Dozens, scores, maybe hundreds of Scots, mostly Highlanders
and Islanders, with some Uplanders, Lowlanders, and Borders, lived and traded
with the Indians of the Old Southwest, that part of the U.S.A. now known as the
American Southeast. There were also
traders and agents who were of English, Irish, Welsh, and German origin, even a
few Hugeonot French, but these were far fewer in comparison than the number of Scots.
During the French and Indian War of 1754-1763, the British
colonial administration decided it needed to centralize all forms of relations
with the myriad Indian nations and tribes under a single umbrella rather than
continue with each province (colony) going its own separate way. To some extent this worked out, to some
extent things remained as they were. By
the eve of the Revolution, trade responsibility had returned to the individual
provinces while the Indian Department was in charge of political relations.
Initially, the Department of Indian Affairs was divided into
two districts, Northern and Southern, divided by the Ohio River. From its opening in January 1756 until 1764,
activities of each were conducted by a Superintendent with one assistant.
In 1764, the governor general authorized each superintendent
to appoint permanent resident agents among the tribes called commissaries, each
with an interpreter and clerk. In the
Southern District, there was a commissary for each of the major tribes—Cherokee,
Creek, Choctaw, and Chickasaw—plus one for the Small Tribes on the Lower
Mississippi River (Biloxi, Houma, Attacapa, Bayogoula, Tunica, Apalachee,
Ofogoula, Quapaw). John Stuart,
Superintendent since 1762, handled relations with the fifth major tribe, the
Catawba, out of his Charlestown, South Carolina, headquarters. The Seminole were counted among the Creek. The province of Virginia maintained authority
over the Indian tribes within its boundaries.
In 1766, the governor general authorized Deputy Superintendents
in both districts, three for the Northern and two for the Southern. Stuart appointed Alexander Cameron,
Commissary to the Cherokee, as Deputy Superintendent to oversee relations with
the Catawba, Cherokee, and Creek and his cousin Charles Stuart, then Commissary
to the Small Tribes, as Deputy Superintendent to oversee relations with the
Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Small Tribes.
The number of commissaries had expanded as well, each major tribe now having
more than one, plus posts at St. Augustine, Pensacola, and Mobile.
By the outbreak of the Revolution, there were Deputy
Superintendents for the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Small Tribes,
and Stuart had appointed his brothr Henry Stuart as chief Deputy Superintendent. Those who served with the British Indian
Department during the Revolution, with the exception of John and Henry Stuart,
did so not just as mere adminstrators but often as active combatants and
commanders.
Notable Scottish traders, agents, and refugee Tories among
the Cherokee and other tribes of the Old Southwest (now the American Southeast)
included the men listed below.
Edmond Atkin, of
Scottish origin, served as the first Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the
Southern District, based out of his hometown of Williamsburg, Virginia. He served from 1756 until his death at the
end of 1761.
Thomas Brown was
born in England, but emigrated with a group of Scots from the Orkney Islands to
Georgia. During the Revolution, he was a
Loyalist living in Brownsborough, Georgia, near Augusta, who relocated to
Florida after he was tied to a tree, roasted with fire, scalped, tarred, and
feathered by a mob of the Sons of Liberty.
Making his base among the Seminole, he led the East Florida Rangers,
made up of Loyalist, Seminole, and Lower Creek.
When the British Southern District for Indian Affairs was
split after the death of John Stuart in March 1779, Brown was Superintendent of
Indians Affairs for the Atlantic District to work with the Cherokee, Creek, and
Seminole, relocating to the recently captured Augusta, Georgia, from which he also
led the King’s Carolina Rangers. He
remained there until June 1781, when the American recaptured the city and he
had to relocate with Cameron and Taitt to Savannah until June 1782, when they
had to remove again to St. Augustine, East Florida. He was ordered to cease operations in
September 1783. He moved to Abaco Island
in the Bahamas, then to St. Vincent’s, where he died in 1825.
William Buchanan
was the first white man to settle among the Cherokee beyond the Tuckaseegee
River, at least according to family records.
