There is among the Rochambeau maps (no. 36) a small but good plan (5 × 4 inches), called An accurate map of North and South Carolina, with their Indian frontier, showing in a distinct manner all the mountains, rivers, swamps, marshes, bays, creeks, harbors, sandbanks, coasts, and soundings, with roads and Indian paths, as well as the boundary of provincial lines, the several townships and other divisions of the land in both the provinces,—from actual surveys by Henry Mouzon. It is the same map given in Jefferys' American Atlas (1776, no. 23), and was republished in Paris in 1777 by Le Rouge, and is included in the Atlas Amériquain. The middle, upper, and over-hill towns are given on one of the sections of Arrowsmith's map (1795-1802), and also upon the Carte des Etats-Unis de l'Amérique Septentrionale.—Copiée et Gravée sur celle d'Arrowsmith, etc., etc. Par P. F. Tardieu, à Paris, 1808.
Faden issued in 1780 a map of the northern frontiers of Georgia, by Archibald Campbell.—Ed.
This powder was seized by the royalists, but as an offset the annual presents of Stuart were seized at Tybee by the "Liberty People." It was stated that the best friends of Great Britain lived in the back parts of Carolina and Georgia. If the Indians were put in motion, they, and not the rebels, would suffer. Nevertheless, the first blow from the Indians came from that quarter. Early in July, 1776, news was received at Savannah, at Charleston, and at Fincastle, Va., that the Indians were at work upon the border, carrying destruction wherever they went. On the 7th of July, General Lee wrote to the president of the Virginia Convention that an opportunity offered for a coöperative movement. The Continental Congress, having received a report of the circumstances from the president of South Carolina, recommended, on the 30th of July (1776), the States of Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia to afford all necessary assistance. As soon as the first intelligence of the outbreak in South Carolina reached Col. Andrew Williamson, who at the beginning of this campaign apparently ranked as major, he promptly rallied the inhabitants of the frontier of that State. By the middle of July he had collected a body of 1,150 volunteers. With this force he invaded the Indian territory, and during the remainder of the month of July and the first half of August he was occupied in destroying the Cherokee lower towns. On his return to his main camp from a raid with a detachment, about the middle of August, he found that a number of his men had gone home, and that many of those who remained were suffering for clothes and other necessaries. He erected a fort at Essenecca, which he named after President Rutledge, and furloughed a part of his force until August 28th.
At the same time that the depredations were committed which caused Col. Williamson to invade the Indian country, the settlements in Virginia and North Carolina, on the border of what we now know as Tennessee, were threatened by the Indians. The inhabitants along the border at once "forted" themselves. A small force collected at Eaton's station met a party of Indians on the 20th of July, and repulsed them, with a loss of thirteen of their warriors. Watauga, where 150 persons, of whom 40 were men, had assembled in the fort, was besieged by another band. The Indians hung about the fort for six days, and skulked in the woods for a fortnight longer, but left on the approach of a relief column. Other Indians went up the Holston to Carter's Valley, but accomplished nothing in that immediate vicinity.[1416] The settlements in Virginia, in the Clinch Valley and for a long distance from this point, were, however, raided, and the surrounding country devastated.
Georgia performed her share of the season's work simultaneously with Colonel Williamson's first raid. An independent command, led by Major Jack,[1417] operated against the lower towns beyond the Tugaloo, during the latter part of July.
The work performed by South Carolina and Georgia during the months of July and August was not considered complete. It was determined to inflict a blow which would be remembered. About the first of September Colonel Williamson again marched into the Indian country, this time at the head of about two thousand men. It was intended that on an appointed day in September he should effect a junction with General Rutherford of North Carolina, who at the head of twenty-four hundred men simultaneously marched from that State. Although the two columns met in Indian territory, the junction was not effected at the appointed date, and the work of destroying the middle towns and valley settlements was independently performed. Virginia sent out an expedition at the same time against the upper or over-hill towns. This force, after it was joined by some companies from the northwestern portion of North Carolina, numbered eighteen hundred men, and was commanded by Colonel William Christian. The purposes of this expedition were successfully accomplished.
The South Carolina troops had the misfortune to encounter nearly all the resistance that was offered by the Indians, and the two expeditions lost 22 men killed, with 11 men mortally wounded, and 63 men otherwise wounded. They had the satisfaction, however, of knowing that the joint expedition had thoroughly performed its work. The Cherokee towns were burned, and the crops of the Indians were destroyed. The attack by the Indians consolidated the colonists and aroused their indignation. The Council of South Carolina asserted that they were now convinced of what they had before but little reason to doubt, "the indiscriminate atrocity and unrelenting tyranny of the hand that directs the British war against us." The Assembly spoke of it as a "barbarous and ungrateful attempt of the Cherokee Indians, instigated by our British enemies." The Cherokees accepted such terms of peace as their conquerors allowed. Next year separate treaties were made between representatives of the tribes and Virginia and North Carolina, and between other representatives and South Carolina and Georgia. In the treaty in which South Carolina participated, a portion of the Indian territory was ceded to that State on the ground of conquest. For several years thereafter the Indians kept so quiet that but little was heard from them in that portion of the country. As a sequel to the campaign it may be noted that, on the 25th of September, President Rutledge informed the Assembly of South Carolina that Colonel Williamson desired instructions as to whether the Indians taken prisoners should become slaves. Such an impression prevailed in camp, and one prisoner had already been sold as a slave.[1418]
McCall, in his History of Georgia, is authority for the statement that General Rutherford was accompanied on his march by a small band of Catawba Indians. In Virginia the matter of enlisting Indians was considered in the Convention, and on the 21st of May, 1776, a resolution was passed to engage a number of warriors, not to exceed two hundred. A few days afterward, however, the execution of this resolution was postponed in such a way as to make it ineffective.