Dropped stitches in Tennessee history

by John Allison

CHAPTER II.

THE PICKETS OF CIVILIZATION.

The first settlers in Tennessee: what did they do?

They founded and administered the first free and independent government in America. They established the first church, the first institution of learning, and the second newspaper, in “the new world west of the Alleghanies.”

They were in the wilderness. The hour of the day was determined by the shadow cast by the sun upon the home-made dial; the time of the night was reckoned from the positions of particular stars in the firmament. Years and months they measured by moons. From the course, color and velocity of clouds, from the temperature and from the direction of the winds, they foretold the weather. They also observed the habits of animals and birds of passage, as aids to their weather bureau; and they watched and studied closely the development and growth of plants, herbs, vines, vegetables and the cereals, as helps to their agricultural department.[B]

The country in which Andrew Jackson made his home for about two years deserves a name and place in history not yet fully given to it. In its wild and picturesque magnificence, in the rugged honesty and frank simplicity of the people who settled it, in their love and struggle for liberty, “home rule” and local self-government, it was a counterpart of the Switzerland of tradition and story.

The sun shone nowhere upon a land of more ravishing loveliness and awe-inspiring sublimity—silver threads of river and streamlet, and gem of valley set in emerald of gorgeous luxuriance; waters murmuring and thunderous, striking every note in the gamut of nature’s weird minstrelsy, dashing and bounding to the sea; every acclivity a Niagara of color flashing from rhododendron and mountain magnolia, elysian fields without Rhenish castles or Roman towers; grooved with fastnesses, terraced with plateaus and monumented with peaks upheaved into a very dreamland of beauty and grandeur, all overlooked by the majestic Roan—

“The monarch of mountains—

They crowned him long ago,

On a throne of rock, in a robe of clouds,

With a diadem of snow!”

About one hundred and thirty years ago, the first permanent white settlement was made on the Watauga river, near where Elizabethton now stands. Up to the winter of 1770-1, there were in all probability twenty families in the new settlement.

May 16, 1771, the “Regulators” fought the famous but disastrous battle of the Alamance, about forty miles northwest of Raleigh. During the summer and fall following this battle, settlers came in considerable numbers to “the new world west of the Alleghanies,” and cast their lot with the settlers on the Watauga; and about this time settlements were made on the Holston and Nolichucky rivers.

Who were these people? Whence and why did they come? I answer:

They were every one patriots, soldiers and good citizens. They came from the battle-field of the Alamance—that first contest of the revolution which eventuated in American independence. They left their homes because of the disastrous result of that battle, in which many of them had participated, and because of their unconquerable hatred of the British government and their open revolt against British authority and the oppression of British officials.

The following letter from Hon. George Bancroft, the historian, then Minister from the United States to Great Britain, on the subject of the “Mecklenburg Resolves,” and the subsequent course and conduct of some of those engaged in the battle of the Alamance, is still of great interest to Tennesseans:

90 Eaton Place, London, July 4, 1848.

My Dear Sir—I hold it of good augury that your letter of the 12th of June reached me by the Herman just in time to be answered this morning. You may be sure that I have spared no pains to discover the Resolves of the Committee of Mecklenburg. A glance at the map will show you that in those days the traffic in that part of North Carolina took a southerly direction, and people in Charleston, and sometimes in Savannah, knew what was going on in ‘Charlotte Town’ before Gov. Martin. The first account of the Resolves extraordinary, ‘by the people in Charlotte Town, Mecklenburg County,’ was sent over by Sir James Wright, then Governor of Georgia, in a letter of the 20th of June, 1775. The newspaper thus transmitted is still preserved, and is the number 498 of the South Carolina Gazette and Country Journal, Tuesday, June 13, 1775. I read the Resolves, you may be sure, with reverence, and immediately obtained a copy of them, thinking myself the sole discoverer. I do not send you the copy, as it is identically the same with the paper you enclosed to me, but I forward to you a transcript of the entire letter of Sir James Wright. The newspapers seem to have reached him after he had finished his dispatch, for the paragraph relating to it is added in his own handwriting, the former part being written by a secretary. I have read a great many papers relating to the Regulators, and am having copies made of a large number. Your own state ought to have them all, and the expense would be, for the state, insignificant, if it does not send an agent on purpose. A few hundred dollars would copy all you need from the State Paper Office on all North Carolina topics. The Regulators are on many accounts important. They form the connecting link between the resistance to the Stamp Act and the movement of 1775, and they also played a glorious part in taking possession of the Mississippi Valley, toward which they were irresistibly carried by their love of independence. It is a mistake if any have supposed that the Regulators were cowed down by their defeat at Alamance. Like the mammoth, they shook the bolt from their brow and crossed the mountains.

