Tennessee was first of all a settlement where lived several tribes of Indians. The Chickamaugas lived near where Chattanooga now stands; the Creeks lower down on the Tennessee river partly in Alabama; the Cherokees, who were the most warlike of all inhabited the mountains of the east with Kentucky on one side and Georgia on the other. The Chickasaws lived near Memphis. The Uchen lived near Nashville. These Indians lived in this vast wilderness filled with wild animals and dense forests.
When the white hunters of Virginia and North Carolina heard of this vast wilderness filled with deer and buffalo, some of them ventured into the dangerous and disputed territory.
William Bean, of Virginia, made the first settlement on the Watauga River, building his log cabin at the mouth of Hoone's Creek. His family moved into it in 1769. Here his son Russel Bean was born, who was the first known white child to be born in Tennessee.
This was the beginning of Tennessee History. The Indians used a road called "The Great Trace" in their expeditions. This road ran through East Tennessee and connected the Southwest and the North. The title to the land which is now Tennessee was in dispute for a long time. King Charles II, of Great Britain claimed all territory on the North American Continent which was settled by his subjects. He gave away large tracts of land, sometimes to individuals and sometimes to corporations and companies. He maintained no one could get land from the Indians except himself.
North Carolina was granted to a company of distinguished Englishmen, and this land included Tennessee. The English adopted the policy of building forts. The first fort built in East Tennessee was Fort Loudon in 1756.
Hostilities between the white men and the Indians began when upon returning home from Virginia, the Cherokees saw Some horses running at large and thinking they were wild, caught them. The owners thought they were horse thieves and killed some of the Indians. In revenge the Indians killed all the whites they could find. They besieged Fort Loudon, killing all except one officer and twenty men who lived to tell of the butchery.
By the year 1768 many pioneers began emigrating from older settlements to the Tennessee country where they could get plenty of land cheap. The real hardship and danger they had to undergo to hold their lands was the greatest price they paid.
Pioneers from Virginia and North Carolina began to rear their cabins along the Holston and Watauga rivers and by 1770 a substantial settlement was in progress.
Although nominally within the province of North Carolina, the settlers south of the Holston and along the Wataugs were practically without any form of government. Responding to that dominant trait of t.he Anglo-Saxon race for self government, these sturdy pioneers in 1772 met in convention on the Watauga, where the city of Elizabethton is today and formed the "Watauga Association". This was the first seat of government in Tennessee and continued until August of 1776, when upon petition by the people of Watauga, the territory was annexed to the state of North Carolina and known as "Washington District" into a county of the same name, assigning to it the boundaries of the whole present State oI Tennessee.
Two years later in 1778, Jonesborough (now Jonesboro), the first town in Tennessee, was established as the first seat of government of washington County.
By an act of the Legislature of North Carolina in June. 1784, the territory embraced in Washington District was ceded to the United States subject to acceptance within two years. The Wataugans were indignant at being cast off with out being consulted and were apprehensive of their state of affairs during that time. Representatives of three of the four counties in "Washington District" assembled at Jonesboro on August 23, 1784.
These forty representatives elected John Sevier as their president and formed an association for laying out a new state and provide for another convention to form a constitution and start a new government. The new state was called Franklin in honor of Benjamin Franklin, and John Sevier was elected Governor.
This was the first legislative Assembly in what is now Tennessee, and Greenville became its capital. In November of 1784, North Carolina General Assembly repealed the act of cession and assumed jurisdiction over the Western Territory, which caused a conflict of the governtal authority. The people began to fall away from the Franklin Government and depend on the state of North Carolina. In March 1778, Sevier's term had expired and tlhe State of Franklin was dead. In 1789, John Sevier was the Congressman elected from the Mississippi Valley. Two years tater in 1790, it became the Territory of the United States South of the Ohio River, continuing as such until June 1, 1796 when Tennessee was admitted as the Sixteenth state in the Union.
Transcribed by a Friend of Free Genealogy
