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Source
From: Source:Campbell, 1921
Related
See Also:Dunmore's Treaty
Discussion
Clearness of understanding as to progress of settlement will be
facilitated if the Highland country be pictured as consisting of two
parts: first, the Valley section, which includes the Greater Appalachian
Valley and the larger river valleys of the two belts that border it; and
secondly, the more rugged portions of the mountain country composed of
the ridges and mountains which separate the larger valleys. There are,
of course, within the ridge and mountain sections lesser valleys, and
the rivulets and branches which find their way down the mountain slopes
are tributaries of the larger streams of the major valleys, and also
trails or "traces" from minor valley to minor valley, and from minor to
greater valley. There is often, too, bordering these lesser streams,
much fertile and tillable land, so that settlement has been pushed at
times to the springs which feed them.
Viewing the Southern Highlands as a whole, the accessible valleys were
first settled. The passage of military expeditions and western settlers
over the mountain trails, from the Carolinas into Tennessee, early
advertised the fertility of the broader valleys and led toward the close
of the eighteenth century to the rise of such mountain communities as
Morganton and Asheville,1 North Carolina. The country along the main
routes of travel would naturally be soonest developed, although this was
by no means always true. As late as 1790 there was a stretch of one
hundred miles on the Wilderness Road with no sign of habitation, and
Michaux, in 1796, traveling a much used trace in North Carolina, reports
many miles along the road desolate and unpopulated.
The cessions, at different periods, of lands held by the Indians were
determining factors in settlement. The Highlands were not open to white
occupation by one treaty but by a series of treaties. Consequently some
mountain areas were available earlier than some valley areas, though it
was true that with each cession the valleys were settled earlier than
the ridges.
The last treaty of the Colonial Period that affected the Highlands was
that of July 20, 1777, when a tract of 6,064 square miles, largely of
mountain land within western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee
abutting it, was given over by the Cherokees. Including this cession
there was thus open to entry by 1777, all of our territory in Maryland,
Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, almost all of the limited upland
section of South Carolina, and about one- fourth of western North
Carolina and east Tennessee — in all, an area of approximately 68,000 of
the 112,000 square miles of the Southern Highlands.
The first Indian treaty made after the establishment of the Federal
Government was that of November 28, 1785, when the boundaries of the
Cherokee Nation were defined. These boundaries, however, did not enlarge
the amount of land available within the Southern Highlands, save for an
area of 550 square miles along the French Broad River in North Carolina,
lying just west of the land ceded on July 20, 1777. By successive
treaties more of the Highlands was opened to occupation, but it was not
until 1805 that Indian claims to the Cumberland Plateau section of
Tennessee were extinguished; and not until 1835-1838, when the Cherokees
gave over all of their land east of the Mississippi and were finally
removed to their reservation beyond it, that the larger part of our
territory in northern Georgia and northeastern Alabama and the last
mountain lands in western North Carolina and southeastern Tennessee were
legally free for entry. Even then a few Cherokees, still unresigned to
banishment from the land of their ancestors, refused exile and hid
themselves in the wilderness. A small reservation was later set aside
for them in western North Carolina, where their descendants still live.
It is not to be supposed, however, that there were no cabins raised on
Indian soil prior to the drawing of treaties. Early descriptions of
lands, metes, and bounds, were inaccurate, and unintentional
transgression often took place. There was also wilful transgression in
the appropriation of lands, and individual squatters would occupy tracts
apparently with the hope that later treaties with the Indians would
legalize their holdings. Speaking generally, however, there were few
settlements in the mountain-ridge section until the last decade of the
century and none in large numbers until after 1800. The Watauga
Settlement in 1769 served as an advance guard The Watauga Settlement in
1769 served as an advance guard to that of the mountain-ridge section.
While in general it may be said that the broad central valleys of the
Holston, Watauga, and Nolichucky offered sufficient opportunity for the
expansion of population for some years, yet, from the time of William
Bean's entrance into this mountain region, the valleys of the
neighboring ranges began to receive a scattering immigration. Almost
contemporaneously, home seekers made their appearance in western North
Carolina, which is geographically a part of the same mountain area.
These sections were settled partly from the Watauga district of
Tennessee, and partly from the North and South Carolina Piedmont
frontier....
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