Chickamauga Cherokee

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The Chickamauga Cherokee were a Native American group that separated from the greater body of the Cherokee during the American Revolutionary War and up to the early 1800s.^[1]

Following several military setbacks and American reprisals, the majority of the Cherokee people chose to make peace with the Americans near the end of 1776. However, in the winter of 1776–77, the followers of the skiagusta (war chief), Dragging Canoe, moved with him down the Tennessee River away from their historic Overhill Cherokee towns. Relocated in a more isolated area, they established 11 new towns in order to gain distance from colonists' encroachments.

The frontier Americans associated Dragging Canoe and his band with their new town on Chickamauga Creek and began to refer to this band of Cherokee as the Chickamaugas. Five years later, the Chickamauga moved further west and southwest into present-day Alabama, establishing five larger settlements. They were then more commonly known as the Lower Cherokee, a term closely associated with the people of the "Five Lower towns".

There was a division due to ceding of land;^{[citation needed]} Dragging Canoe who became the first Chicamauga Chief, separated from the Upper Cherokee. Division amongst the Cherokee can be demonstrated by a letter sent from Thomas Jefferson on May 4, 1808 to the "Chiefs of the Upper Cherokee". In this letter, which is found in the National Archives, Jefferson said "You propose My Children, that your Nation shall be divided into two and that your part the Upper Cherokees, shall be separated from the lower by a fixed boundary, shall be placed under the Government of the U.S. become citizens thereof, and be ruled by our laws; in fine, to be our brothers instead of our children."^[2]

In a letter dated January 9, 1809, Thomas Jefferson wrote: "My Children Deputies of the Upper Towns, With respect to the line of division between yourselves & the lower Towns, it must rest on the joint consent of both parties. the one you propose appears moderate reasonable & well defined. we are willing to recognize those on each side of that line as distinct societies and if our aid shall be necessary to mark it more plainly than nature has done, you shall have it. I think with you, that on this reduced scale it will be more easy for you to introduce the regular administration of laws."^[3]