I shall always be glad to hear from you and to be of use to you or your State.

Very truly yours,
George Bancroft.

D. L. Swain, Esq., Chapel Hill, N. C.

One of the “ringleaders” in organizing the Regulators for the battle of the Alamance was John Pugh, who was afterwards sheriff of Washington county, which at that time included all of the territory now embraced within the boundaries of the state of Tennessee. Among the few names of the participants in the battle of the Alamance which have been preserved in history may be found those of several who were afterwards prominent among the settlers on Watauga, Holston and Nolichucky. I have said this much because of some facts which will be given further along.

These people were on the very verge of the frontier, standing as a mere handful of pickets out on the confines of civilization, where the war-whoop of the painted savage rang through the forests, and the constant apprehension of the tomahawk and the scalping-knife haunted every abode, and every thicket ambushed a bloodthirsty foe. When open daring failed, fiendish cunning, the torch and midnight butchery wrought the ruin. Atrocity followed atrocity, in the utter extinction of homes. Men hunted, fished, toiled, slept and worshipped with their trusty rifles at hand. The women also, through necessity and with courage inspired by constant peril, were no less dextrous in the use of deadly weapons, and no less unerring in the precision of their aim. The very genius of evil and desolation seemed at times to brood over the infant settlements. Still, they prospered; and, amid their dangers, they followed industrial pursuits. The creaking clang of the loom and the whir of the spinning-wheel furnished the “accompaniment to the maiden’s concord of measured monotones.” The woodman’s axe felled the forest trees, and fields and farms were opened up, fenced and put in cultivation. Churches and schools were established, and public highways “viewed out” and opened up in the wilderness.

FIRST GRIST MILL BUILT IN WASHINGTON COUNTY, TENNESSEE.
Erected by Michael Bacon, on Little Limestone Creek, six miles southwest of Jonesboro, in the year 1779.

Among the wealthiest the wheaten cake appeared only at the Sabbath breakfast. Milk and spring water were their only drinks at meals. The red deer flitted through the voiceless solitudes, and bruin roamed the jungles at will. The fruits of the chase and the fishing-rod, together with pounded maize, supplied the wholesome comforts of the hospitable board. Quilting bees, log rollings, house raisings, corn shuckings, flax pullings, maple sugar boilings and the innocent abandon of the dance, enlivened with brimming gourds of nectared dew and the high fun and mirth of backwoods “social functions,” gave variety and zest to the monotony of frontier life.

Maid and matron were clad in fabrics of their own handiwork, each a Joan of Arc in moral and physical prowess and power, and a Venus in rounded symmetry and development, with all the unaffected graces of natural and unspoiled womanhood, “the red wine of lusty life mantling and blushing in the alabaster face”; the men garbed in skins or the coarsest textures of the loom, athletic of limb and fleet of foot as the roe, more than a match for all the cunning stratagems of Indian warfare, “lion-hearted to dare and win, and yet with gentleness and generosity to melt the soul.”

The log structure rose in the wilderness, with puncheon floor, slab benches, port-hole windows and rifle-rack, in whose cribbed and darkened shrine alternated the thunderous vociferations of the fire-and-brimstone preacher and the cries of the truant urchin under the savage birch of the pitiless schoolmaster.

These people were without any local form of civil government, without executive, military, civil or peace officers; but they had among them John Sevier, Isaac Shelby, James Robertson and others, who kept the good of the community at heart. It will be remembered that there has been much controversy, at times in the not very distant past, as to when, where and by whom the first declaration of a free and independent government was made and entered into on this continent—some claiming that Mecklenburg, North Carolina, was the place, its citizens the people, and May, 1775, the date; others asserting that the association formed for Kentucky, “under the great elm tree outside the fort at Boonsboro”—this also in 1775—was the first. I propose to show that neither one of these associations, declarations or formations of government was the first “free and independent government” established on this continent; but that this honor belongs to the settlers on the Watauga. Haywood, in his history of Tennessee (page 41), says: “In 1772 (May), the settlement on the Watauga, being without government, formed a written association and articles for their conduct. They appointed five commissioners, a majority of whom was to decide all matters of controversy, and to govern and direct for the common good in other respects”; and again (page 46): “This committee settled all private controversies, and had a clerk, Felix Walker, now or lately a member of Congress from North Carolina. They had also a sheriff. This committee had stated and regular times for holding their sessions, and took the laws of Virginia for the standard of decision.” Haywood further says that they were living under this government in November, 1775.

