(25) Hopewell, South Carolina (p. 61): This place, designated in
early treaties and also in Hawkins's manuscript journal as "Hopewell
on the Keowee," was the plantation seat of General Andrew Pickens,
who resided there from the close of the Revolution until his death
in 1817. It was situated on the northern edge of the present Anderson
county, on the east side of Keowee river, opposite and a short distance
below the entrance of Little river, and about three miles from the
present Pendleton. In sight of it, on the opposite side of Keowee,
was the old Cherokee town of Seneca, destroyed by the Americans in
1776. Important treaties were made here with the Cherokee in 1785,
and with the Chickasaw in 1786.
(26) Colonel Benjamin Hawkins (p. 61): This distinguished soldier,
statesman, and author, was born in Warren county, North Carolina,
in 1754, and died at Hawkinsville, Georgia, in 1816. His father,
Colonel Philemon Hawkins, organized and commanded a regiment in the
Revolutionary war, and was a member of the convention that ratified
the national constitution. At the outbreak of the Revolution young
Hawkins was a student at Princeton, but offered his services to the
American cause, and on account of his knowledge of French and other
modern languages was appointed by Washington his staff interpreter for
communicating with the French officers cooperating with the American
army. He took part in several engagements and was afterward appointed
commissioner for procuring war supplies abroad. After the close
of the war he was elected to Congress, and in 1785 was appointed
on the commission which negotiated at Hopewell the first federal
treaty with the Cherokee. He served a second term in the House and
another in the Senate, and in 1796 was appointed superintendent for
all the Indians south of the Ohio. He thereupon removed to the Creek
country and established himself in the wilderness at what is now
Hawkinsville, Georgia, where he remained in the continuance of his
office until his death. As Senator he signed the deed by which North
Carolina ceded Tennessee to the United States in 1790, and as Indian
superintendent helped to negotiate seven different treaties with
the southern tribes. He had an extensive knowledge of the customs
and language of the Creeks, and his "Sketch of the Creek Country,"
written in 1799 and published by the Historical Society of Georgia
in 1848, remains a standard. His journal and other manuscripts
are in possession of the same society, while a manuscript Cherokee
vocabulary is in possession of the American Philosophical Society
in Philadelphia. Authorities: Hawkins's manuscripts, with Georgia
Historical Society; Indian Treaties, 1837; American State Papers:
Indian Affairs, I, 1832; II, 1834; Gatschet, Creek Migration Legend;
Appleton, Cyclopædia of American Biography.
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