The Anglo-Cherokee War is, of course, the most famous war in American history.
Seriously, though, it’s probably a conflict most Americans—even many historians—have never heard of. I first learned about this war in graduate school, and I immediately became hooked on studying it because it’s such a great example of intercultural conflict—and cooperation. At so many points during the months leading up to the outbreak of open warfare, things could have gone a different way, and there are so many interesting personalities in the war that shape the alliance—good, bad, broken, and repaired—between South Carolina and the Cherokee. So let’s do a brief overview of the war, and get into some of those tense moments and personalities.
“The Cherokees”—A Group That Didn’t Exist
First off, a quick note about the term “The Cherokee.” We tend to think of Native American tribes today as unified political and cultural bodies, with elected leaders, centralized governments, etc. That was not the case for Native American groups in the 1700s Southeast. Instead, what we have come to refer to as the Cherokee were a loosely united grouping of dozens of towns spread across Northwest Georgia, upstate South Carolina, western North Carolina, and eastern Tennessee. These towns clustered into 3-5 regions (scholars disagree on how to differentiate them; I use 3 here: Lower for the easternmost towns, Overhill for the westernmost, and Middle for, well, the middle). The key thing to understand is that these towns were largely self-governing; they had their own appointed leaders, who governed by consensus, not authoritarian dictates. Sometimes towns from the same region cooperated; sometimes they were rivals. Sometimes different regions cooperated; other times, they competed. Decision making was very localized, something that gets lost when we talk about “the Cherokee.” I have tried to maintain the regional and individual variations and decisions while also making this story comprehensible to readers, so you’ll often see “Overhill” or “from Chota” to describe an individual’s regional or town affiliations.
Trade, Military Aid, and the Treaty of Whitehall
So, that being said, the alliance between Cherokees and South Carolina has its roots in the late 1600s, when trade first opened in that new colony. Trade was slowly regulated—though early regulations left a lot of loopholes and room for exploitation. Cherokee towns also participated in the Tuscarora and Yamasee Wars of the 1710s, giving military support to Carolina colonists against other more eastern groups. The alliance between the British and Cherokees was formalized (at least in British eyes) in 1730, when a delegation of 7 Cherokees, largely from Overhill towns, journeyed to London with eccentric adventurer Alexander Cuming to meet King George II. Their visit culminated with the signing of the Treaty of Whitehall, which the British believed set up an “emperor” over all Cherokees, an Overhill leader named Moytoy. The Treaty of Whitehall also put Cherokees under British authority, naming the king as their “father” and British colonists as their “older brothers.” British officials were thrilled with the treaty, believing they had gained access to Cherokee lands, trade rights, and military alliance. For the Cherokee delegates, their interpretation of the treaty was quite different. They were not representatives of “the Cherokee,” for there was no such thing in the 1730s. Instead, they represented their individual towns, and had no authorization to speak for anyone beyond those towns. They certainly did not see the Treaty of Whitehall as taking over Cherokee lands or doing away with Cherokee sovereignty; instead, they saw the treaty as a trade and alliance agreement offering economic and military incentives and protections to their towns. This sort of fundamental mismatched understanding of what a treaty meant would plague the 18th century relationship between British officials and colonists and the Native Americans they sought to negotiate with.
Trade with British merchants grew in the 1740s and 1750s, as colonial traders moved into Cherokee towns; some even had Cherokee wives and children. Cherokees also traded and negotiated with the French in Louisiana, a fact that frequently vexed the British, who believed the Treaty of Whitehall forbid such disloyal behavior. Indeed, the French were a useful threat that Cherokee leaders—or headmen—could wield at convenient moments if British trade prices were not to their liking, or if they found supply unable to meet growing consumer demands. In the 1750s, Cherokees increasingly began investigating opening more trade routes with Virginia, showing their political savvy at playing not just colonial empires off each other, but also capitalizing on British colonies’ rivalries with each other.
Seven Years’ War
In the 1750s, South Carolina constructed two forts in Cherokee territory; Fort Prince George, in upstate South Carolina, and Fort Loudoun, in eastern Tennessee. These forts gave extra opportunity for trade and diplomacy, and served a military function, which became crucial as the Seven Years’ War erupted in 1754. Virginians especially sought to recruit Native American allies to protect their borders from French and French-allied Indian attacks, and from 1755-1758, around a thousand Cherokees participated in raids against the French and their allies in the Ohio River valley. The largest contingent of Cherokee—over 600—joined John Forbes’ campaign against Fort Duquesne (near today’s Pittsburgh) that took the better part of 6 months, from spring to November 1759. Cherokees who made the several hundred mile trip expected a quick assault and to be able to return to their livelihoods (primarily hunting) within a few weeks. Instead, they grew increasingly frustrated with Forbes’ delays—and the fact that while British and colonial soldiers were paid and provisioned, Cherokees and other Native American allies were expected to supply their own food and weapons and received no salary. Most Cherokees left within a few months of arrival; when Forbes finally defeated Fort Duquesne, he had few Native American allies left in his army.