Some four years after this local, self, independent government had been entered into by the settlers of Watauga, John Sevier, in a memorial to the North Carolina legislature explaining it, says: “Finding ourselves on the frontiers, and being apprehensive that, for want of a proper legislature, we might become a shelter for such as endeavor to defraud their creditors; considering also the necessity of recording deeds, wills, and doing other public business, we, by consent of the people, formed a court for the purposes above mentioned, taking, by desire of our constituents, the Virginia laws for our guide, so near as the situation of affairs would permit. This was intended for ourselves, and was done by consent of every individual.”

I rather suspect that some inquiry was made by the authorities of North Carolina, as to what kind of a government this was which had been set up within their jurisdiction, and which established courts that took the laws of Virginia as their guide.

The “written association and articles for their conduct,” entered into by the settlers on the Watauga, in May, 1772, formed the first “free and independent government” established and put into practical administration on this continent.

The five commissioners or committeemen first appointed were John Sevier, James Robertson, Charles Roberson, Zachariah Isbell and John Carter. This was an independent government, because they did not ask permission of any power on earth to enter into it, and they did not recognize any authority as superior to that which they had voluntarily vested in the five commissioners chosen by them. It was not a compact or league with any other power, but, as Sevier says, “was intended for ourselves.” It was a free government, because it was voluntarily entered into by the whole people, “by consent of every individual.”

The settlers lived, prospered and were happy, under the government of the five commissioners, for about six years. These commissioners settled all questions of debt, determined all rights of property, took the probate of wills and the acknowledgment of deeds, recorded the same, issued marriage licenses and hanged horse thieves, with much zest and great expedition—the arraignment, trial, conviction, condemnation and execution of a horse thief all occurring within an hour or so after he was arrested, inasmuch as they had no jail in which to imprison him overnight, and believed strongly in the idea that a man who was bad enough to be put in jail deserved to be hanged on the spot.

In November, 1777, the assembly of North Carolina erected the District of Washington into Washington county, which included the whole of what is now the state of Tennessee. This was the first territorial division in the United States named in honor of George Washington. The Governor of North Carolina appointed justices of the peace and militia officers for this county, who, in February, 1778, met and took the oath of office, and organized the new county and its courts. Thereupon, the first “free and independent government” formed and put into operation in America was no more, the jurisdiction and authority of the five commissioners having, by their own consent and that of the people, been superseded by the newly appointed authorities. The first written instrument, paper or record authoritatively made in the organization of what is today the judicial, political, civil and military existence of the state of Tennessee, is in the office of the county clerk at Jonesboro, and is in the words and figures following:

FEBRUARY COURT 1778

The oaths of the Justices of the peace melitia & for officers There Attestments, &c,

Washington County, I A. B. do solemnly swear that as a Justice of the peace, and a Justice of the County Court of pleas, & Quarter Sessions in the County of Washington, in all articles in the Commission to me directed. I will do equal Right to the poor and to the Rich to the Best of my Judgment and according to the Law of the State. I will not privately or Openly by my-self or any other person, be of Council in any Quarrel, or Suit, depending Before me, and I will hold the County Court, and Quarter Sessions of my County, as the Statue in that case shall and may direct.

The fines and amerciaments that shall happen to be maid and the forfeitures that shall be incurred I will cause to be duly entered without Concealment. I will not wittingly or willingly take by myself or any Other Person, for me, any fee, Gift, Gratuity, or reward whatsoever for any matter or thing by me to be done, By virtue of my office except such fees as are or may be directed or Limited by statue, but well and truly I will do my office, of a Justice of the peace as well within the County Court of pleas, and Quarter Sessions as without. I will not delay person of common Right, By reason of any Letter, or order from any person or persons in authority to me directed, or per any other Cause whatever, and if any Letter or Order Come to me, contrary to Law I will proceed to Inforce the Law, such letter or Order notwithstanding. I will not direct or cause to be directed any warrent by me to be maid to the parties. But will direct all such Warrants to the Sheriff or Constable of, the County or Other the Officers, Of the State or Other Indiferant person to do execution Thereof, and finally, in all things belonging to my office, during Continuation therein will faithfully, Truly and Justly according to the best of my (Jud) skill and Judgment do equal and Impartial Justice to the Public and to Individuals, So help me God. Jas, Robertson, Valentine Sevier, John Carter, John Sevier, Jacob Womack, Robert Lucas, Andr, Greer, John Shelby Jr, George Russill, William Been, Zacr. Isbell, Jno McNabb, Tho, Houghton, William Clark, Jno McMaihen, Benjamin Gist, J. Chisholm, Joseph Wilson, William Cobb, James Stuart, Michl, Woods, Richd. White, Benjamin Wilson, Charles Roberson, William McNabb, Thos Price, Jesse Walton.

