The Chickamauga Wars, also known as the Cherokee-American Wars, was really just an escalation of the hostile relationship between Americans and the Cherokee tribe.

The problem really started during the French and Indian War, which ran from 1758-1761. During that war, British forces simply destroyed many Cherokee towns, which were never reoccupied. Some treaties were signed after the war, and then boundaries established, but the colonists resented those boundaries. They showed their resentment by largely ignoring them, forcing officials in charge of Indian Affairs to put together new treaties with new boundaries. Go figure, those didn’t work either.

Things got ugly in 1773 when Daniel Boone led about 50 settlers through the Cumberland Gap. Natives from several tribes descended on a foraging/scouting party, capturing them and then ritually torturing them to death. Among the dead was Boone’s son James.

Tensions continued to rise until this day in 1776, when they escalated into full-scale raids and battles which came in fits and starts, and then would settle into long periods of no activity.

This went on into the 1790s before the Army came in with a major offensive, forcing the Cherokees to back down and seek a peace treaty, formally ending the Chickamauga Wars.

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