His son or grandson John Buchanan sold the land which became the first
British settlement in Tennessee, Sapling Grove (now Bristol), the first of the
North-of-Holston settlements, to Evan Shelby in 1768. John’s son, also named John, was one of
fourteen defenders who managed to hold off an attack by 280 Cherokee, Creek,
and Shawnee on Buchanan’s Station the night of 30 September 1792.
Alexander Cameron
served as John Stuart’s Commissary to the Cherokee then (simultaneously) Deputy
Superintendent (over relations with the Catawba, Cherokee, and Creek) until the
latter’s death. His base was first at
the Cherokee town of Keowee in what’s now Oconee County, South Carolina. He later moved to the Cherokee town of Toqua
on the Little Tennessee River, and became adopted brother to Dragging Canoe,
then headman of Great Island Town. Later
he moved to the Upper Creek town of Little Tallassee, where he lived until an
assassination plot in September 1777 forced him to relocate to Pensacola, West
Florida.
Upon John Stuart’s death, the Southern District for Indian
Affairs was split in two, and Cameron was assigned as Superintendent of Indian
Affairs for the Mississippi District to work with the Choctaw and the
Chickasaw. After Pensacola was captured
by the Spanish in May 1781, he joined Brown in Augusta, Georgia. Barely a month later, Cameron and the rest
had to relocate to Savannah when Augusta was retaken by the Americans. He died there in December 1781.
Alexander Campbell
served as John Graham as Chief Deputy Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the
Mississippi District, making his base at the Cherokee town of Turkeytown, near
what is now Centre, Alabama.
Dugald Campbell
served as the Southern District’s Commissary at Mobile.
John D. Chisholm
was a Scottish trader originally based out of Pensacola who moved to live among
the Upper Creek in 1778, then later with the Cherokee, before establishing
himself in the North-of-Holston settlements, from which he traded with the
Overhill and other Cherokee. He later
moved to reside permanently in Willstown, serving as secretary to Cherokee
leader Doublehead until the latter’s assassination. When Cherokee began migrating west beyond the
Mississippi River in the early 1800s, he joined them.
James Logan Colbert
was a longtime trader living several decades among the Chickasaw, who was
either born in Inverness or in the Carolinas to someone born in Inverness. During the Revolution, he became a Captain of
the Department of Indian Affairs Mississippi District, operating independently
against the Spanish after their capture of the Lower Mississippi in autumn 1779. At his death in 1784, he owned a huge
plantation with 150 slaves. Of his six
sons, four became leading headmen of the Chickasaw during the late 18th and
early 19th centuries, while his two daughters married other headmen.
Alexander Cuming
was a Scottish aristocrat who may have been sent to the Cherokee by King George
II, or may have ventured to Cherokee Country on his own. He claimed the Cherokee had given him the
title of “king”. It is a fact that he
brought the first seven Cherokee to visit London.
John Doigg served
as the Southern District’s Commissary at Pensacola.
John Elliot was a
prominent early trader among the Cherokee, contemporary of Ludovic Grant and
John Watts, Sr. The Cherokee reportedly
detested him.
John Anthony Foreman
was a Scottish trader who settled in the town of Ooyougilogi, twenty miles
northeast of Chattooga (site of the later Rome, Georgia), who married Susie
Rattling-Gourd of the Paint Clan, with whom he had seven sons, man of whom
became prominent leaders of the Cherokee Nation, and five daughters.
Christopher Gist
served as assistant to Edmond Atkin, Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the
Southern District, 1756-1761.
Nathaniel Gist,
son of Christopher, was a trader among the Cherokee of the Overhill Towns on
the Little Tennessee River who became the father of Sequoyah (also known as
George Gist or Guess), inventer of the Cherokee alphabet.
John Graham
succeeded Alexander Cameron as British Superintendent of Indian Affairs in the
Mississippi District upon the latter’s death at Savannah, Georgia, in December
1781.
Ludovic Grant was
one of the first, if not the first, traders among the Overhill Towns of the
Cherokee along the Little Tennessee and Tellico Rivers, first making his home
at Great Tellico, later moving to the Little Tennessee. He lived in the Overhill Towns from 1726 to
1756, and his letters written 1730-1756 provide a wealth of information about
the Cherokee of that time.
