It started as a trickle and became a flood; European settlement of America. The English “Adventurers” (investors) watched the Spanish plunder the New World, and so they dreamed of riches. Then there was just that short trip from America’s eastern seaboard, over the mountains, to the Pacific Ocean, on then to the south seas, and to the East Indies - the Spice Islands - with all that Nutmeg,¹ and of course, even more riches.

First came the Roanoke settlement in 1585 (which was abandoned) and a second attempt in 1586 (which also soon failed). Then the Virginia Company² of London was established by the English Crown (James I) in 1606, and James Town (Jamestown) was founded in 1607. After a period of dreadful diseases, serious white/Indian relationship problems, and deadly Indian wars, the tiny population of James Town grew, and more land was needed for new arrivals.

They found neither hoards of gold nor a quick passage to the south seas, however they soon found that the real gold was the land itself and the tobacco that could be grown upon it.³ The only obstacle that stood in their way was the Indian (Aboriginal) claims to the land.

Treaties (really purchases or forced sales) were the instruments used to obtain the lands from the Indians, often these treaties occurred after a war with the Indians. Often too, the wars were started when illegal settlements were made on Indian land. The treaties were used as the legal justification to seize the land.

As the population grew,⁴ there started a migration to the south and in 1653, the first settlers from Virginia occupied a section of land north of Albemarle Sound (now in North Carolina). The King’s Charter for Carolina was issued in 1665, with Carolina being split into North and South in 1723.

By the 1750s, white settlement had entered south-west Virginia, and North Carolina’s “western lands” (Tennessee⁵) were just a step away. It was the Virginians who took that first step,⁶ yet it is North Carolina who maintained the land records.

Later, the treaties appear, and slowly, Indian land was consumed; the land speculators, along with the vast number of settlers guaranteed it. The last Tennessee treaties of the 1830s required Tennessee’s First People to remove out of the state, and on to the country west of the Mississippi River.

1.  In 1542, Andrew Borde published his Introduction of Knowledge and Dyetary of Helth. In his book, he advocates the curative value of spices. Nutmeg was thought to cure everything from the plague to the “blody flux.” Cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, saffron, pepper, and more, were in great demand in England. In 1553, the first English expedition of the Mystery, Company and Fellowship of Merchant Adventurers for the Discovery of Unknown Lands,  sailed off to the Spice Islands only come to grief in the ice-bound waters of the Arctic. In 1600 the East India Company  was founded by Royal Charter during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. Potentially, there was great profit in spices, some say as much as 60,000%. Unfortunately for the English merchant adventurers, it was a long arduous, often deadly voyage to the Spice Islands. Portugal and Spain were already involved in the trade and controlled ports along the shipping routes. What England needed was a safer, shorter, faster route to the Spice Islands, a route that avoided the Portuguese and Spanish. In time, it became a hope that there would be a short route through the Colony of Virginia to the Pacific Ocean. In 1716, Virginia’s Governor Spotswood and his The Knights of the Golden Horseshoe had gotten as far as western Virginia where they discovered the Shenandoah Valley. No safe, short, fast route from Virginia to the Spice Islands was ever found.

2.  “Treasurer and Company of Adventurers of the City of London for the First Colony of Virginia” (Second Charter, 23 May 1609)

3.  In 1612, John Rolfe plants a tobacco crop in order to save a struggling James Town. In 1614, he ships the crop to England. From this humble beginning, the south’s tobacco production grew to immense proportions; and so did the need for land on which to grow tobacco. There also grew the need for labor to raise the crops. From John Rolfe’s Diary: About the last of August came in a dutch man of warre that sold us twenty negars. So from this humble beginning, we see too that slavery grew to immense proportions. Of course, it was more than the Africans who were forced into slavery. Indians were enslaved too, and that caused great harm to their diminishing populations.

4.  It is estimated that at time of the establishment of James Town, the Indian population of America was about 1,000,000. However, imported European and African diseases, warfare, and enslavement had drastic and negative effects on the Indian population. By 1690 the American population had risen to a 250,000. From then on, it doubled every 25 years until, in 1775, it numbered more than 2,500,000. The year 2000 United States Census reports that the population of the United States was 281,421,906 with only 0.9% (2,532,797) of that number being American Indian and Alaska Native persons.

