Chapter I: Front Matter

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Transcriber’s Note:

This volume is a reprint of Adair’s original text. The editor had preserved the page numbers in the form of bracketed numbers. Those page breaks frequently were interpolated in mid-word. In this rendering of the text, those page numbers are moved slightly to allow each word to complete without hyphenation.

The Adair’s fifty-six footnotes, originally employing ‘*’ and ‘†’, have been reindexed sequentially using Roman numerals. As the editor informs us in his Preface, some of these notes were extended by him. Adair’s portion is followed by ‘(A)’, for Adair, and his own extended remarks are followed by ‘(W)’, for ‘Williams.’

The editor’s own footnotes were already numbered sequentially from the first to the last page, beginning again at ‘1’ after the Introduction. This approach has been retained, however an ‘i’ is prefixed for the twenty-seven notes in the Introduction.

Adair’s footnotes have been moved to follow the paragraphs in which they are referenced. The editor’s notes are gathered at the end of each section.

This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects. Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_.

Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Adair’s History of the
American Indians

------------------------------------------------------------------------

OTHER WORKS OF THE EDITOR

William Tatham, Wataugan, 1923 (out of print)
History of the Lost State of Franklin, 1924 (out of print)
Memoirs of Lt. Henry Timberlake, ed., 1927
Early Travels in the Tennessee Country, 1928
The Beginnings of West Tennessee, 1929

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Adair’s History
of the
American Indians

_Edited under the auspices of the
National Society of the Colonial
Dames of America, in Tennessee_

BY
SAMUEL COLE WILLIAMS, LL.D.

THE WATAUGA PRESS
JOHNSON CITY, TENNESSEE
1930

------------------------------------------------------------------------

COPYRIGHT, 1930
_By the National Society of Colonial
Dames of America, in Tennessee_

---

Printed in an edition limited to
750 copies from type.

MANUFACTURED COMPLETE BY
KINGSPORT PRESS, INC.
KINGSPORT, TENNESSEE
_United States of America_

------------------------------------------------------------------------

EDITOR’S PREFACE

James Adair’s _History of the American Indians_, published in London in 1775, has always been regarded and treated by ethnologists and historians as reliable authority on the Southern Indians, as well as on Southern history in a period of no little obscurity. The book has long been rare, selling in 1930 at one hundred dollars a copy. Recognizing its value as source material on Southern history of the colonial period, the National Society of Colonial Dames of America, in Tennessee, determined to bring out a reprint, which should be annotated to supplement in some degree Adair’s own detailed and vivid description of life among the Indians of the South, east of the Mississippi River; of the Indian trade and traders, and of intrigues and wars that involved both the red and the white races, in the years of struggle for the possession of the Mississippi Valley by the French and English.

The writer was asked to undertake the editorial work. The task of annotation has proceeded on the basis of a reckoning that Adair’s book is not true to name—a history of the American Indians—but of its being an account of the principal tribes of the Indians of the Southeast and of their countries. His work is all the more unique and useful in that such is its real scope; and the editor’s notes, speaking generally, have been brought within the same limitation. The London edition carried no index—a lack that impaired its useability. One is supplied in this reprint.

In the Introduction it is purposed to give as full and accurate an account of Adair, the man, and of his book, as is feasible. In order to compass this a fairly wide investigation of archives was entered upon and a correspondence conducted. To Professor R. L. Meriwether, of the Department of History of the University of South Carolina, Emmett Starr, of St. Louis, historian of the Cherokee Indians, John R. Swanton, of the Bureau of American Ethnology, Washington, D. C., W. J. Ghent, of the staff of the _Dictionary of American Biography_, Judge Samuel Martin Young, of Dixon Springs, Tennessee, Dr. P. M. Hamer, of the Department of History of the University of Tennessee, and Miss Mary U. Rothrock, librarian of the Lawson McGhee Library, Knoxville, Tennessee, the editor is under obligations for aid given in its preparation. An expression of gratitude cannot be withheld. The editor, also, has had the hearty coöperation at all times of the officers of the Society which has promoted the enterprise, not with a view to financial profit, but under patriotic prompting.

The notes of Adair are indicated by * and other reference marks; those of the editor by numerals. In cases where the editor has extended notes of the author the latter’s work is followed by (A) and the editor’s by (W).

The author’s punctuation, spelling and capitalization have been followed, but the old form of “s” has been changed to the modern. For the convenience of students in running references to pages of the original edition its page-numbers are carried into the body of the text between brackets.

SAMUEL COLE WILLIAMS.

“Aquone”
Johnson City
Tennessee