Cherokee Tribe And The American Revolution

The Cherokees were one of the greatest Native American tribes in the South. The Cherokee fought as allies of Great Britain against American patriots during the Revolutionary War, in addition to fighting against settlers in the Overmountain region and later in the Cumberland Basin to defend against territorial colonization. The North was the center of British strategy, not the remote outposts, particularly those in the west. With the exception of supplies from British coastal ports and a few collaborative operations in South Carolina, the Cherokee were therefore on their own.

John Stuart, the British superintendent of the South, had intended to utilize English troops and Indian tribes against the colonists when the Revolutionary War broke out in 1775. Their choice to support the British was influenced by white encroachment at the Tennessee-North Carolina boundary along the Watauga, Nolichucky, and Holston Rivers, as well as a delegation of Shawnee and other northern Indians pushing the Cherokee to fight against the Americans. White North Carolinians gained independence during the American Revolution, but the region's native populations, particularly the Cherokee, were captured. Nevertheless, despite suffering military loss, the Cherokee were able to preserve some degree of political independence and cultural purity. The United States started a "civilization" program in an effort to integrate the Cherokee people into mainstream American society with the Treaty of Holston (1791). This primarily means switching to sedentary agriculture. As a result, Indians could now easily obtain more Cherokee territory because they could no longer use their vast hunting areas.