5.   The name Tennessee originates with the Indian (perhaps Cherokee) name Tenase, or as the Spanish recorded it, Tanasqui. It appears as the name of the river, Tenase, (also called the Cherokee River) and the later Anglicized form; “Tennessee” River. In 1788 it appeared in North Carolina’s western lands as Tennessee County. In 1796 that county relinquished the name so it could become the name of the new state.

6.  It is believed that the first settler to the Wataugah area was Captain William Bean, who settled on Boon’s Creek in 1769.
F.S.

Our Aboriginal People of Tennessee map (93k) shows the Indian cultural groups at about 1700 CE (AD) just after the beginning of the Historic Period. The map locates the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Quapaw, Shawnee, and Yuchi (a.k.a Uchee) in what is now Tennessee. We have added to our list, Catawba, Chiaha, Kaskinampo, Mosopelia, Muscogee (Creek), Natchez, Tali, and Tuskegee.

Of these First Nations, only the Cherokee and Chickasaw treated with the British colonials and/or later with the United States government to cede land in Tennessee. Spanish or French treaties with Chickasaw may exist.

   Cherokee, linguistic group, Iroquian.

In historic times, East Tennessee’s major Indian Nation. (Also in western North Carolina and northern Georgia.)

   Chickasaw, linguistic group, Muskogian.

In historic times, West Tennessee’s major Indian Nation. (Also in northern Mississippi and northwestern Alabama.)

The Nations (or small parts of them) listed below are believed to have either lived in within the bounds of modern Tennessee or contiguous to those bounds. Some of these Nations have treated with the United States government and have ceded non-Tennessee land. Some but not all of these Nations have simply faded away.

  Catawba, linguistic group, Siouan.

In historic times, the Catawba lived in the Carolinas.

“For a brief time in their later history the Catawba lived among the Cherokee and may have occupied lands in Tennessee at that time. There are indications they may have been in eastern Tennessee at a more remote epoch.”¹

  Chiaha.

“A part of this tribe was encountered by De Soto in 1540, in the territory now forming this State, probably as shown by Mr. J. Y. Brame, on what is now Burns Island [South Pittsburg, Marion Cty. Tennessee]. They are also mentioned in connection with the explorations of Juan Pardo in 1567.”¹

  Kaskinampo.

“There is every reason to believe that this tribe constituted the Casqui, Icasqui, or Casquin ‘province’ which De Soto entered immediately after crossing the Mississippi River, and it was probably in what is now Phillips County, Ark. We hear of the Kaskinampo next in connection with the expeditions of Marquette and Joliet but do not learn of their exact location until 1701, when they seem to have been on the lower end of present Pine Island. We are informed, however, by one of the French explorers that they had previously lived upon Cumberland River, and there is evidence that when they first moved to the Tennessee, they may have settled for a short time near its mouth. Both the Cumberland and the Tennessee were known by their name, and it stuck persistently to the latter years of the eighteenth century. After the early years of the eighteenth century we hear little more of them, but there is reason to believe that they united with the Koasati.”¹

  Mosopelia.

“This tribe probably established themselves on Cumberland River and at one or two points on the Tennessee shore of the Mississippi on their way from Ohio to Mississippi.”¹

  Muscogee (Creek), linguistic group, Muskogian.

A northern Georgia Nation whom Ramsey reported as having a slight presence on the Tennessee River as far north the mouth of the Hiwassee River.

Then we see ...

“Although we do not have records of any settlements in Tennessee by the true Muskogee, it is probable that some of them occupied part of its territory in prehistoric times, and at a later date their war parties constantly visited it.”¹

  Natchez, linguistic group, Natchez-Muskogian.

In 1729, the pro-Chickasaw Natchez massacred the French people of Fort Rosalie (located at present day Natchez Mississippi). Soon after, a French-Choctaw force destroyed the Natchez people. Many Natchez were killed; some were enslaved and sent to the West Indies. Some Natchez were able to flee and joined other tribes.

“After being driven from Mississippi and Louisiana, one band of Natchez lived among the Cherokee.”¹

  Quapaw, linguistic group, Siouan.

Originally from the Ohio Valley. By 1667, they were forced from their homelands by the Iroquois League. They settled at the mouth of the Arkansas River. There influence on the east side of the Mississippi was minimal.

  Shawnee, linguistic group, Algonkian.

