CHIEF PATHKILLER “KING” OR SOLDIER?

Although some confusion exists with facts surrounding Chief Pathkiller, it is reported he was born in 1764 in Cherokee County, Alabama. Possibly the son of Chief Stalking Turkey Oconostota and Dragging Canoe. A Cherokee warrior, he rose to the chieftainship of Gun’-di’ga-duhun’yi (Turkey Town), the largest of the Cherokee settlements, where he would become a tribal elder.

Pathkiller became the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation by 1811. Because the British had enlisted Creek warriors who continually encroached upon Cherokee territory, Cherokees were forced to defend their sovereignty, thus drawing them into the War of 1812. Pathkiller was a colonel in the Morgan Regiment of Cherokee County. His gravestone attests to that assignment.

Under his tenure as Chief of the Cherokee Nation, significant laws of the Cherokee Nation were developed. He is considered the last of the hereditary chiefs and is known to some as the last great king of the Cherokees. A conservative full-blood native American, he resisted the removal of tribes from their lands, which resulted in the infamous Trail of Tears. The chief’s power and influence were quickly eroded by new thinking, and changes in Cherokee leadership with mixed ancestry and more liberal views took charge.

When Pathkiller died in 1842, his close friend, Major John Ridge of Rome, Georgia, succeeded him as chief and served as executor of Pathkiller’s estate that left behind a ferry on the Coosa River in Turkey Town, one hundred acres of cleared land, a peach and apple orchard, and a large house with several outbuildings and quarters.

Pathkiller rests in a wooded graveyard on a high bluff overlooking the Coosa River. It is located on a farm owned by the Donald C. Garrett family near Centre, Alabama. It is near the original location of Pathkiller Ferry, later known as Garrett’s Ferry. A simple marker is inscribed: “Chief Pathkiller Referred to as Last of the Cherokee Kings.”

Be a History Sleuth...if you would like to discover real facts and actual stories of interest about Chief Pathkiller or other ancestors and pioneers of Cherokee County, visit the Cherokee Historical Museum located on Main Street or peruse through Cherokee County Library’s rare books. Let us know what your research uncovers!

(Buttram, Hawkins, and Hopper, continued from page 21)

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