Note 191 — II—HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE CHEROKEE

In July a man named John Ish was shot down while plowing in his field eighteen miles below Knoxville. By order of Hanging-maw, the friendly chief of Echota, a party of Cherokee took the trail and captured the murderer, who proved to be a Creek, whom they brought in to the agent at Tellico blockhouse, where he was formally tried and hanged. When asked the usual question he said that his people were at war with the whites, that he had left home to kill or be killed, that he had killed the white man and would have escaped but for the Cherokee, and that there were enough of his nation to avenge his death. A few days later a party of one hundred Creek warriors crossed Tennessee river against the settlements. The alarm was given by Hanging-maw, and fifty-three Cherokee with a few federal troops started in pursuit. On the 10th of August they came up with the Creeks, killing one and wounding another, one Cherokee being slightly wounded. The Creeks retreated and the victors returned to the Cherokee towns, where their return was announced by the death song and the firing of guns. “The night was spent in dancing the scalp dance, according to the custom of warriors after a victory over their enemies, in which the white and red people heartily joined. The Upper Cherokee had now stepped too far to go back, and their professions of friendship were now no longer to be questioned.” In the same month there was an engagement between a detachment of about forty soldiers and a large body of Creeks near Crab Orchard, in which several of each were killed.191 It is evident that much of the damage on both sides of the Cumberland range was due to the Creeks.