164 CHEROKEE NATION OF INDIANS. 
yet as the United States, in their military operations, might want the 
assistance of the Cherokees, perhaps it would be better policy to 
haye the lines ascertained and marked after rather than before the 
campaign then about to commence against the Indians northwest of 
the Ohio.! It was thus determined, in view of numerous individual 
acts of hostility on the part of the Cherokees and of the desire to 
soothe them into peace and to engage them as auxiliaries against the 
northern Indians, to temporarily postpone the running of the line. 
After considerable correspondence between Governor Blount and the 
Cherokee chiefs in council, the 8th of October, 1792, was fixed upon as 
the date for the meeting of the representatives of both parties at Major 
Craig’s, on Nine-Mile Creek, for the purpose of beginning the survey.” 
In the mean time an increased spirit of hostility had become manifest 
among the Cherokees and Creeks, the five lower towns of the former 
having declared war, and an Indian invasion of the frontier seemed im- 
minent. Governor Blount, therefore, in the latter part of September,? 
deemed it wise to call fifteen companies of militia into immediate service, 
under the command of General Sevier, for the protection of the settle- 
ments. Notwithstanding this critical condition of affairs, the boundary 
line commissioners on the part of the United States assembled at the 
appointed time and place. After waiting until the following day, the 
representatives of the Cherokees putting in no appearance, they pro- 
ceeded to inspect the supposed route of the treaty line. After careful 
examination they came to the conclusion that the ridge dividing the 
waters of Tennessee and Little Rivers struck the Holston River at the 
mouth and at no other point.* 
They then proceeded to run, but did not mark, a line of experiment 
from the point of the ridge in a southeast direction to Chilhowee Moun- 
tain, a distance of 174 miles, and also from the point of beginning in a 
northwest direction to the Clinch River, a distance of 9 miles. From 
these observations they found that the line, continued to the southeast, 
would intersect the Tennessee River shortly after it crossed the Chil- 
howee Mountain, and in consequence would deprive the Indians of all 
‘Tt may not be uninteresting as a historical incident to note the fact that at the time 
of General Wayne’s treaty at Greeneville, in 1795, a band of Cherokees had settled 
on the head-waters ef the Scioto River in Ohio. Not presenting themselves at the 
conferences preceding that treaty, General Wayne sent them a special message throngh 
Captain Long Hair, one of their chiefs, with the information that if they failed to 
conclude articles of peace with him they would be left unprotected. They sent a dele- 
gation to assure General Wayne of their desire for peace, saying that as soon as they 
gathered their crop of corn they would return to their tribe, which they did. 
"American State Papers. Indian Affairs, Vol. I, p. 630. According to the original 
manuseript journal of Col. Benj. Hawkins, Major Craig’s house was } mile below the 
source of Nine-Mile Creek. 
’ September 27, 1792. See American State Papers, Indian Affairs, Vol. I, p. 630. 
*Report of Boundary Commissioners, November 30, 1792. American State Papers, 
Indian Affairs, Vol. I, p. 630. 