George Lowrey was
a Scottish trader who married Nanyeh of the Wolf Clan (also known as Nannie
Watts) and became father to Cherokee warriors and later political leaders John
and George Lowrey.
John McDonald was
Alexander Cameron’s assistant. At the
outbreak of the Revolution, he took up a post on the west bank of South
Chickamauga Creek where a branch of the Great Indian Warpath crossed, providing
a link to Henry Stuart in Pensacola. The
site later became Brainerd Mission.
After the first westward relocation of the militant Cherokee during the
Revolution, Dragging Canoe (Tsiyugunsini), their chief war leader, set up his
base at the town established his headquarters at the town of Chickamauga on the
east bank of South Chickamauga Creek, across from McDonald’s trading post and
commissary.
When John Stuart died and Thomas Brown became Superintendent
of Indian Affairs for the Atlantic District while Cameron moved to the
Mississippi District, McDonald became his Deputy Superintendent to the Cherokee,
based out of the Cherokee town of Running Water at what is now Whiteside,
Tennessee.
In 1788, he and his deputy and son-in-law Daniel Ross transferred
operations to Turkeytown (Centre, Alabama) in order to be closer to their
supply lines from now Spanish-held Pensacola, after he became the official
Spanish agent to the Cherokee as well as British Superintendent of Indian
Affairs for the Southern District. When
the Cherokee-American wars ended in 1795, he moved to modern-day Rossville,
Georgia, and built what is now known as the John Ross House, later moving to
his former home on South Chickamauga Creek.
In 1817, he sold that land to the American Board of Missioners, where
they established Brainerd Mission, which lasted until the Cherokee Removal in
1838. Afterwards, he moved in with his
grandson, now living at the Rossville house, where he died in 1824.
John McGillivray
commanded a company of provincial militia working with the Chickasaw along the
Mississippi during the Revolutionary War, at least between the time of Willing’s
Raid (September 1778) and the capture of the Lower Mississippi by Spain in fall
1779.
Lachlan McGillivray
was a Scottish trader among the Creek who became the father of later Creek
leader Alexander McGillivray, who led the pro-British faction of the Lower
Creek during the American Revolution.
John McIntosh
served as John Stuart’s Commissary and later Deputy Superintendent to the
Chickasaw from late colonial times into the Revolutionary War, except for a
brief period when he was instead Commissary for all West Florida based out of
Mobile.
Roderick McIntosh
served as Southern District’s Commissary to the Upper and Middle Creek from
1764 to 1772.
William McIntosh
was a Scottish Loyalist who moved from Savannah, Georgia, to live among the
Creek during the Revolution and became David Taitt’s assistant deputy among the
Lower Creek towns. His son, also named
William, became one of the leading men of the Creek Confederacy after the
Revolution.
Charles McLemore was
a trader among the Cherokee at the time of the Anglo-Cherokee War (1758-1761)
who became father to later Cherokee warriors and postwar leaders John and
Robert, the latter of whom named McLemore’s Cove in northern Walker County,
Georgia.
Daniel Ross, father
of later Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation John Ross, was a trader
travelling down the Tennessee River in 1780, captured by the militant Cherokee
near the later City of Chattanooga and rescued from death by John
McDonald. He later married McDonald’s
daughter Molly, and served as McDonald’s assistant when the latter was Deputy
Superintendent of the Atlantic District to Thomas Brown. He remained McDonald’s assistant after the
Revolution, moving with him to Turkeytown (Centre, Alabama) to continue
supporting southern Indians fighting American settlers. When the Cherokee-American wars ended in
1795, he and his family moved to the Cherokee town of Tsatanugi (from which
Chattanooga is derived) at the modern St. Elmo.
Charles Stuart served
as his cousin John’s first Commissary to the Small Tribes (on the Mississippi
River), stationed in Mobile, then became Deputy Superintendent to coordiante
relations with the Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Small Tribe along with serving as
Commissary to the Choctaw.
