Person:Catherine Sherrill (1)

Date of Import: Aug 25, 1998

Extract of two written sworn statements recorded by S/ G. W. Sevier.
(1) "This day personally appeared before the undersigned Charles M. Moorman the Affiant George W. Sevier who on oath States that his mother Catherine Sevier wife of General John Sevier (formerly Governor of Tennessee) died on the 2nd day of October A.D. 1836 aged about Eighty..."
(2) "Personally appears in open Court this 17th day of May 1839, Geo. W. Sevier of said County & makes oath that his mother Catherine Sevier, widow of the late General John Sevier, departed life on the second day of October 1836, at Russellville Alabama."

Birth: 1754, Yadkin County, North Carolina, USA
Death: Oct. 7, 1836, Russellville, Franklin County, Alabama, USA
Burial: Old Knox County Courthouse Grounds, Knoxville, Knox County, Tennessee, USA

Also known as "Bonnie Kate," Katherine Sherrill Sevier was the wife of John Sevier (1745-1815), Revolutionary War hero, Indian fighter, governor of the State of Franklin, and first governor of Tennessee. Legend has it that their courtship began after she was surprised by an Indian attack while milking a cow outside the walls of Fort Watauga in northeast Tennessee. The defenders of the fort quickly closed the gates, locking her out. She ran to the palisades and, helped by Sevier, climbed to safety. She and Sevier married in 1780, when she was twenty-six, after the death of his first wife, Sarah Hawkins. At their home in Washington County, Bonnie Kate made soldiers' uniforms, cast lead balls for ammunition, and prepared food for her husband's victorious campaign against the British at the battle of Kings Mountain in South Carolina. On the eve of the battle, she thwarted a Tory attempt to murder her husband. Bonnie Kate held the title "First Lady" three times, first from 1785 to 1788, when her husband was governor of the State of Franklin, and during his terms as the first and third governor of Tennessee, 1796 to 1801 and 1803 to 1809. She was originally buried in Russellville, Alabama, but was reinterred in 1922 next to her husband on the lawn of the old Knox County Courthouse in Knoxville. The inscription on her tombstone describes her as the "brightest star among pioneer women of this state."

"One of the most famous attacks recounted in the Tennessee history books involved Catherine Sherrill Sevier, the second wife of John Sevier, known as “Bonnie Kate.” On July 21 [1794], at daybreak, some women were milking just outside the fort [Watauga] when Indians broke from the green skirting of the forest. All of the women made it inside except a tall athletic young woman named Catherine Sherrill, who was rescued dramatically as she leaped high on the wall and was pulled up over the top by a shower of arrows and lead balls. The strong hand that pulled Catherine Sherrill to safety was that of John Sevier, a man who would become her husband four years later (Dixon 1976:45)."
Source Citation: Faulkner, Charles H.. Massacre at Cavett's Station: Frontier Tennessee during the Cherokee Wars. Knoxville, US: Univ Tennessee Press, 2013. ProQuest ebrary. Web. 26 May 2016. (Copyright © 2013. Univ Tennessee Press. All rights reserved.)