This oath has a deep and significant meaning, in view of the practices which had characterized the administration of justice by British officials. It is worthy of note that this oath, so full and specific in detail, did not bind those who took it to allegiance either to the state or the colony of North Carolina, or to the United States of America. It did bind them, however, to be honest, just and faithful to the people; it did bind them to “do equal right to the poor and to the rich”; it did bind them not to make suggestions or give counsel in any quarrel or suit pending before them, not to delay any person in obtaining justice, not to allow outside influence to dictate or control their actions, not to accept any fee, gift, gratuity or reward whatsoever for any matter or thing by them to be done, except the compensation allowed by law; to keep an account of fines and to enter them without concealment; and, finally, to “do equal and impartial justice to the public and to individuals.” This oath was not merely administered to them in the modern, perfunctory way, as “You do solemnly swear,” etc. They took it, repeated it after the officer, and signed it.

The new order of things was an innovation on the former simple, direct and expeditious way of administering justice; but the five “committeemen” were also members of the new court, and methods were not very materially changed, as the records of the clerk’s office at Jonesboro will show. They took jurisdiction of all matters relating to the public good, and disposed of all questions summarily, as will be more fully and particularly shown in another chapter.

Whenever a stranger appeared in the settlements, and gave his name as William Morningstar, Samuel Sunshine or Walter Rainbow, he would not be there long before he would be waited upon by a committee, one of whom would say to him: “Look here, stranger, we have examined the book of Genesis from end to end since you came here, and we can’t find the name of your ancestors. We think that you have got another name, and that you stole a horse somewhere and have run off. You must leave this settlement before night, or we’ll hang you!” Such frank treatment was invariably effective: its object was sure to heed the warning and to disappear before sunrise the next morning.

About this time a vigorous and ambitious young man left the city of Philadelphia for the wilds of the southwest. His mind was stored with the rich intellectual treasures of old Princeton, then under the presidency of the father of Aaron Burr. He walked, driving before him through Delaware and Maryland, over the Alleghanies and across Virginia, his “flea-bitten grey,” burdened to the utmost capacity with a huge sack of books. These classics were the nucleus of the library of an institution of learning yet unborn. After a fatiguing journey through a large portion of territory, with only obscure paths through gloomy forests for a highway, this devout and dauntless adventurer halted among the settlers whom I have been describing. Soon thereafter, the first church—a Presbyterian—and the first institution of learning that were established west of the Alleghanies were founded. These were “Salem Church” and “Washington College,” both established in the year 1780, eight miles southwest of the seat of the present town of Jonesboro—the college being the first one in the United States that honored itself by assuming the name of the Father of his Country. It is stated as a fact that, long prior to the late war, twenty-two members of the Congress of the United States had received or completed their education at Washington College, under this pioneer in letters and religious training, whose achievements constitute the jewels of our early literary and moral history. This man was Rev. Samuel Doak, D.D. Though he left a deep and indelible impress on the civilization and the literature of the Southwest, he sleeps today, amid the scenes of his successful earthly labors, with only a simple and fast crumbling memorial to mark the hallowed sepulchre of his silent dust.

THE FIRST CHURCH AND FIRST SCHOOLHOUSE BUILT IN THE “NEW WORLD WEST OF THE ALLEGHANIES.”
Afterward, and now, Washington College and Old Salem Church. The picture in an exact reproduction of the original log house, with log partition, erected by Samuel Doak, D.D., 1780, eight miles southwest of Jonesboro.

