MOONEY] HOPEWELL — COL. BENJ. HAWKINS 211 



part in Dunmore's war in 1774 and, afterward, from the opening of tlie Revolution 

 in 1775 until the close of the Indian wars in Tennessee — a period extending over 

 nearly twenty years — was the acknowledged leader or organizer in every impor- 

 tant Indian campaign along the Tennessee border. His sc;rvices in this connection 

 have been already noted. He also commanded one wing of the American forces 

 at the battle of King's mountain in 17.S0, and in 1783 led a body of mountain men to 

 the assistance of the patriots under Marion. At one time (hiring the Revolution a 

 Tory plot to assassinate him was revealed by the wife of the principal consjiirator. 

 In 1779 he had been commissioned as commander of the militia of Washington 

 cnnnty. North Carolina — the nucleus of the present state of Tennessei — a position 

 which he hail already held by common consent. Shortly after the close of the Revo- 

 lution he held for a short time the office of governor of the seceding "state of 

 Franklin," for which he was arrested and brought to trial by the government of 

 North Carolina, but made his escape, when the matter wa.s allowed to drop. The 

 (|uestion of jurisdiction was finally settled in 1790, when North Carolina ceded tlie 

 disputeil territory to the general government. Before this Sevier had been connni.s- 

 sioneil as brigadier-general. When Tennessee was admitted as a state in 179t) he was 

 elected its first (state) governor, serving three terms, or six years. In 1803 he was 

 again reelected, serving three more terms. In 1811 he was elected to Congress, where 

 he served two terms and was reelected to a third, but died before he could take his 

 seat, having contracted a fever while on duty as a boundary commissioner among the 

 Creeks, being then in his seventy-first year. For more than forty years he had been 

 continuously in the service of his country, and no man of his .state was ever more 

 loved and respected. In the prime of his manhood he was reputed the handsomest 

 man and the best Indian fighter in Tennessee. 



(2rt) Hopewell, South C.\roli.na (p. (il) : This place, designated in early treaties 

 and also in Hawkins's manuscript journal as "Hopewell on the Keowee," was the 

 plantation seat of General Andrew Pickens, who resided there from the close of the 

 Revolution until his death in 1817. It was situated on the northern edge of tlie 

 pre.sent Anderson county, on the east side of Keowee river, opposite and a short 

 tlistance below the entrance of Little river, and about three miles from the present 

 Pendleton. In sight of it, on the opposite side of Keowee, was the oUi Cherokee 

 town of Seneca, destroyed by the .Americans in 177(). Important treaties were made 

 here with the Cherokee in 1785, and with the Chickasaw in 1786. 



(2H) Colonel Benm.^mix H.\wki.ns (p. til ): This distinguished soldier, statesman, 

 and author, was liorn in Warren county. North Carolina, in 17.54, and ilied at Haw- 

 kinsville, (ieorgia, in 1816. His father. Colonel Philemon Hawkins, organized and 

 commanded a regiment in the Revolutionary war, and was a member of the conven- 

 tion that ratified the national constitution. At the outbreak of the Revolution young 

 Hawkins was a student at Princeton, liut offered his services to the American cause, 

 and on ac('ount of his knowledge of French and other modern languages was 

 appointed by Washington his staff interpreter for conmiunicating with the French 

 officers cooperating « ith the .\nierican army. He took [lart in se\eral engagements 

 and was afterward appointe<l commissioner for |)rocuring war supplii-sal)road. .\fter 

 the close of the war he was elected to Congress, and in 1785 was ai)pointed on the 

 commission which negotiated at Hopewell the first federal treaty with the Cherokee. 

 He served a second term in the Hou.se and another in the Senate, and in 1796 was 

 appointed superintendent for all the Indians .south of the Ohio. lie tliereujHin 

 removed to the Creek country and established himself in the wilderness at what is 

 now Hawkinsville, (ieorgia, where he remained in the continuance of his office 

 until his death. As Senator he signe<l the <leed by which .North Carolina ceded 

 Tennessee to the United States in 1790, and as Indian superintendent lieli)ed to nego- 

 tiate seven different treaties with the southern tribes. He had an extensive knowl- 

 edge of the custimis and language of the Creeks, and his "Sketch of the Creek 



