The Cherokee Lighthorse Brigade

by Denise Weimer

As I’ve approached this month’s release of my Southeastern frontier romance, Bent Tree Bride, I’ve delved into some related historical topics on HHH Blog. We talked about how the Red Stick War—the part of the War of 1812 that involved Creek Indians allied to the British, against Cherokees allied to the Americans—began in modern-day Alabama (https://www.hhhistory.com/2021/01/the-trouble-tecumseh-stirred.html).

Many readers are surprised to learn that in the early 1800s, the Cherokee Indians had adopted many of the ways of the white settlers, including farming, weaving, European education, recording their language and starting a newspaper, and forms of government. This attempt to blend in and secure their land also extended to military endeavors. When the Tennessee militia—later joined by those in Georgia and Mississippi Territory—asked for allies against the Red Stick Creeks, the Cherokee Council responded by promising five to seven hundred men for a Cherokee Regiment that would fight under General Andrew Jackson.

Mistrust of their Cherokee counterparts ran through the militia. After all, the Cherokees had been enemies as recently as the late-1700s. And while the battles had cooled in the twenty years prior to 1813, the Cherokees had not sat idle. Young men were trained to split a coconut or a melon with a tomahawk at a range of thirty feet. They were also skilled knife fighters, archers, and even excellent shots with the older muskets to which they had access. Many were also former or present members of the mounted Cherokee Lighthorse Brigade. 

What was the Cherokee Lighthorse?

In 1797, with the encouragement of U.S. Indian agents, the Cherokee Council created the first Lighthorse force, marking a move from leadership by charismatic war chiefs toward an Americanized, paramilitary structure. The name was taken from the rapid cavalry movements of “Lighthorse” Harry Lee during the Revolutionary War. The organization allowed a place for young Cherokee men to achieve esteem during a time when war no longer offered a passage to adulthood. Indian Agent Benjamin Harrison pledged to any who served honorably a rifle engraved with that man's name. Six Regulators, including a captain and a lieutenant, rode in each company.

The Ridge, a.k.a. Major Ridge after the Creek War

Cherokee Chief The Ridge encouraged the end of the tribe’s blood laws, where a murderer’s fate was up to the victim’s family. If the murderer fled, a member of his family could be killed in his stead. Agreeing, in 1808, the Cherokee Council adopted the Nation’s first set of written laws based on the U.S. Constitution. Soon thereafter, they outlawed blood revenge and passed an act appointing “Regulators” (called “Lighthorsemen” by the 1820s) to suppress horse stealing and robbery, to protect widows and orphans, and to kill any person accused of resisting their authority. Eventually, they dealt with other crimes such as cattle-rustling, adultery, rape, and murder. Ridge and his recruits rode between villages mediating disputes and arresting criminals, tasks once performed by Indian agents. Whippings were a common form of punishment. The criminals were turned over to tribal courts for trial and sentencing. The troop also curbed the influx of any unruly white settlers into Cherokee Territory.

Plaque showing Cherokee warriors at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, 1814

**For more information, Toward the Setting Sun by Brian Hicks and “Souls in the Treetops: Cherokee War, Masculinity, and Community, 1760-1820,” a dissertation by Susan Marie Abram.**

Represented by Hartline Literary Agency, Denise Weimer holds a journalism degree with a minor in history from Asbury University. She’s a managing editor for the historical imprints of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas and the author of almost a dozen published novels and a number of novellas. A wife and mother of two daughters, she always pauses for coffee, chocolate, and old houses! 

TODAY IS RELEASE DAY for Bent Tree Bride! https://www.amazon.com/Bent-Tree-Bride-Denise-Weimer-ebook/dp/B08Q8K5YD6/

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The Trouble Tecumseh Stirred

by Denise Weimer

Tecumseh

As we turn from 2020 to 2021, my focus gravitates to 1813. Why? It’s the year my April 2021 release, Bent Tree Bride, is set. Travel with me as I draw back the veil on a little-known era of U.S. history, the Red Stick portion of the War of 1812. Our backdrop will be the Southern states, present-day Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia.

In the early 1800s, the United States became caught up in the war between Britain and France. Our fledgling country resented British trade restrictions and naval impressments and feared Native Americans in the Northwest Territory who had decided they needed British support to prevent further American settlement. One such Native American leader was Shawnee war chief Tecumseh. After surviving multiple destructions of his boyhood villages during the American Revolution, he joined a band attacking settlers’ flatboats on the Ohio River. Eventually, he became a leader, while his brother, Tenskwatawa, became a prophet who predicted an apocalypse that would destroy the settlers. In 1808, at the confluence of the Wabash and Tippecanoe Rivers, they established Prophetstown, a multi-tribal village. 

Tenskwatawa

In September 1811, Tecumseh traveled to Creek Indian Territory (modern-day Alabama) to stir support for his British-allied union of tribes. They performed the Dance of the Lakes at Tukabatchee, principal Creek town on the Tallapoosa River. Days later, Tecumseh revealed a vision of his brother’s that said they should kill their cattle, destroy spinning wheels, and cast aside plows. “The white people have no right to take the land from the Indians, for it is ours. The Great Spirit gave it to us. Let all the red men unite …” He then presented the Creeks a bundle of red sticks which he pointed out could not be broken because the sticks were joined together. When Chief Big Warrior responded with skepticism, Tecumseh declared, “Your blood is white! You have taken my talk, and the sticks, and the wampum and hatchet, but you do not mean to fight.” He stormed out after stating he’d return home to shake the ground. The extensive tremors of the New Madrid earthquake in December of that year convinced some that Tecumseh was right.