Henry Stuart was
his brother John’s Chief Deputy Superintendent, based during the Revolution out
of Mobile, then Pensacola, both in West Florida.
John Stuart was
the lone survivor of the Fort Loudon Massacre in 1758 which began the
Anglo-Cherokee War (fought concurrently with the French and Indian War). Of course, that was in response to the murder
of a large number of Cherokee hostages of the British at Fort Prince George
near the Cherokee town of Keowee. In
1761, he became British Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Southern
District out of Charlestown, South Carolina, which he remained until his death
during the Revolution. In that office,
he succeeded its first holder, English-born Emond Atkin, who served from 1756 until
his death in 1761. After his house was
attacked at the outbreak of the Revolution, he relocated to St. Augustine in
British-held East Florida, where he died in March 1779. By Susannah Emory, he became the progenitor
of the Bushyhead family of the Cherokee Nation.
David Taitt
served as Stuart’s Deputy Superintendent to the Creek, making his base at the Upper
Creek town of Little Tallassee near present-day Mongomery, Alabama. At the time, the Creek ere divided into four
divisions, the Upper, Middle, and Lower Towns, and the Seminole, who were
counted as another. Taitt relocated with
Alexander Cameron in September 1777, but returned in early 1778 only to be
recalled to Pensacola shortly thereafter, from which he fled in May 1781, along
with Alexander Cameron, after its capture by the Spanish, only to be forced to
relocate to Savannah, Georgia, in June 1781 when Augusta was captured by the
Americans.
Charles Thomas Taylor
was the natural son of a Scottish laird and British soldier who was station at Fort Frederica on St. Simon’s Island then at Fort Prince George across the river from the Cherokee town of Keowee, the major trading post of South Carolina with the Lower Towns, where he was last reported as a captain. His son Thomas married Jennie Walker, and they had three children, Richard Fox Taylor and Charles Fox Taylor, who prominent
business and political leaders of the Cherokee Nation, the former leading one
of the parties heading west during the Cherokee Removal, and Susannah, who married Samuel A. Parks and avoided Removal to die in Bradley County, Tennessee, in 1876. Charles Thomas’ other son, also Charles Fox Taylor, sided with the Loyalists during the American Revolution, serving with Thomas Brown’s East Florida Rangers and Carolina Rangers, emigrating after the war to the Caribbean.
John Thomas
served as John Stuart’s Commissary and later Deputy Superintendent to the Small
Tribes on the Lower Mississippi and Gulf Coast (Biloxi, Houma, Attacapa,
Bayogoula, Tunica, Apalachee, Ofogoula, and Quapaw).
James Clement Vann
was another Scottish trader among the Cherokee, possibly brother to John
Joseph, who later married Wah-Li of the Wild Potato Clan and became step-father
to James and sisters Nancy and Jennie.
John Joseph Vann
was a Scottish trader who lived among the Cherokee near what became
Springplace, Georgia, the site of the first Christian mission among the
Cherokee, built by the Moravian Brethren.
By a Cherokee woman named Wah-Li, he became father of James Vann, a later
Cherokee warrior, plantation owner, merchant, and civic and political leader
who during his life was the richest man east of the Mississipi River of any
ethnicity.
John Walker, Sr.
was a trader among the Cherokee after the Cherokee-American wars ended who
became friends with then General Andrew Jackson while serving under him during
the Creek War of 1811-1813. He was
already by then father of future Cherokee leader John Walker, Jr.
John Watts, Sr. was
an Indian trader of Scottish descent among the Cherokee from about 1750 who
became the official British interpeter with the Cherokee after the
Anglo-Cherokee War (1758-1761). He
married Wurteh of the Paint Clan, sister of war leader and later political
leader Doublehead and of First Beloved Man of the Cherokee Overhill Towns, Old
Tassel, who was murdered by settlers in 1788.
They had six children, one of whom was John Watts, Jr., a later warrior
who succeeded Dragging Canoe as leader upon the latter’s death on 1 March 1792.
