The Great Men of Virginia were Liars
“I don’t understand writing, but got a Man to write a Letter for me to the Governour to acquaint him what things I had promised my young Men to engage them to come up with me, and expected to have found everything I mentioned ready for us. . . . Brother we blame the Govr and not you. What you have, you are free of; and it looks to me, the Govr has little Regard for you that are in the back Settlements”
Next time you visit 419 N Loudoun Street, you might imagine the 148 Cherokee who came there to Fort Loudoun and what they said.
That quote above is what Swallow said.
He said that to our Captain George Mercer.
This is the Captain we portray in our reenactment group, telling the story of a company in the Virginia Regiment who help build Fort Loudoun.
Swallow is noted as First Warrior in the lower Cherokee town of Estatoe, who said the above quote to our Captain Mercer at Fort Loudoun Winchester VA, on either 21 or 22 April 1757.
We wonder if that man, who Swallow references, might have been Clement Read back on 5 April 1757 when the Cherokee went to Lunenburg and then Williamsburg before coming here to Winchester VA. Was Clement Read the man Swallow told to write a letter to the Governor?
Clement Read says it was Wawhatchee who referred to that letter to the Governor.
Clement Read writes,"He Wawhatchee - [ also called Ohatchee, Wawhatchee, Wayayochy,] further ordered me not to fail to inform you [Lt Gov Dinwiddie] that the presents wrote for he expected would be sent up to Winchester soon . . . " Again, here is the link to the story on that question.
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And then Mercer tells more of what the Cherokee leaders said to him:
". . .they found from every Action, the Great Men of Virginia were Liars."
These speeches and quotes are all told in Captain George Mercer's hand in a letter he writes to Colonel George Washington 24 April 1757.
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Mercer writes Washington:
Dear Sir
Thursday and Friday last came to Town 148 Cherokees, with Major Lewis, and yesterday I spoke to them, as they did not chuse an Interview sooner.
Wauhatchee the Head Warriour, after I had told him among many other things, that I was sorry we had not timely Notice of their Coming, that the Governour would have ordered the necessary presents for them, but they might depend upon every thing they could want at their Return, would not receive the Wampum I offered him, as is usual, at the End of the Speech; but immediately got up, & went out of the Council in a great passion, and told the rest of the Warriours they might speak to me, if they had anything to say.
This Behaviour gave me great Uneasiness, which was not a little increased, when the Swallow, after a long Silence, made the Speech which I inclose.
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And that speech enclosed, was quoted at the top of this story.
Source:
Who did Lie? Who is telling the Truth?
What if today's Fact Checkers looked at this?
If you take the short and narrow view, you might find evidence that Wawhatchee forced a promise out a top county leader before the county leader could find out if he could guarantee that promise. But Dinwiddie suspects that the Indians were not the instigators of the violence that intimidated Clement Read into making that promise. Yet then again even despite that, Clement Read shows he was legitimately afraid. All the Indians were eating all his food. They were ordering him and all his family to wait beck and call on every one of their needs. It was as if a motorcycle gang had taken over the house.
See more on that story as told by Clement Read on 5 April 1757.
So, how about the broader big picture? Then of course the whole thing turned into a lie, didn't it?
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MORE ON THIS FORT LOUDOUN VISIT?
More detail on this story was first published in the French and Indian War Foundation website:
We are transferring the story to this link which is more secure.
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Compiled by Jim Moyer 4/25/2021
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Links found in the course of doing this research
ESTATOE
There probably were only two Cherokee towns called “Estatowe” when Bartram passed through in the late spring of 1775. We have to use his spelling, because there are no better records of the Cherokee pronunciation, and I have no clear idea of the original meaning of the name. He places one of them a little below the place where the Tallulah and Chattooga Rivers form the Tugaloo. The other, which he mentions as “Estatowe great,” was on Eastatoe Creek in Pickens County, South Carolina, and the creek bears its name. We should note that the name Eastatoe also occurs in Eastatoe Falls and Eastatoe Gap, near Rosman, NC, not so very far from Eastatoe Creek and Little Eastatoe Creek. There seems to be a trend to spell Eastatoe with only one final E.