The settlers lived and their public affairs were conducted under the jurisdiction of the County Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions for a period of about six years, in a quiet and orderly manner; but ever since that May day of 1772 when they organized the first “free and independent government,” their dream had been of a new, separate and independent commonwealth, and they began to be restless, dissatisfied and disaffected toward the government of North Carolina. Many causes seemed to conspire to increase their discontent. The first constitution of North Carolina had made provision for a future state within her limits, on the western side of the Alleghany mountains. The mother state had persistently refused, on the plea of poverty, to establish a Superior Court and appoint an attorney general or prosecuting officer for the inhabitants west of the mountains. In 1784, many claims for compensation for military services, supplies, etc., in the campaigns against the Indians, were presented to the state government from the settlements west of the Alleghanies. North Carolina was impoverished; and, notwithstanding the fact that these claims were just, reasonable and honest, it was suggested, and perhaps believed, “that all pretences were laid hold of (by the settlers) to fabricate demands against the government, and that the industry and property of those who resided on the east side of the mountains were becoming the funds appropriated to discharge the debts contracted by those on the west.” Thus it came about that, in May, 1784, North Carolina, in order to relieve herself of this burden, ceded to the United States her territory west of the Alleghanies, provided that Congress would accept it within two years. At a subsequent session, an act was passed retaining jurisdiction and sovereignty over the territory until it should have been accepted by Congress. Immediately after passing the act of cession, North Carolina closed the land office in the ceded territory, and nullified all entries of land made after May 25, 1784.

The passage of the cession act stopped the delivery of a quantity of goods which North Carolina was under promise to deliver to the Cherokee Indians, as compensation for their claim to certain lands. The failure to deliver these goods naturally exasperated the Cherokees, and caused them to commit depredations, from which the western settlers were of course the sufferers.

At this session, the North Carolina assembly, at Hillsboro, laid taxes, or assessed taxes and empowered Congress to collect them, and vested in Congress power to levy a duty on foreign merchandise.

The general opinion among the settlers west of the Alleghanies was that the territory would not be accepted by Congress (and in this they were correct); and that, for a period of two years, the people in that territory, being under the protection neither of the government of the United States nor of the state of North Carolina, would neither receive any support from abroad nor be able to command their own resources at home—for the North Carolina act had subjected them to the payment of taxes to the United States government. At the same time, there was no relaxation of Indian hostilities. Under these circumstances, the great body of the people west of the Alleghanies concluded that there was but one thing left for them to do, and that was to adopt a constitution and organize a state and a state government of their own. This they proceeded to do. Was there anything else which these people could have done? Perhaps there was; but did they not adopt just such a course as any people situated as they were would have taken?

They proceeded to take steps for the holding of a convention. Delegates were elected from Washington, Sullivan and Greene counties, who met in convention at Jonesboro, August 23, 1784. Messrs. Cocke, Outlaw, Carter, Campbell, Manifee, Martin, Roberson, Houston, Christian, Kennedy and Wilson were appointed a committee, “to take under consideration the state of public affairs relative to the cession of the western country.” This committee appointed Messrs. Cocke and Hardin a sub-committee to draft a report, which they did. This report was in the nature of an address to the people. The convention then adjourned, to meet again in Jonesboro, September 16. It did not, however, assemble on that date. In October, 1784, the North Carolina assembly repealed the act of cession. In the following November, the delegates again assembled at Jonesboro, but failed to adopt a constitution, and broke up in confusion, because of the repeal of the act of cession. John Sevier, having received official information that the cession act had been repealed, courts established, an attorney general appointed and military officers commissioned, made a speech advising the people to go no further; but Cocke and a majority of the people were unwilling to abandon their dream of a new state—and Sevier went with his people.

December 14, 1784, another convention assembled at Jonesboro, and adopted a constitution, which was to be ratified or rejected by a convention called to meet at Greeneville, November 14, 1785. In the meantime, a general assembly was elected, which met at Greeneville, early in 1785, and chose John Sevier for Governor, David Campbell judge of the Superior Court, and Joshua Gist and John Anderson assistant judges. Landon Carter was chosen Speaker of the Senate, and William Cage Speaker of the House. The same assembly, at the same session, afterward elected Landon Carter Secretary of State and William Cage State Treasurer. Joseph Hardin was then elected Speaker of the House, but I have not been able to ascertain from any source who was elected Speaker of the Senate in place of Carter. Stoakley Donaldson was made Surveyor General, and Daniel Kennedy and William Cocke were appointed Brigadiers General. The assembly elected all other officers, civil and military, being careful to choose those who already held offices under the government of North Carolina—and so the ill-starred “state of Franklin” began its career. The new state was named in honor of Benjamin Franklin, as the correspondence of Sevier conclusively shows, and the name should therefore always be written “Franklin,” and not “Frankland.”