See below.

  Tali.

“A tribe met by De Soto near the great bend of the Tennessee and found in the same region by the earliest English and French explorers, living in what is now northern Alabama and perhaps also in Tennessee. It is probable that they were a part of the Creeks.”¹

  Tuskegee.

In historic times, the Tuskegee lived in Alabama.

“One band of Tuskegee formed a settlement or settlements in the Cherokee Nation.”¹

“The later and best know location of this tribe was on the point of land between Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers, but in 1685 part of them were on the Chattahoochie River near modern Columbus [Alabama] and the rest were on the upper Tennessee near Long Island [Long Island is on the Tennessee Georgia line].”²

  Yuchi (a.k.a. Uchee), linguistic group, Siouan.

Please visit our Yuchi Page.

For our purposes, the Historic Period for Tennessee’s Indian Nations is the period covered by the white man’s written records. Before that, there were hundereds of generations of Indians living in Tennessee. Stepping back in time to the Prehistoric Period, we find the mound builder societies; there were the Mississippian (800 CE to 1450 CE) and Hopewell (100 BCE to 400 CE) cultures in Tennessee. Today, archeological work is conducted at many of these sites. All are part of the story of the First People of Tennessee.
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1.  The Indian Tribes of North America, by John R. Swanton. Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology. Bulletin 145. Government Printing Office, 1953; pp. 215-229.
2.  Ibid, p. 172.

“. . . All that Province, Territory, or Tract of ground, situate, lying, and being within our Dominions of America aforesaid, extending North and Eastward as far as the North end of Carahtuke River or Gullet; upon a straight Westerly line to Wyonoake Creek, which lies within or about the degrees of thirty six and thirty Minutes [36° 30'], Northern latitude, and so West in a direct line as far as the South Seas; and South and Westward as far as the degrees of twenty nine, inclusive, northern latitude; and so West in a direct line as far as the South Seas . . .”

“History does not make clear the policy of the North Carolina colony in dealing with the Indians in regards to their lands; it does not appear that any official policy was adopted until the near the close of its colonial existence . . .

“. . . the relations existing between the settlers and natives were friendly and peaceful up to the year 1711 . . . After the conquest of the Tuskarora there was no other tribe, except the Cherokee, on the their western frontier which the colonists deemed worthy of consideration . . .

“It would seem . . . that but a comparatively small portion of the territory of North Carolina was purchased from the Indians . . . Mr. James Mooney, of the Bureau of American Ethnology, who has made a careful study of the natives of the section, remarks-

The tribes of between the mountains and the sea were but of small importance politically; no sustained mission work was ever attempted among them, and there were but few literary men to take an interest in them. War, pestilence, whisky and systematic slave hunts had nearly exterminated the aboriginal occupants of the Carolinas before anybody thought them of sufficient importance to ask who they were, how they lived, or what were their beliefs and opinions.
. . .”

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From : Indian Land Cessions in the United States, Compiled by Charles C. Royce. The 18th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology -- 1896-’97, Vol II, p 624-630.
Full text, pp. 624-630.

“Pioneers of the Old Southwest”¹
Chapter III
The Trader
(Excerpt)

“The trader was the first pathfinder.² His caravans began the change of purpose that that was to come to be the Indian warrior’s route, turning it slowly into the beaten track of communication and commerce. The settlers, the rangers, the surveyors, went westward over the trails which he had blazed for them tears before. Their enduring works are commemorated in the cities and farms which today lie along every ancient border line; but of their forerunner’s hazardous Indian trade nothing remains. Let us therefore pay a moment’s homage here to the trader, who first --- to borrow a phrase from Indian speech --- made white for peace the red trails of war.

He was the first cattleman of the Old Southwest. Fifty years before John Findlay, one of this class of pioneers, led Daniel Boone through the Cumberland Gap, the trader’s bands of horses roamed the western slopes of the Appalachian Mountains and his cattle grazes among the deer on the green banks of the old Cherokee (Tennessee) River. He was the pioneer settler beyond the high hills; for he built in the center of the Indian towns, the first white man’s cabin --- with its larger annex, the trading house --- and dwelt there during the greater part of the year. He was America’s first magnate of international commerce. His furs --- for which he had paid in guns, knives, ammunition, vermilion paint, mirrors, and cloth --- lined king’s mantels, and hatted the Lords of Trade³ as they strode to their council chamber in London to discuss his business and to pass on those regulations which might have seriously hampered him but for his resourcefulness in circumventing them.