The third Estatowe must not have been in existence in 1775. There are several reports of such a town at the base of Estatoah Falls, in Rabun County, Georgia. Chief Junaluska was born somewhere within a few miles of the falls in 1775. Bartram specifically described this place as he found it after reaching the Little Tennessee River’s headwaters and proceeding downstream.
This photo is the Little Tennessee River, near its headwaters, in Wolf Fork Valley, two or three miles upstream from the confluence with Mud Creek.
He says he was “pursuing my serpentine path, through and over the meadows and green fields and crossing the river” He traveled a few miles down the river and came to “a very beautiful creek, which flowed into the river just before me; but now behold, high upon the side of a distant mountain overlooking the vale, the fountain of this brisk flowing creek; the unparalleled water fall appears as a vast edifice with crystal front, or a field of ice lying on the bosom of the hill.” The distance along the nearly straight creek from its mouth at the river to the falls is less than one and one-half miles, and it should have presented a good line of sight. I doubt that he would have failed to see any Indian settlement here and the inhabitants of it would surely not have missed his passing through. The falls are indeed beautiful. As a very small child, I lived for a time at the base of them. I am saddened that the creek has been named Mud Creek, and that there are some who have begun to refer to Estatoah as “Mud Creek Falls.”
There are those who report that Eastatoe and Estatoah are derived from the Cherokee name for the Carolina Parakeet, but I have not been able to confirm that story yet. We may surmise that all three of the towns were likely pronounced “Eestatoee” from the fact that an early name for what became the town of Dillard, Georgia, was recorded as “Eastertoy” by the whites. Bartram’s spelling of the name may have been simply his rendition of “Eestatoee.”
Source:
Letter From George Mercer
Fort Loudoun April 24th 1757.
Dear Sir, Thursday and Friday last came to Town 148 Cherokees, with Major Lewis, and yesterday I spoke to them, as they did not chuse an Interview sooner.
George Mercer Biography Highlights
Why is George Mercer a subject for our interest? Because George Washington knew the whole Mercer family.
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George Mercer’s father, John Mercer, was one of the founders of the Ohio Company of Virginia which GW was a part.
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George Mercer’s father was also an attorney for GW.
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George Mercer’s Brother, Captain John Fenton Mercer was killed and scalped near Fort Edwards April 18, 1756.
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George Mercer himself?
George Mercer was a Captain of a company
for George Washington’s Virginia Regiment, 1756-1758.
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His company was the initial company,
along with Captain Bell’s and Captain Peachey’s,
providing carpenters to start the building
of Fort Loudoun in Winchester VA.
One of those carpenters repeatedly deserted
and was later court martialed and hanged
at Fort Loudoun Winchester VA.
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George Mercer was GW’s aid de camp.
George Mercer was wounded at Fort Necessity.
He was on the Braddock Expedition.
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Later on the Forbes Expedition,
Mercer, now a Lt Colonel in the 2nd Virginia Regiment,
and GW of the 1st Virginia Regiment,
ran into each other at night in a
horribly sad friendly fire incident,
in which GW recorded very little
until decades later providing notes
to David Humphreys who was planning to
write a biography of George Washington.
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Somehow the two remained friends.
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George Mercer ran for election with GW.
They both won a seat in the
House of Burgesses in 1761,
representing
Frederick County Winchester VA.
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Click on all pictures to enlarge.
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Later he almost became a Governor of a Colony –
the proposed Colony called Vandalia.
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He also became a tax collector at the height of hysteria
against England. Bad timing. Again. He resigned.
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And that’s just a small part of the George Mercer story.
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Short bio on our Capt. George Mercer.
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Born Marlborough Plantation, Stafford Co. Virginia, June 23, 1733.
Died in England, April 1784.
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Family Tree.
Source is from
Click to enlarge chart.
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More detail on this story was first published
We are transferring the story to this link which is more secure.
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