* * * * *
While in the Southern Theater during the Revolution, nearly all
the Scottish Highlanders and their descendants were Loyalists, most of the
Irish Protestants or Irish Presbyterians, the group later called “Scotch-Irish”,
almost universally supported the Whigs. The
same was the case in the North, at least in the beginning, but three Irish
Protestants defected to the Loyalist cause in 1778 and became prominent in
Indian affairs. These three were Alexander
McKee, Matthew Elliot, and Simon Girty, whose brother James and George later
joined.
Contemporary references to the “Scotch-Irish” do exist, but
they are incredibly few. Usually the
group is referred to as “Irish Protestants” or “Irish Presbyterians”. In Ireland, “Protestants” were strictly those
of the Anglican Church of Ireland; even Episcopalian immigrants from Scotland
were classed with Presbyterians as “Dissenters”. The term “Scotch-Irish” did not come into
common usage in the North until the 1840s, with sudden expansion of influx of
refugees from the Irish Famine of those years.
In the South, it was not common until the late 19th and early 20th
centuries.
In 1776, the Continental Congress organized its own Department
of Indian Affairs, divided into Northern, Middle, and Southern Districts. In practice, however, each state appointed
its own representatives to the various tribes.
For example, North Carolina appointed James Robertson its agent to the
Cherokee, Virginia appointed Joseph Martin, and South Carolina appointed Andrew
Williamson, each of Irish Protestant descent.
3 comments:
Hi!
Could you tell me the source of your information about Alexander Campbell serving John Graham as Chief Deputy Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Mississippi District, making his base at the Cherokee town of Turkeytown, Alabama?
I have been chasing this Campbell for years and, dang, he is allusive. Do you know of any other information about John Graham and where I could find it?
Thanks,
Laurie
What little I know about Alexander Campbell is here: https://notesfromtheninthcircle.blogspot.com/2011/08/chickamauga-wars-17761794.html
On further research just now, I discovered that he may gave remained in North America after the war. An Alexander Campbell was granted, or regranted, a license to trade with the Cherokee Nation by the US War Department in 1797.
The Tennessee State Archives in Nashville holds the Penelope Allen Collection, which includes correspondence between Alexander Campbell and the Indian Commissioner to the Cherokee for Virginia, Joseph Martin, from 1779-1793.
He seems to have been prominent in Alabama history, particularly in connection with Willstown, so you might try looking to Alabama for sources.
Charles Taylor was not a trader, he was a British soldier stationed in the Cherokee Nation about 1755. He fathered two sons, Thomas and Charles. He died in Charleston in 1774. His son Charles fought with the British in the Revolutionary War and received a land grant in the Bahamas for his service. He lived there for the rest of his life. Son Thomas married Jennie Walker, also Cherokee, and fathered three children Fox, Richard, and Susannah. Thomas' son Richard led a detachment on the Trail of Tears. Although the first Charles Taylor claimed to be the illegitimate son of a member of the Fox family in England there is nothing to support that claim.
Jennie Walker, who married Thomas, made the following statement: "Charles Thomas Taylor came into the C[herokee] Nation a Captain in a Brittish Regiment & married a Cherokee woman by whom he had a son named Thomas. Thomas married a Cherokee woman by whom he had three children; Richard, Fox, & Susan, the first named Taylor was a natural son of the Fox family in England, on that account the son of Thomas was called Fox & they have ever since continued to say that they by blood are allied to the late Charles Fox. Thomas had a brother named Charles who died in the west Indies. The simple narative from the widow of Thomas [NOTE: this would be Jennie Walker] who is still living bears all the marks of truth. It will be observed that the first mentioned Taylor had a brother named Charles & a son also named Charles so that there were three heirs of that name including the first-mentioned, that bore the name of Charles & the son of the first named his son by the Cherokee woman Fox [knowing?] at the time that he named him after his great grandfather in England. November 14, 1811 [marginal notation] The first Charles Taylor died in Charles Town, SoCarolina (Charles' death was reported in the South Carolina Gazette as July 15, 1774.) RG75, Records of the Cherokee Agency in Tennessee, 1798-1838 (correspondence, 1811-1813) Microfilm #M208, Roll 6
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