HISTORIC OCONEE COUNTY, SOUTH CAROLINA Subject: Tomassee Indian Village Version 1.0, 5-Jan-2003, FCH-02.txt **************************************************************** REPRODUCING NOTICE: ------------------- These electronic pages may not be reproduced in any format for profit, or presentation by any other organization, or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. Paul M Kankula - nn8nn Seneca, SC, USA Oconee County SC GenWeb Coordinator Oconee County SC GenWeb Homestead http://www.rootsweb.com/~scoconee/oconee.html Oconee County SC GenWeb Tombstone Project http://www.rootsweb.com/~scoconee/cemeteries.html http://www.rootsweb.com/~cemetery/southcarolina/oconee.html Contributor: Frederick C. Holder, Box 444, Pickens, SC 29671 **************************************************************** DATAFILE INPUT . : Paul M. Kankula at kankula1@innova.net in Jan-2003 DATAFILE LAYOUT : Paul M. Kankula at kankula1@innova.net in Jan-2003 HISTORY WRITE-UP : Frederick C. Holder in 1989 TOMASSEE INDIAN VILLAGE (now commonly spelled Tamassee) During the 1700s, most of the Lower Cherokee in South Carolina lived along the Tugaloo River, the Keowee River, and the upper middle section of present-day Oconee County. The exact date that Tomassee Indian Village came into being is unknown. Although whites made contact with the Lower Cherokee in the late 1600s, no mention of Tomassee appears in documents until 1721. The village was reported in that year to have a population of 152 people. Most of the Lower Cherokee villages, including Tomassee, were abandoned in 1752 because of a threatened war with the Creek Indians. One of the functions of Fort Prince George, built in the fall of 1753 near Keowee Indian Town, was to protect the Lower Cherokee, who served as a buffer against French encroachments into South Carolina territory. It was the French who had earlier caused the Creeks to attack the Lower Cherokee and the Iroquois and other northern tribes to attack the Upper Cherokee. In addition, the fort served to pro- tect the lucrative Indian trade. Though Fort Loudon in Tennessee would later serve as the major bulwark against the French, Fort Prince George continued to serve a variety of functions, including that of be- ing a retreat position should the soldiers in Tennessee be forced to withdraw. As a result of the protection against the Creeks afforded by Fort Prince George, some Cherokee returned to their abandoned villages. In late 1759, South Carolina went to war with the Cherokee, and most of the Lower villages were destroyed in early 1760 during the campaign. Though disagreements over trade and trading practices had occurred for a number of years, the immediate causes of the war were the killing of whites in Virginia by the Cherokee and the wholesale massacre of Cherokee captives held at Fort Prince George. Cherokee families probably returned to Tomassee and other village sites sometime in the 1760s or early 1770s; however, the villages perhaps declined in size after 1761. Some evidence tends to indicate that the Lower Cherokee lived farther apart over a larger area after the war so that any future attacks by whites would be more difficult. On August 12, 1776, in a battle which became known as "the Ring Fight," Andrew Pickens and his troops fought a number of Cherokee near Tomassee Indian Village. The battle was part of a larger campaign which destroyed all of the Lower and many of the Middle Cherokee villages. After the destruction of their villages, most of the Lower Cherokee left the area of present-day Oconee County, and a treaty be- tween the Cherokee and the whites in 1777 ceded most of the land that now comprises Oconee, Pickens, Greenville, and Anderson counties to the State of South Carolina. Materials cited in the suggested reading list provide information about the Cherokee, including the way they lived and the effects which whites had on their lives. (NOTE: A variety of scholars have claimed that select Revolutionary era battles between Indians and whites after 1777 took place in the Oconee County area. Such statements apparently resulted from a lack of geographical knowledge on the part of one writer. A misprinted date of a battle in Gen. Andrew Pickens' obituary notice added to the confu- sion. In more recent publications, it is obvious that one researcher is simply repeating another without taking time to re-examine the data.) Locations: Both Keowee Indian town and the Fort Prince George site are a few miles from Salem under the waters of Lake Keowee, not far offshore from Old Town Boat Landing. To reach Tomassee, take Highway 11 north from Walhalla/West Union approximately 13 miles to the stone gates of Tamassee D.A.R. School. Turn left onto Dynamite Rd. (Road 172). After going a little over a mile on a curving road and coming to stop sign, turn right onto Cheohee Valley Road (Road 375). After going about a mile and coming to a small triangular road junction, bear (or turn) left onto White Cut Road (Road 95). As you proceed along this road, you will be near the sites of "the Ring Fight", the last home site of Brig. Gen Andrew Pickens, and Tomassee Indian Village. These sites are on PRIVATE PROPERTY and public access is restricted. SELECTED BACKGROUND READING LIST: Thomas M. N. Lewis and Madeline Kneberg, Tribes That Slumber (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1958). Charles Hudson, The Southeastern Indians (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1976). Virginia Pounds Brown and Laurella Owens, The World of the Southern Indians (Birmingham: Beechwood Books, 1983). Forest Acres/McKissick Quest Program, Sketches of Lower Cherokee Villages in South Carolina (Easley, S.C.: Forest Acres/McKissick Quest Program, 1991). William 0. Steele, The Cherokee Crown of Tannassy (Winston- Salem, N.C.: John F. Blair, 1977). James Mooney, Myths of the Cherokee (Nashville: Charles and Randy Elder-Booksellers, 1982). David H. Corkran, The Carolina Indian Frontier (Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1970). Chapman J. Milling, Red Caro/inians (Columbia, S.C.: University of South Carolina Press, 1969). This work is dated and contains some errors in regard to the area of Oconee County. John P. Brown, Old Frontiers (Salem, N.H.: Ayer Company, 1986). SELECTED ADVANCED READING LIST: VernerW. Crane, The Southern Frontier 1670-1732 (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1981). David H. Corkran, The Cherokee Frontier: Conflict and Survival, 1740-62 (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1962). Chester B. Depratter, Mike Harmon, Marvin T. Smith, Mark Williams, Marshall Williams, Archaeological Investigations at Tomassee (380C186) A Lower Cherokee Town (Columbia, S.C.: The Lamar Institute and the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology, 1988). See particularly pps. 6-11. Forest Acres/McKissick Quest Program, Cherokee Villages in South Carolina (Easley, S.C.: Forest Acres/McKissick Quest Program, 1990). John Richard Alden, John Stuart and the Southern Colonial Fron- de/-[1754-1775] (New York: Gordian Press Inc., 1966). Bryan Forrest McKown, "Fort Prince George and The Cherokee- South Carolina Frontier 1753-1768" (M.A. thesis, Clemson University, 1988). Available in the public libraries of Oconee and Pickens counties and select major South Carolina libraries.