancestry) visited the area in 1809–1810, some of the formerly-militant Cherokee of the Lower Towns had become the most assimilated. James Vann became a majorplanter, holding more than 100 African-American slaves, and was one of the wealthiest men east of the Mississippi. Norton became a friend ofTurtle-at-Home, John Walker, Jr. andthe Glass, all of whom were involved in business and commerce. At the time of Norton's visit, Turtle-at-Home owned a ferry and landing on the Federal Road betweenNashville, Tennessee andAthens, Georgia (where he lived at Nickajack).
When Georgia and the US government increased pressure on the Cherokee Nation to cede its lands and move west of the Mississippi River, Lower Towns leaders such asTahlonteeskee,Degadoga,John Jolly, Richard Fields, John Brown, Bob McLemore, John Rogers, Young Dragging Canoe, George Guess (Tsiskwaya, orSequoyah) and Tatsi (also known as Captain Dutch) were forerunners. Believing that removal was inevitable in the face of settler greed, they wanted to get the best lands and settlements possible. They moved with their followers toArkansas Territory, establishing what ecame known as the Cherokee Nation West. They then moved to Indian Territory after an 1828 treaty between their leaders and the US government. They were called the Old Settlers in Indian Territory, living there for nearly a decade before the rest of the Cherokee were forced to join them.
The remaining Lower Towns leaders also strongly advocated voluntary westward emigration, bitterly opposed by the former warriors and their sons who led the Upper Towns.Major Ridge (as the Ridge had been known since his military service during the Creek and First Seminole Wars), his sonJohn Ridge, and his nephewsElias Boudinot andStand Watie came to believe that they needed to negotiate the best deal with the federal government in the face of removal. Other emigration advocates were John Walker, Jr.,David Vann, and Andrew Ross (brother of principal chief John Ross).
Taking advantage of negotiations after the Creek War, a small group of negotiators selected by American forces and headed by Major Ridge signed the Treaty of New Echota on December 29, 1835. The delegation was not authorized by the Cherokee government to sign treaties on behalf of the nation, however, and the treaty was seen by the people as illegal.[17]
In November 1811, theShawnee chiefTecumseh returned to the South in the hope of support from the southern tribes for his crusade to drive back the Americans and revive the old ways. He was accompanied by representatives of the Shawnee, Muscogee,Kickapoo, andSioux peoples. Tecumseh's exhortations in theChickasaw,Choctaw and Lower Muscogee towns found no traction, but he attracted some support from younger Upper Muscogee warriors.
The Cherokee delegation under the Ridge, who visited Tecumseh's council atTuckabatchee, strongly opposed his plans; Tecumseh cancelled his visit to the Cherokee Nation because the Ridge threatened him with death if he went there. Tecumseh was escorted on his recruiting tour by 47 Cherokee and 19 Choctaw, however, who presumably went north with him when he returned to theNorthwest Territory.[18][19]
Tecumseh's mission sparked a religious revival, referred to by anthropologistJames Mooney as the "CherokeeGhost Dance" movement.[20] It was led by Tsali of Coosawatee, a former Chickamauga warrior. He later moved to the western North Carolina mountains, where he was executed by U.S. forces in 1838 for violently resistingremoval.
Tsali met with the national council at Ustanali, arguing for war against the Americans. He moved some leaders until the Ridge was more persuasive in rebuttal, calling for support of the Americans in the coming war with the British and Tecumseh's alliance. During theWar of 1812,William McIntosh of the Lower Muscogee sought Cherokee help in theCreek War to suppress theRed Sticks (Upper Muscogee). More than 500 Cherokee warriors served underAndrew Jackson against their former allies.[21][22]
A few years later,Major Ridge led a troop of Cherokee cavalry who were attached to the 1,400-strong contingent of Lower Muscogee warriors underWilliam McIntosh in theFirst Seminole War in Florida. They were allied with, and accompanied, a force of U.S. regular Army, Georgia militia, and Tennessee volunteers into Florida for action against theSeminoles, refugee Red Sticks, and escaped slaves fighting against the United States.[23]
Warriors from the Cherokee Nation East traveled to the Old Settlers lands (or Cherokee Nation West) inArkansas Territory to assist them during the Cherokee-Osage War of 1817–1823. Cherokee warriors (with only one exception) did not take to the warpath in the Southeast again from the end of the Seminole War to theAmerican Civil War, whenWilliam Holland Thomas raised the Thomas Legion of Cherokee Indians and Highlanders in North Carolina to fight for theConfederacy.
The state of Georgia seized land in its south in 1830 which had belonged to the Cherokee since the end of the Creek War (land separated from the rest of the Cherokee Nation by a large section of Georgia territory), and began to parcel it out to settlers. Major Ridge led a party of 30 south; they drove the settlers out of their homes on what the Cherokee considered their land and burned the buildings to the ground, but harmed no one.[24]