He was the first frontier warrior, for he either fought off or fell before small parties of hostile Indians who, in the interest of the Spanish or French, ⁴ raider his pack-horse caravans on the march. Often, too, side by side with his red brothers of his adoption, ⁵ he fought the in the intertribal wars ...”

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1. From : Pioneers of the Old Southwest, a Chronicle of the Dark and Bloody Ground; by Constance Lindsay Skinner, 1919, Yale University Press, pp. 52-53.

2. The first Carolina trader among the Chickasaw was Thoms Welch, as early as 1698; English traders, Virginians or Carolinians, were reported by the French to be among the Overhill Cherokee at least four years earlier. (From: Annals of Tennessee, by J. G. M. Ramsey, 1853, East Tennessee Historical Society edition, 1967, annotation section, by Stanley Folmsbee, p. 750.)

3. The European demand for furs was gigantic. Between 1700 and 1715, i.e., one million deer hides were shipped through the Port of Charles Town (Charleston) alone. Competition from white hunters also hurried the depletion these resources. As more animals were taken, this caused an environmental impact which forced Indians to hunt farther from home. The Indians became accustomed to the trade goods, and in time, became indebted for those trade goods. In the end, they could only pay their debts with their land.

4. “Jean du Charleville, who was a youthful assistant of an anonymous trader who had established a trading post at ‘French Lick’ on the Cumberland about 1710 ... Those traders were preceded in the Tennessee Country by two French renegades, Martin Chartier on the Cumberland in 1689, and Jean Couture on the Tennessee by 1696.”
(From: Annals of Tennessee, by J. G. M. Ramsey, 1853, East Tennessee Historical Society edition, 1967, annotation section, by Stanley Folmsbee, p. 750.)

5. The traders were the first to penetrate Indian Country. They were white men living on the edge of civilization, or in some cases, living among the Indians, and very often taking an Indian wife. Some became almost Indian but only a few left records. One who left much was James Adair, the “English Chickasaw” who wrote Adair’s History of the American Indians.” London 1775.

Indian Traders on Muscle Shoals of the Tennessee River¹
“Two Hundred Years at Muscle Shoals”
(Excerpt)

“Both the French and the English contended for the Indian trade along the western waters; the French planted a post at Muscle Shoals before 1715. Because of the increasing importance of trade with the whites the Cherokee planted villages near Muscle Shoals area in the last quarter of the eighteenth century ... Oka Kapassa was established about 1770 ... about one mile west of present Tuscumbia ... This site was resorted to by neighboring Indians for the purpose of trading with the French who still persisted on the Wabash [river, after the French and Indian War], and became the source of great vexation and numerous outrages to the Cumberland settlements about our present Nashville. After the murder of his brother by plunderers from Oka Passa, Col. James Robertson resolved on the destruction of the Indian village ... In the latter part of 1787, Col. Robertson with a volunteer force of about 130 men and two Chickasaw Indians as guides ... fell upon the town ... Twenty-six Indians were killed; three French traders and a white woman met a similar fate ... sent the six remaining French traders away with a division of the goods taken--the goods consisted of ‘stores of tafia,² sugar, coffee, cloth, blankets, knives, powder, tomahawks, tobacco, and other articles suitable to Indian commerce’ ... ”
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1. From: Two Hundred Years at Muscle Shoals, by Nina Leftwich Tuscumbia Alabama, 1935, pp. 12 &c 13.

2. Tafia, a crude and violent rum drink, the pirates employed it to disinfect wounds, cure migraines, lend courage in battle and celebrate after a victorious raid. They carried this firewater to all the ports of the Caribbean. Apparently, some Tafia also found its way to Oka Passa.

“In 1762 a grant to one Captain Patrick Jack was signed by [North Carolina] Governor [Arthur] Dobbs and Little Carpenter for certain lands in eastern Tennessee, which seems had been purchased by Jack of the Cherokee in 1757.”
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From : Indian Land Cessions in the United States, Compiled by Charles C. Royce. The 18th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology -- 1896-’97, Vol II, p 629.

Excerpts from:
Royal Proclamation of 1763
King George III, 7 October 1763

[The Indian Provisions]

“ . . .