The boundaries of the new state, as set forth in a paper in the handwriting of Col. Arthur Campbell of Virginia, were as follows: “Beginning at a point on the top of the Alleghany or Appalachian mountains, so as a line drawn due north from thence will touch the bank of the New river, otherwise called Kenhawa, at the confluence of Little river, which is about one mile above Ingle’s ferry; down the said river Kenhawa to the mouth of Rencovert or Greenbriar river; a direct line from thence to the nearest summit of the Laurel mountain, and along the highest part of the same to the point where it is intersected by the parallel of thirty-seven degrees north latitude; west along that latitude to a point where it is met by a meridian line that passes through the lower part of the rapids of Ohio; south along the meridian to Elk river, a branch of the Tennessee; down said river to its mouth, and down the Tennessee to the most southwardly part or bend in said river; a direct line from thence to that branch of the Mobile called Donbigbee [Tombigbee]; down said river Donbigbee to its junction with the Coosawatee river to the mouth of that branch of it called the Higtower [Etowah]; thence south to the top of the Appalachian mountains, or the highest land that divides the sources of the eastern from the western waters; northwardly along the middle of said heights and the top of the Appalachian mountains, to the beginning.”

I am not prepared to say whether or not these people intended their new state to become part of the Union, as one of the provisions in their proposed form of government was that “the inhabitants within these limits agree with each other to form themselves into a free, sovereign and independent body politic or state, by the name of the commonwealth of Franklin.” I am inclined to the opinion that in the beginning they did not intend to join the Union of states, but that later they concluded that they would, as there was an effort made to have Congress recognize the new state.

An examination of the boundary lines of the state of Franklin will show that it included fifteen counties of Virginia, six of West Virginia, one-third of Kentucky, one-half of Tennessee, two-thirds of Alabama and more than one-fourth of Georgia. Cast your eye over this magnificent area: see the blue mountains, the sun-browned cliffs, the beautiful rivers, the broad valleys with their golden wheat-fields and verdant meadows, with the hundreds of smaller streams and sparkling springs: it seems like one grand piece of natural embroidery, fashioned and put together by the fingers of infinity and spread out by the hand of the Almighty. Think of the iron, coal, marble, lead, copper, zinc and other minerals hidden within its soil—you might have put a Chinese wall around the people of the “state of Franklin,” and still they could have lived in absolute independence of the outside world. There is more iron and coal in this territory than can be found in the same area elsewhere in the United States, and it is today yielding a vast revenue to its inhabitants. You can stand on some of its mountain-tops, and see the heavens darkened by day with the pillar of cloud, and made luminous by night with the pillar of fire, arising from furnace and forge in the valleys below, and hear the hammer of Thor beating the iron ribs of those majestic old mountains into the marvellous machines of modern invention and the utilities of a grand civilization.

At the first session of the general assembly of the state of Franklin, held in March, 1785, fifteen acts or laws were passed. In the act levying a tax for the support of the government was the following section:

Be it enacted, That it shall and may be lawful for the aforesaid land tax, and the free polls, to be paid in the following manner: Good flax linen, ten hundred, at three shillings and six pence per yard. Nine hundred at three shillings: Eight hundred two shillings and nine pence: Seven hundred two shillings and six pence: Six hundred two shillings: tow linen one shilling and nine pence: linsey three shillings: and woolen and cotton linsey three shillings and six pence per yard: Good clean beaver skin six shillings: cased Otter skins six shillings: uncased ditto five shillings: rackoon and fox skins one shilling and three pence: woolen cloth at ten shillings per yard: bacon well cured at six pence per pound: good clean beeswax one shilling per pound: good clean talow six pence per pound: good distilled rye whiskey at two shillings and six pence per gallon: good peach or apple brandy at three shillings per gallon: good country made sugar at one shilling per pound: deer skins, the pattern six shillings: good neat and well managed tobacco fit to be prized that may pass inspection the hundred, fifteen shillings, and so on in proportion for a greater or less quantity.

