wbbb] ARCHAEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF NORRIS BASIN 207 



of Indian affairs, a formal remonstrance against the continued encroachments 

 of the whites upon their lands. The subject was immediately considered by 

 the royal government; and near the close of summer, orders were issued to 

 Sir William Johnson, Superintendent of Northern Indian Affairs, instructing 

 him to convene the chiefs, warriors, and sachems of the tribes most interested. 

 Agreeably to these orders, Sir William Johnson convened the delegates of 

 the Six Nations, and their confederates and dependents, at Fort Stanwix (now 

 Utica, N. Y. ) , October 24. Three thousand two hundred Indians of 17 different 

 tribes, tributaries to the Confederacy, or occupying territories coterminous 

 with theirs, attended. On the 5th of November, a treaty of limits and a 

 deed of cession to the King of England, were signed. In this, the delegates 

 of their respective nations aver that "they are the true and absolute proprietors 

 of the lands thus ceded", and that for the consideration mentioned, "we have 

 continued the line south to the Cherokee or Eogohegee Rivers (the Holston 

 was thus called), because the same is, and we declare it to be, our true bounds 

 with the Southern Indians, and that we have an undoubted right to the 

 country as far south as that river." 



The cession thus made by the Six Nations, of the country north and east 

 of the Tennessee River, is the first deed from any of the aboriginal tribes for 

 any territory within the boundaries of our state. The title of the Confeder- 

 ates to these lands was, by the treaty of Fort Stanwix, forever transferred 

 from them but other tribes contended that the Six Nations had not an exclu- 

 sive claim to them, but that they were the common hunting grounds of the 

 Cherokees and Chickasaws also. In the journal of the commissioners, detailing 

 the progress of the treaty, the tribes represented, etc., no mention is made of 

 delegates in attendance from any of the southern Indian Tribes. It is said 

 by Haywood, that some visiting Cherokees were present at the treaty, who 

 upon their route had killed game for their support, and on their arrival at 

 Fort Stanwix, immediately tendered the skins to the Indians of the Six Na- 

 tions, saying: "they are yours; we killed them after we passed the big river", 

 as they always designated the Tennessee. This would seem to imply an acqui- 

 escence on their part, in the validity of the claim of the Six Nations. These 

 claimed the soil, not as its aboriginal owners, but by right of conquest ; and all 

 tradition concurs in admitting their right to that extent. But the Cherokees 

 had long exercised the privilege of hunting upon these lands, and therefore 

 regarded, with jealousy and dissatisfaction, the approaches of the white settle- 

 ments. Mr. Stuart, the Superintendent of Southern Indian Affairs, was there- 

 fore instructed to assemble the southern Indians for the purpose of establish- 

 ing a boundary with them ; and before negotiations with the confederates at 

 Fort Stanwix had begun, he concluded a treaty with the Cherokees at Hard 

 Labour, in Southern Carolina, October 14, 1768. By this treaty it was agreed 

 that the southwestern boundary of Virginia should be a line "extending from 

 the point where the northern line of North Carolina intersects the Cherokee 

 hunting grounds, about thirty-six miles east of Long Island, in the Holston 

 River, and thence down that stream to its junction with the Ohio." This line, 

 however, did not include all the settlements then made; and even during the 

 progress of the treaty the settlers were advancing farther west and erecting 

 their cabins northwest of the Holston and upon the branches of the Clinch and 

 Powell rivers, within the limits of the Indian territory. This fact being ascer- 

 tained, a subsequent treaty became necessary for the adjustment of a new 

 boundary and the remuneration of the savages for an additional extent of 

 country. 16 



"Ramsey, 1853, pp. 73-77. (Quotations within the quotation are from Monette, J. G.) 



