After the Seven Years War, King George III issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763, restricting colonists from encroaching on Native American lands west of Appalachia. The decree was largely ignored. Then, in 1774, a land speculator coerced the Cherokee to part with 20 million acres in Tennessee in exchange for essential goods and a meager 10,000 English pounds.
The Treaty of Sycamore Shoals was opposed by some younger Cherokee, including Tsiyu Gansini (Dragging Canoe). Fearing that a cycle of land purchase and relocation would lead to the Cherokee’s extinction, Dragging Canoe led raids on frontier settlements in 1776. A series of counterattacks by American militia then scorched Cherokee villages and crop supplies.
By winter, Dragging Canoe and his followers separated from the larger group of peace-focused Cherokee. Moving along Chickamauga Creek, they became known as the Chickamauga Cherokee and continued their opposition throughout the war and into the eighteenth century.
Several decades after Dragging Canoe’s death in 1792, his fears turned prophetic through the Trail of Tears. However, his acts of resistance during the Cherokee-American Wars helped to unify Native nations against colonization.