And whereas it is just and reasonable, and essential to our Interest, and the Security of our Colonies, that the several Nations or Tribes of Indians with whom We are connected, and who live under our Protection, should not be molested or disturbed in the Possession of such Parts of Our Dominions and Territories as, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them, or any of them, as their Hunting Grounds -- We do therefore, with the Advice of our Privy Council, declare it to be our Royal Will and Pleasure, that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of our Colonies of Quebec, East Florida. or West Florida, do presume, upon any Pretence whatever, to grant Warrants of Survey, or pass any Patents for Lands beyond the Bounds of their respective Governments. as described in their Commissions: as also that no Governor or Commander in Chief in any of our other Colonies or Plantations in America do presume for the present, and until our further Pleasure be known, to grant Warrants of Survey, or pass Patents for any Lands beyond the Heads or Sources of any of the Rivers which fall into the Atlantic Ocean from the West and North West, or upon any Lands whatever, which, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us as aforesaid, are reserved to the said Indians, or any of them.

And We do further declare it to be Our Royal Will and Pleasure, for the present as aforesaid, to reserve under our Sovereignty, Protection, and Dominion, for the use of the said Indians, all the Lands and Territories not included within the Limits of Our said Three new Governments, or within the Limits of the Territory granted to the Hudson’s Bay Company, as also all the Lands and Territories lying to the Westward of the Sources of the Rivers which fall into the Sea from the West and North West as aforesaid.

And We do hereby strictly forbid, on Pain of our Displeasure, all our loving Subjects from making any Purchases or Settlements whatever, or taking Possession of any of the Lands above reserved, without our especial leave and Licence for that Purpose first obtained.

And We do further strictly enjoin and require all Persons whatever who have either wilfully or inadvertently seated themselves upon any Lands within the Countries above described or upon any other Lands which, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are still reserved to the said Indians as aforesaid, forthwith to remove themselves from such Settlements.

And whereas great Frauds and Abuses have been committed in purchasing Lands of the Indians, to the great Prejudice of our Interests. and to the great Dissatisfaction of the said Indians: In order, therefore, to prevent such Irregularities for the future, and to the end that the Indians may be convinced of our Justice and determined Resolution to remove all reasonable Cause of Discontent, We do, with the Advice of our Privy Council strictly enjoin and require, that no private Person do presume to make any purchase from the said Indians of any Lands reserved to the said Indians, within those parts of our Colonies where We have thought proper to allow Settlement: but that, if at any Time any of the Said Indians should be inclined to dispose of the said Lands, the same shall be Purchased only for Us, in our Name, at some public Meeting or Assembly of the said Indians, to be held for that Purpose by the Governor or Commander in Chief of our Colony respectively within which they shall lie: and in case they shall lie within the limits of any. Proprietary Government, they shall be purchased only for the Use and in the name of such Proprietaries, conformable to such Directions and Instructions as We or they shall think proper to give for that Purpose: And we do, by the Advice of our Privy Council, declare and enjoin, that the. Trade with the said Indians shall be free and open to all our Subjects whatever, provided that every Person who may incline to Trade with the said Indians do take out a Licence for carrying on such Trade from the Governor or Commander in Chief of any of our Colonies respectively where such Person shall reside, and also give Security to observe such Regulations as We shall at any Time think fit, by ourselves or by our Commissaries to be appointed for this Purpose, to direct and appoint for the Benefit of the said Trade:

And we do hereby authorize, enjoin, and require the Governors and Commanders in Chief of all our Colonies respectively, as well those under Our immediate Government as those under the Government and Direction of Proprietaries, to grant such Licences without Fee or Reward, taking especial Care to insert therein a Condition, that such Licence shall be void, and the Security forfeited in case the Person to whom the same is granted shall refuse or neglect to observe such Regulations as We shall think proper to prescribe as aforesaid.

And we do further expressly conjoin and require all Officers whatever, as well Military as those Employed in the Management and Direction of Indian Affairs, within the Territories reserved as aforesaid for the use of the said Indians, to seize and apprehend all Persons whatever, who standing charged with Treason, Misprisions of Treason, Murders, or other Felonies or Misdemeanors, shall fly from Justice and take Refuge in the said Territory, and to send them under a proper guard to the Colony where the Crime was committed, of which they stand accused, in order to take their Trial for the same.

