Herald and tribune. [volume] (Jonesborough, Tenn.) 1869-current, 1896-02-05
HAYWOOD'S
HISTORY OF TENNESSEE
CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK. I

On the 23rd and Gath of October.
James Mayberry and John White, were
killed and scalped on Cum berland
Mountain. They had been engaged to
20 express from Knoxville to the office
OF the surveyor general, at Nashville,
for the purpose of carrying from thence
to the office of the Secretary of State
in North Carolina, number of mill.
tary warrants and the surveyors re.
turns, that grants might issue upon
them within the time limited by law.
The Assembly of North Carolina at
their session commencing on the end
of November, 1889. and ending on the
22d of December, gave further time for
surveying lands entered in John Arm
strong's office, on military warrants
and on preemption rights. They al
lowed three years, which expired on
the I'd of November, 1909, but were
understood by the people of Cumber.
land to expire on the 22d of December,
1792. 1t is easy to perceive from the
view we have just taken of the state of
affairs in all these three years that &C
tual surveys could not be made at any
considerable distance from Nashville,
but at the most imminent hazard of
those who made them. And not being
able to make and return actual SURVEYS,
the surveyors took the warrants and
entries made upon military warrant is
and made out plats without ever seeing
the lands and returned them 10 the
Secretary's Office in great mum bers,
and grants issued upon them. For
this reason it is that the Judges of Ten
nessee, with respect to these grants at
least, will not receive the plat and
water courses laid down in itas locative
evidence in controversies concerning
boundary. frequently of late, new
entries and surveys have been made of
the same lands, in the present and late
land offices, and the surveyors have
been summoned to declare on oath,
where are the boundaries which they
actually made; but the courts have ex-
cused them from answering such ques.
'tions, as tending to implicate them,
either in breach of duty or of the
promissory oaths of Office, taken previ.
ously to its exercise. The courts laud-
ably have been ingenious in support of
these grants; and have by series of
Judicial decisions sanctioned actual
surveys mado after opening the new
offices, with demarcation of lines, so as
to give notice in time to subsequent
enterers, of the real locality of the
lands claimed under these grants, pro.
vided the survey be such as might have
been made by the original surveyor in
point of form and location. Many
legal controversies have been raised
upon the foundation of supposed
defect in those grants, but hitherto
they have maintained their ground,
and the honest purchasers have not vet
been obliged to lose them for want of
actual surveys, if surveys have been
since made and have identified the
lands. The Assembly of North Caro-
lima, by virtue of the powers reserved
in the cession act, which enabled the
Governor to complete titles not yet per
fected upon entries and rights of pre-
emption, and upon all entries in John
Armstrong; Office on which grants
were not perfected, and upon all other
rights granted by law, continued to
legislate upon the subject of vacant
lands within the ceded territory and
upon the mode of satisfying claims to
lands under North Carolina, in the
same manner as if the cession act had |
never passed; and all the laws of North |
Carolina upon this subject were con-
formed to and confirmed by the west.
ern people. Let US return to the melan-
choly story which we left.
On the 7th of Der, 1902, party |
of cavalry in service for the protection
of the district of Nero, about eight
miles from Nashville, was fred upon
by about twenty Indians, who put
them to flight, killed John Hankins
who was scalped and his body much
mangled. The Indians stole horses in
this district without intermission, thro'
all the month of Decem ber, 1893.
On the Goth of December, John Hag-
gard was killed and scalped, about
six miles from Nashville; twelve balls
were shot into him. His wife was
killed by the Indians in the summer,
and he left five small children in pow
erty and wretchedness.
Gov. Blount, not unmindful OF the
instructions he had received from the
President, to engage the Cherokees,
Choctaws and Chickasaws, to co .oper.
ate with the United States in their war
against the northwards,. as they were
then called, and having so far felt the
pulse of the Cherokees as to discover
that the application to them would not
be successful, dropped the subject with
1892, he wrote TO the Choctaws and
to meet him at Nashvill
on the 10th of June, that.he might de-
liver the presents he had for them, and
that they and himself might shake
hands and drink aud smoke together.
Because these things, said he, serve to
make people and nations love each
other. And he desired not only that