The last section of the act is in these words: “And all the salaries and allowances hereby made shall be paid by any treasurer, sheriff or collector of public taxes to any person entitled to the same, to be paid in specific articles as collected, and at the rates allowed by the state for the same, or in current money of the state of Franklin.” This provision furnished those who adhered to the North Carolina government much amusement. They asserted that the salaries of the Governor, judges and other officers were to be paid in skins, absolutely; and, to add to their amusement, had them payable in mink skins at that. From this provision the inhabitants of that section of the country fell into the habit of referring to money as “mink skins;” and this term, as descriptive of money, thus spread all over the southwestern country.

They estimated by law two dollars and fifty cents to be equal to fifteen shillings of the current money of Franklin. They allowed the Governor two hundred pounds annually; the Attorney General twenty-five pounds for each court he attended; the Secretary of State twenty-five pounds and fees; the judge of the Superior Court one hundred and fifty pounds; the assistant judges twenty-five pounds for each court they attended; the treasurer forty pound; and each member of the council six shillings per day for each day of actual service.

A convention met in Greeneville, in November, 1785, to adopt a constitution. Up to this time no disagreement had taken place—all were for Franklin; but when the constitution which had been proposed was submitted, it was rejected; and, on motion of Col. William Cocke, the convention adopted the entire constitution of North Carolina. Thus began the trouble which ended in the overthrow of the state of Franklin.

HOUSE USED AS CAPITOL OF THE STATE OF FRANKLIN.
In Greeneville, Tennessee. From a photograph taken in April, 1897.

I can not now notice the various sessions held by the assembly of Franklin. It met for the last time in Greeneville, in September, 1787. “During the years 1786 and 1787, a strange spectacle was presented—that of two empires being exercised at one and the same time, over one and the same territory and people.” County courts were held in the same counties, under the Franklin and the North Carolina governments; “the same militia was called out by officers appointed by each government; laws were passed by both assemblies”; taxes were laid by authority of both states—but the people said that they did not know which government had the right to receive their taxes, and therefore they adopted the easy solution of paying to neither. The Superior Courts of Franklin were held at Jonesboro; the courts under North Carolina were held at Davis’s on Buffalo creek, ten miles east of Jonesboro, and at Col. Tipton’s. There were now two strong parties, one under Tipton, adhering to North Carolina, and the friends of Franklin following Sevier, each of whom endeavored by every possible means to strengthen his cause. “Every provocation on the one side was surpassed in the way of retaliation by a still greater provocation on the other.... The clerks of the county courts of Washington, Greene and Sullivan, under Franklin, issued marriage licenses, and many persons were married by virtue of their authority.”

In 1786, while a court was in session at Jonesboro, under the Franklin government, Col. John Tipton entered the court house with a party of men, took the records away from the clerk and drove the justices out of the house. Not long after this, Sevier entered the house where the North Carolina court was sitting, turned the justices out bodily and carried off the records. “The like acts were repeated several times during the existence of the Franklin government.” James Sevier was clerk of Washington county under the Franklin government, as he had been under North Carolina. Tipton went to Sevier’s house and took the old records away from him by force. Shortly afterward, the same records were recaptured, and James Sevier hid them in a cave. During these captures and removals many of the records were lost. Of the Franklin records all save one were either lost or destroyed.

This single remaining record of the Franklin courts is not only interesting but amusing; and, to be as drunk as it unquestionably is, contains some law and a great deal of early history. This record was evidently made late at night, by the light of a “tallow dip” or a bear-oil lamp, with a bottle of well-distilled apple or peach brandy near by. It is the only written record relative to the “lost state” and its courts that I have ever been able to find. It is like an old-time copy-book. On the outside are the following entries and memoranda—I give them literally:

State of Franklin,—Washington County
J James Sevier, State of Franklin James Sevier clerk of
Washington County State of Franklin
Franklin
Franklin
Franklin

Inside, in the same handwriting, will be found the following:

Good deeds are very commendable in youth,

Good many men of good many minds

Good birds of Good many kinds

State of —— Court Adg’d, till court In course from a general insurrection of the times, to this date 7th, of May 1786,

On the next page the record continues as follows:

Something ambiguous will say he went to the Indians, no witnesses, no opportunity, they are not able to proove anything, The meaning is to be taken, the latter in contracts, deeds and wills, construed differantly was there a ejectment, and he never tryed, nothing can be done until Injunction issue from the judge. The law says no party shall be tryed without witnesses Hobgobblins, and Ghosts. So many tryals

Read and interpret this record in the flickering light of the history of the times. The court had been broken up and the justices driven out of the house—this, I suppose, is the “ejectment” referred to. John Sevier was at this time on the frontier, fighting the Indians—hence, he “went to the Indians.” There was at this time in the hands of the North Carolina sheriff a bench warrant for the arrest of Sevier; if he was arrested, the charges against him could not be proven without witnesses; these would be hard to procure against John Sevier, and yet no one could be fairly “tryed without witnesses.” So this clerk, alone at midnight, with no company except the flask whose odor seems still perceptible in the pages of his record, reasoned and wrote—until the “Hobgobblins and Ghosts” got after him!

