Whitfield County sits right in the middle of two historical extremes of the Cherokee Nation.
To the south, just below Resaca, sits the capital of the Cherokee, New Echota. At New Echota the Cherokee, a nation that had its own constitution in 1827, its own written language, its own supreme court and its own newspaper (The Cherokee Phoenix) when no other indigenous tribes in North America had those, lived as a sovereign nation.
Then, on the north side of the county, literally 200 yards into Tennessee because it was against the law for the Cherokee to assemble in large groups in Georgia, they established their last capital, Red Clay. There were councils, with the last meeting being in 1839. Red Clay is where Chief John Ross announced that the entire nation would be removed west, in what would become known as the Trail of Tears.
A story of victory
But it’s the new year and we start it with optimism, so let’s go back before those sad times, back into the mid-1700s, and celebrate a major Cherokee victory. Just up the road from us, on the way to Knoxville in Eastern Tennessee, in the heart of the old Cherokee Nation, there is a re-creation of a fort from those days: Fort Loudoun. It was there that a twisty tale of politics and military actions turned into a major win for the home team (the Cherokee!). So unless you’re a descendant of one of the British soldiers that finished his tour of duty here, let’s enjoy a story of victory.
To set the stage, in the mid-1700s there was what many consider the first actual world war. This was between the British and the French, both colonizing European powers who had possessions around the world.
Known as the Seven Years War (although it lasted longer), in North America it was called the French and Indian War, since that’s who the British were fighting. The clash between them saw various fights spread all over the globe, dragging many other nations, including the Cherokee, into their fight. Battles were fought in Europe, North America, South America, the Caribbean, Africa and India.
Overall, the winners were Britain and her allies. The losers were primarily France and Spain. If you’ve ever read the book or seen the movie “The Last of the Mohicans,” that takes place during the French and Indian War.
While the British and the French were duking it out for Quebec up north, we’ll see how things were playing out around here, with the 13 colonies on one side of the Appalachians heading west and the French gaining from the Mississippi River side. And stuck right between them, the Cherokee!
The push was on
Trade with the Cherokee was important to the British colonies in the early to mid-1700s and so the idea of a British fort on the west side of the mountains was brought up. Add to this the encroachment of the French from their holdings along the Mississippi, aided by their Native American allies, and the push was on.
The Cherokee, allies of the British, were being attacked by other Indians working with the French so a deal was worked out where the Cherokee would provide 600 fighting men to the British cause and, partly in exchange, a fort would be built to aid in trade and to protect the Cherokee villages while the men were away fighting. Some Cherokee were all for it, while other Cherokee villages were joining the French side. Each Cherokee village had a lot of leeway on where their political ties might lie.
The construction of the fort was a joint project of the colonies of Virginia and South Carolina. They each sent a team to meet up in the area, but the Virginians got there first, and rather than wait around, went ahead and built a square fort with walls about 105 feet long near the Cherokee village of Chota. This first fort, called the Virginia Fort, was finished in August 1756, and the Virginians packed up and went back home. The group from South Carolina wouldn’t even head out until mid-September of 1756.
The South Carolina team that would build Fort Loudoun marched about 10 miles per day and got to the Cherokee village of Tomotley the first day of October. The British force was led by Capt. Raymond Demeré (remember that first name). Under his command were 80 British regular army soldiers and 120 local militiamen, 80 pack horses, a contracted team to move the 300-pound cannon and women and children who were coming with their husbands.
They were greeted by Chief Conocotocko, known to the Europeans as Old Hop, who had 200 Cherokee with him to help. Capt. Demeré had with him the fortification designer John De Brahm who was supposed to design the fort. Demeré was a military man and De Brahm a military engineer who had immigrated to the colony of Georgia where he was baptized as a Christian.
Initially believing European colonization a good thing, his encounters with Native Americans led him to believe it exploitation. Later in life his views were not appreciated in America or Europe.
Demeré and De Brahm clashed over the site and design of the fort, winning and losing arguments as to the final outcome. If you visit the reconstruction of the fort today you will see a classic log palisade with log walls with sharpened points on top. Inside are barracks, officers quarters, a stockade, a powder magazine, a storehouse and a blacksmith shop. Outside the wall is the 18th century equivalent of barbed wire: thorn bushes planted inside a dry moat. The site is where the Tellico River meets the Little Tennessee River.
The Warrior Who Ran Away in the Night
The fort was begun on Oct. 5, 1756, and was declared essentially complete on Dec. 24, 1756, by designer De Brahm. De Brahm then left and went back to civilization. Demeré was upset, knowing the fort was not what he envisioned.
The Cherokee watched the argument and then watched De Brahm leave. Evidently they nicknamed him the Warrior Who Ran Away in the Night. Demeré altered the designs and kept working on the fort until he declared the two-acre fort finished on May 30, 1757. The soldiers then planted 200 acres of crops, adding to their bounty from hunting, fishing and trapping. They also had a small herd of cattle. Throughout 1757 things hummed along with there being about 60 women and children living in the fort with their husbands. Some of the soldiers had by this time taken Cherokee wives.
Capt. Raymond Demeré, his job finished and suffering from illness, asked to be replaced. In August 1757 who should march in with reinforcements but Capt. Paul Demeré, Raymond’s brother! They switched leadership roles and the new Capt. Demeré took over the military directive of pushing against the French.
He visited the Cherokee in the area, appealing for British support and encouraging them to attack the French and their allies. Back in June, just before he arrived, a 36-man force had attacked French-aligned Indians at Great Tellico, inflicting casualties and pushing them back. The British were living up to their side of the bargain for the fort and were now looking for the Cherokee to support them.
If they could have seen the future …
Cherokee in the area, including Attakullakulla, the nephew of Old Hop, headed north to join the Forbes Expedition of 1758. This was a campaign to capture the French Fort Duquesne, site of modern day Pittsburgh. This event would set in motion the actions that would lead to the fall of Fort Loudoun. If the British could have seen the future, they would never have asked this of the East Tennessee Cherokee.
The Forbes Expedition spent the majority of the summer building a road as they went, moving slowly and cautiously. With the small army of about 6,000 was a young George Washington commanding a Virginia unit. Attakullakulla lost patience with the slow approach and withdrew with his men from the campaign. The Forbes Expedition eventually succeeded in forcing the French to retreat from the area in Pennsylvania, blowing up the fort as they left. As Attakullakulla and other Cherokee returned to their homes in various parts of the Cherokee Nation, things went out of control.
The British were paying their Indian allies a bounty for enemy scalps. Some Cherokee on their return home attacked settlers and presented the scalp or scalps for the bounty, declaring them enemy scalps. The British had suspicions and while trying to sort things out, took Attakullakulla and his men under guard and took their firearms from them, even though they had nothing to do with the incident.
The Virginia governor worked things out with Attakullakulla himself, but some of the Cherokee now resented that they had been thus treated and raided settlements in Virginia on their way back to Tennessee. In response to these attacks, settlers killed several Cherokee warriors. Then, in April 1759, a Cherokee leader by the name of Moytoy of Citico led another raid that ended in the deaths of more settlers. Attakullakulla and Capt. Demeré called for some of the raiders to surrender to authorities, but none did.
Against this backdrop of mistreatment, false charges and back and forth attacks, things were heading to a boil at Fort Loudoun. Next week, war comes to the valley.
Mark Hannah is a Dalton native and works in the film and video industry.