It’s said someone threatened him not to repeat his speech in Cherokee Territory (where many progressive chiefs embraced white ways), or they’d kill him. Some speculate this could have been Cherokee Chief The Ridge, who was the Cherokee ambassador at the Tukabatchee meeting. Thus, Tecumseh traveled home without stopping in Cherokee Territory. Facing great division and confusion, The Ridge had his work cut out when his people met in council at their main town, Ustanali.

 

Massacre at Ft. Mims

When the Red Stick Creeks (those who sided with Tecumseh and the British) began attacking National Creeks (those who did not want war), the National Creeks called to the Cherokees for aid. Meanwhile, the American militia entered into conflict with the Red Sticks at Burnt Corn Creek and Fort Mims, near Mobile, and the governors of Tennessee and Georgia called for Cherokee volunteers. The Ridge failed to sway the council from its neutrality until a Cherokee woman was killed by Red Sticks. At that point, he helped round up five to seven hundred volunteers for The Cherokee Regiment, which would come to serve under General Andrew Jackson. And there begins my story, Bent Tree Bride.

Represented by Hartline Literary Agency, Denise Weimer holds a journalism degree with a minor in history from Asbury University. She’s a managing editor for the historical imprints of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas and the author of almost a dozen published novels and a number of novellas. A wife and mother of two daughters, she always pauses for coffee, chocolate, and old houses! 

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For more information, Toward the Setting Sun by Brian Hicks and Forging a Cherokee-American Alliance in the Creek War: From Creation to Betrayal by Susan M. Abram

The Early Adventures of Davy Crockett

1889 Henry Huddle painting

by Denise Weimer

David Crockett, born August 17, 1786 in Greene County, Eastern Tennessee, might best be known as a congressman who opposed President Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act and a Texas revolutionary who died at the Alamo, but few are as familiar with the years that formed him as a frontiersman and his service in the War of 1812. However, his militia stint under the very man, Jackson, he’d one day stand against in politics was what captured my notice as I researched for a novel set in Alabama during the Red Stick War (1813-14).

Crockett was the fifth of nine children born to John and Rebecca Crockett. Some might find Davy’s later opposition to Indian Removal surprising given the fact that while John had been away fighting with the militia, his parents (Davy’s grandparents) were killed in 1777 by Chickamauga Cherokee under Dragging Canoe, allied to the British. One of Davy’s aunts had been scalped but survived, while John’s brother Joseph was wounded, and his brother James was held captive for seventeen years.

We know that John taught Davy to shoot by age eight, but history is unclear on whether Davy actually played the fiddle. To help with family expenses, Davy was often hired out as a worker. At age thirteen, his brief enrollment in school ended with him running afoul of a local bully, then running away to escape his father’s displeasure. Davy spent two years drifting and honing his survival skills, returning in 1802 and working to pay off his father’s debt to a John Canady.

On August 14, 1806 (yes, just shy of twenty years old, and already twice jilted by other girls!), David married Mary “Polly” Finley in Jefferson County—over her mother’s disapproval. They had two sons and a daughter and moved several times, landing in Franklin County in 1813, where he enlisted in the militia of Major John Gibson. He joined the troops of General Andrew Jackson at Camp Blount, just south of Fayetteville, in October, signing on to help avenge the massacre at Fort Mims, Alabama. The Red Stick Creeks had allied with the British, and local militia had ambushed their supply caravan. The Creeks had retaliated by attacking Fort Mims, killing civilians as well as soldiers. 

By November, Crockett found himself hunting and gathering intelligence with a scouting party out of the makeshift Fort Strother (present-day Alabama). In the attack on the Red Stick town of Tallushatchee, four dozen Creeks retreated to a log-and-mud building. According to Crockett’s report, when General Coffee’s dragoons approached, a weakened woman sitting on the ground stretched a bow with her feet and killed a lieutenant, sending the troops into a rage. Men, women, and children were killed in the resulting rampage.

1832 stone engraving

His ninety-day enlistment expired, Crockett missed the Battle of Horseshoe Bend that quelled the Red Stick rebellion. He re-enlisted the following September but saw little action. Soon after, following another move, Crockett first took public office as a commissioner, then a justice of the peace and lieutenant colonel of militia. In 1821, he won a seat in the Tennessee General Assembly, well on his way to being recorded in the annals of history.

Represented by Hartline Literary Agency, Denise Weimer holds a journalism degree with a minor in history from Asbury University. She’s a managing editor for the historical imprints of Lighthouse Publishing of the Carolinas and the author of almost a dozen published novels and a number of novellas. A wife and mother of two daughters, she always pauses for coffee, chocolate, and old houses! Connect with Denise here:
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Fort Mims drawing: https://www.flickr.com/photos/internetarchivebookimages/14579187199/Source book page: https://archive.org/stream/thrillingadventu00fros_0/thrillingadventu00fros_0#page/n299/mode/1up, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4562894