The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-12-04
LETTERS TO EDITOR
More About Creek Path Town

To the Editor of The Age-Herald.
 Referring back to your issue of October 29, in which the Hon. O. D. Street takes issues with me as to the location of the mission school established among the Cherokees, and at place known then as Creek Path town (March, 1S2D, and seeks to locate both as being at or near the present site of Guntersville, in Browns Valley, wish to say that I have no de- sire to trespass on your space or pro- long the controversy; but would like to add that I do not question the statement of MT. Street as to the location of village known as Creek Path, or as to a Presbyterian mission in Browns Valley, in 1928, or possibly as early as 1924; but if he will read his books a little more closely he will find that in Octover, 1913, General Coffee, acting under orders of General Jackson, secured that entire country for Creek Indians Chat being Creek and not Cherokee country), travelling in 12 days over 200 miles without finding a single Indian. He found, in fact, only two de- serted villages. Three years later, in October, 1916, he was in the same country again. and negotiated treaty both with the Chickasas and with the Cherokees, but no mention is made of village or town at the present site of Guntersville. He had taken that territory from the Creeks by force of arms, and paid the Cherokees $65,Oo0 (there being, as he states, 65 Cherokees in his command who joined him at Talladega before he fought the battle of Horse Shoe Bend) as their part in the spells of the campaign.
 The mission school referred to by Rev. Rufus Anderson, secretary of the Amer ican board of commissioners for foreign missions as having been established at place known to him as Greek Path town" near the home of Capt. John Brown Gather, as he says, of Col. Dick Brown, who commanded large num- Der of Cherokees who made a part of the army under General Jackson'), was To- cated and established as result of pe- tition from "the head men, chiefs of Creek Path town, Cherokee Nation,'' and the place. as Rev. Rufus Anderson says
 was p miles southeast of the Tennessee river," in Wills valley" 'sbetween Rae coon and Lookout mountains" 100 miles from Brainerd or Chickamauga, and if this statement as to the location is true
 the place was near the present site of At tal'a. At that time the Indians were more numerous at and near Turkey Town and in Wills valley than they were across the line in the old Creek territory, to which the Cherokees had absolutely no claim; and the Brown family, by which the mis- sion school was strongly backed up, were not only Cherokees, but were among the leading CherolSees then in the nation, and the school was wanted for the benefit of the Cherokees. Such being the facts,
 1t would be ridiculous. to assume that they procured a school to be located in the old Creek territory, or that they would have been recognized either by their own countrymen or by General Jackson, as Cherokee chiefs or Cherokees of au- thority, if they had not been actual resi- dents of the Cherokee Nation The Rich ard Brown who signed the treaty of Tur- key Town October f. 1916, was undoubtedly the same Col. Dick Brown who joined General Jackson with the 65 Cherol1ees at Ialladega Fort, January 1S 1S14 and con- tlnued with him until the close of the campaign against the Creeks, which finally ended with the treaty of Fort Jackson in the summer of that year.
 Catherine Brown, the Indian girl. who was teacher in the Creek Path school died July IS, 1S23 and the Brown family left for the new Cherokee country beyond the Mississippi river in the late sumn,e ger or early fall of that year. The migration of the Cherokees Gall voluntary had be- gun in 1894, and when, Capt John Brown
 left in the fall of 1923, but few of the old leaders were left behind. It would not be long stretch of the imagination to
 fnppose that at that time another vil- large was springing up in the old Creek country, then opened to settlement as a re- suit of the treaty of Turkey Town, and that the Presbyterians moved their school | 10 BroWns valley about that time. If the 1 school was first established at or near At talla, it was near place where tradition says the Creeks and Cherokees in the early days met to play ball, about one i mile south of Attalla. which is on the
 route of the old Jackson trail" and was also on an Indian trail Cheir roads | being trai's), evidently identical with the l old Kusa-Nunnahi, or Coosa trail Cor
 path, and from which the villages took ! their names. Yours truly,
 ED D. HAMMER.
 Attalla, November 19, 1915.
 Ished. MT. Cohen, however, is best known