As Cherokees made their way back south to the Carolinas, they periodically raided Virginia farms for supplies, food, and horses. Virginia colonists, angered at this and also conflating Cherokees with enemy Shawnees raids, took their vengeance upon other bands of Cherokees traveling through an area in the weeks after a raid. In all, about 30 Cherokees died in Virginia, at the hands of their allies, on their return trip from offering military aid to the British army. The relatives and towns of the deceased took their revenge on colonists in the Carolinas through 1758 and 1759, killing several dozen colonists in raids.
In fall 1759, South Carolina’s governor William Henry Lyttelton issued a trade embargo cutting off trade with all Cherokee towns until the violence stopped and restitution was made for the dead colonists (he said nothing about restitution for the dead Cherokees in Virginia). Cherokee headmen rushed to send talks to Charlestown, arguing that their towns were innocent of wrongdoing, and blaming all the trouble on other towns or regions. Some headmen began journeying to Charlestown to try to negotiate peace through the fall, culminating in a several day long talk with Lyttelton. That talk ended with Lyttelton taking the entire group hostage and transporting them to Fort Prince George, to continue finalizing a peace treaty with another group of Cherokee headmen. (Pro tip: If you’re trying to negotiate an end to conflict, go ahead and take the people willing to talk peace hostage—it’s great for building trust!)
In December 1759, a treaty of sorts was signed, though many of the signers were being held hostage at the time. Lyttelton’s terms demanded 24 Cherokee warriors guilty of killing colonists be handed over for execution, as well as the immediate cessation of hostilities. For insurance, he kept 24 Cherokee headmen as hostages at Fort Prince George, to be exchanged out for the doomed murderers as they were brought in. Lyttelton departed for Charlestown immediately after the treaty was signed, and left South Carolina several months later when he was promoted to the governorship of Jamaica. Lieutenant Governor William Bull would oversee the rest of the conflict.
The Anglo-Cherokee War
While Lyttelton believed he had properly “chastened” the Cherokee, the war was just getting started. Infuriated at having multiple headmen insulted and held as prisoners, relatives and townspeople tried to negotiate for the release of specific prisoners through February 1760. Finally, on February 16, Overhill headman Oconostota (also known as The Great Warrior), led an attack on Fort Prince George that killed its commander. In the ensuing chaos, the garrison murdered the Cherokee prisoners, which caused towns that had previously been more or less neutral to embrace open warfare. Overhill headmen started a siege on Fort Loudoun in spring that carried through to summer, ending with the near starvation and eventual surrender of the garrison on August 9, 1760. The following day, as they were marching east to Fort Prince George, Cherokees attacked the garrison and executed roughly two dozen of them, widely believed to have been vengeance for the murdered Cherokee headmen. Further east, the summer saw the arrival of a regiment of Highlanders under Colonel Archibald Montgomery to assist in the war. Montgomery raided and burned Lower Cherokee villages and was involved in one battle that saw several dozen soldiers and Cherokees killed or wounded. In fall and winter 17600, a few efforts at peace were made, along with some attempts to secure French aid, but nothing definite came of any of these preliminary talks. Spring and summer 1761 saw the second arrival of the Highlanders under Major James Grant; this time, 14 Middle towns and their fields were burned. Grant conducted several rounds of preliminary negotiations at Fort Prince George before the final treaties were agreed on with Bull near Charlestown and with Virginia on the Holston River. The eastern Cherokee border was pushed further west, cutting down Lower Cherokees’ hunting lands, and prisoner exchanges occupied the better part of the next few years. The demand for 24 Cherokee executions was quietly forgotten.
The War’s Aftermath
Ending just two years before the Seven Years’ War’s conclusion, the aftermath of the Anglo-Cherokee War was shaped by many of the same factors that influenced Anglo-Native American relations in the 1760s and 1770s. The absence of the French left a large hole in the playoff strategies used by the Cherokee and other groups earlier in the century. Another group of Cherokee, led by Ostenaco, visited London in 1762 and renewed their treaty of alliance with George III. The years leading up to the American Revolution saw increased pressure to sell land, and increased internal conflict over the relationship with British colonies and imperial officials.