In January or February of 1788, John Sevier’s property was seized under a fieri facias issued by North Carolina. Sevier and Tipton, with their respective followers, met and fought a slight battle two miles south of the present site of Johnson City, in which the former was repulsed. In the following October, Sevier was arrested and carried to North Carolina for trial. Soon afterward, the government of Franklin collapsed, and North Carolina passed an act of “pardon and oblivion,” and reassumed her government of these people.

The state of Franklin, in 1787-8, was composed of the three original counties of Washington, Sullivan and Greene, together with four new counties—Sevier, which covered the same territory it now covers and a part of what is now Blount; Caswell, which occupied the same section of country now included in Jefferson; Spencer, which covered Hawkins; and Wayne, covering Johnson and Carter.

As late as February, 1789, the record in Jonesboro shows the following entries:

James Allison and James Sevier came into open court and prayed to be admitted to take the benefit of the act of pardon and oblivion by taking the oath provided by law, which was deferred till tomorrow for want of the acts of the General Assembly.

On the next day the following entry was made:

James Sevier, James Allison and Francis Baker, persons who had withdrawn their allegiance [from North Carolina] came into open court, and availed themselves of the act of pardon and oblivion by taking the oaths prescribed by law.

At the February term, 1788, of the court, the following order was made and entered of record:

Ordered by the Court that Johnathan Pugh Esqr, Sheriff of Washington County, Take into custody the County court docket of said county, supposed to be in the possession of John Sevier Esqr, And the same records bring from him or any other person or persons, in whose possession they are now, or hereafter shall be, and the same return to the Court or some succeeding court for said county.

At the May term, 1788, this order was made:

Ordered by the court that the Sheriff of this County demand the public records of this County from John Sevier, former clerk of the court.

The records referred to were lost, or remained in the cave where they were hidden.

All opposition to North Carolina authority was now virtually withdrawn, but the people west of the Alleghanies worked quietly for a separation and a new state.

North Carolina passed a second cession act, under the provisions of which, February 25, 1790, Samuel Johnston and Benjamin Hawkins, Senators in Congress from North Carolina, deeded the territory to the United States, and the sovereignty of North Carolina over it instantly expired. It has been aptly said that “the separation was not like that of a disconsolate mother parting from a beloved daughter, but rather like that when Abraham said to Lot, ‘Separate thyself, I pray thee, from me. If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left.’”

President Washington appointed William Blount Governor of the territory, August 7, 1790. On the 10th day of the following October, Governor Blount organized the territorial government, at the house of Mr. Cobb, in Sullivan county, on the north side of Watauga river, since known as the Massengale farm, above and opposite where Austin Springs are. The population of the territory in July, 1791, was 36,043, including 3,417 slaves. The whole population of the Cumberland settlement at that time was 7,042.

November 5, 1791, the second printing press introduced in the “New World west of the Alleghanies” was set up, at Rogersville, by Mr. George Roulstone.

The people who made it possible for Tennessee to have a centennial were a wonderful people. Within a period of about fifteen years, they were engaged in three revolutions; participated in organizing and lived under five different governments; established and administered the first free and independent government in America; founded the first church and the first college in the southwest; put in operation the second newspaper in the “New World west of the Alleghanies;” met and fought the British in half a dozen battles, from King’s Mountain to the gates of Charleston, gaining a victory in every battle; held in check, beat back and finally expelled from the country four of the most powerful tribes of Indian warriors in America; and left Tennesseans their fame as a heritage, and a commonwealth of which it is their privilege to be proud.

These are the people among whom Andrew Jackson settled and began life, and from whose character, example and achievements he must have received some little degree of inspiration.

Passing from the scene of their toil and trials, their struggles and dangers, from war with the savage and war with the civilized, let us devote a little time to further examination into their character, as revealed in the judicial records made and left by them.