Given at our Court at St. James’s the 7th Day of October 1763, in the Third Year of our Reign.

GOD SAVE THE KING”

. . . Mr. Stuart, the Superintendent of Southern Indian Affairs, was therefore instructed to assemble the southern Indians for the purpose of establishing a boundary with them; and before negotiation with the confederates as Fort Stanwix had begun, he concluded a treaty with the Cherokees at Hard Labour, in South Carolina, October 14, 1768, By this treaty, it was agreed that the south-western boundary of Virginia should be a line “extending from the point where the northern line of North Carolina intersects the Cherokee hunting grounds, about thirty-six miles east of Long Island, in the Holston river, and thence extending in a direct course, north by east to Chiswell’s Mine, on the east bank of the Kenhawa river, and thence down that stream to its junction with the Ohio.” This line however, did not include all the settlements then made; and even during the progress of the treaty, the settlers were advancing further west, and erecting their cabins north-west of the Holston, and upon the branches of the Clinch and Powell’s river, within the limits of the Indian territory. This fact being ascertained, a subsequent treaty became necessary for the adjustment of a new boundary and the remuneration of the savages for an additional extent of country. *

*Monette. _____
From : The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century. 1853. Dr. J. G. M. Ramsey. pp 76-77

. . . Three thousand, two hundred Indians, of seventeen tribes, tributaries to the Confederacy, or occupying territories coterminous with theirs attended. On the 5^th of November, a treaty of limits and a deed of cession to the King of England, were signed. In this, the delegates of their respective nations aver that“they are the true and absolute proprietors of the lands thus ceded,” and that for the considerations mentioned, “we have continued the line south to the Cherokee or Hogohegee rivers,* because the same is, and we declare it to be, our true bounds with the Southern Indians, and that we have an undoubted right to the country as far south as that river.

The cession thus made by the Six Nations,** of the country north and east of the Tennessee river, is the first deed from any aboriginal tribes for any territory within the boundaries of our state [Tennessee]. . .

*The Holston was thus called. _____
From : The Annals of Tennessee to the End of the Eighteenth Century. 1853. Dr. J. G. M. Ramsey. pp 75-76
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** The Six Nations (Iroquois Confederation) were composed of the Mohawks, Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas (the original five tribes of the Iroquois Confederation --- all were New York area tribes), plus a sixth tribe, the Tuscaroras, who moved from the North Carolina area to the Pennsylvania-New York area after 1712, later joining the Iroquois Confederation.
F.S.

All the Country comprehended between the Western and Southern Boundaries of the Province of Pennsylvania and extending Southward (on the Eastern Side of the River Ohio) to the Mouth of the Cherokee [Tennessee] River and Thence from every part of its Front on the River Ohio to the Allegany Mountains (except that part of the Country called Indiana*) was granted by the Six United Nations of Indians to his Majesty for the Sum of £10.460.73 Sterling as by their Deed bearing Date at Fort Stanwix in the Province of New York, on the 5^th day of Novem. 1768

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From : A new map of the western parts of Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and North Carolina; comprehending the River Ohio, and all the Rivers which fall into it; Part of the River Mississippi, the Whole of the Illinois River, Lake Erie, Part of the Lakes Huron, Michigan &c. And all the Country bordering on these Lakes and Rivers.

By Thos Hutchins
Captain in the 60 Regiment of Foot.
London, Published according to Act of Parliament Novembr 1st 1778

Source : Library of Congress, American Memory, Map Collections, 1500-1999

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* “Indiana” (Indiana Land Company) appears on the 1778 map as a tract south of the River Ohio and would now be in present day West Virginia, northeast of the Little Kanawa River. See Image.
F.S.

The Last of the Mohicans

Based on the book by James Fenimore Cooper, the film The Last of the Mohicans, is one of the best and most beautiful period films ever made. The story includes the siege at Fort William Henry (1757) during the French and Indian War. The Fort was located on Lake George (New York) or as the French called it, Lac Du St. Sacrement. Recent archeological studies at the fort have uncovered much information of the siege. The film itself was photographed not in New York state, but in western North Carolina -- in what had been Cherokee Country. Visit the Mohican Press website and enjoy the efforts of two folk who pay reverence to the film and the Mohicans.