Places: Bledsoe's Station, Castalian Springs, Tennessee

One of the main reasons Natives opposed White settlement on their land was the destruction of hunting range.  Both sides knew prime land when the saw it and while settlers wanted to put the land under cultivation as soon as possible, the Natives knew they had to protect an area where game was known to be plentiful.  Such was the dilemma of the land on which Isaac Bledsoe (1735-1793) built his fortified home in the 1780's.

Bledsoe was a longhunter, a colleague of Daniel Boone.  Like Boone, he saw the potential for development in the Cumberland River Valley and decided to capitalize on the growing number of settlers in the region.  Unfortunately, the land he claimed as his own belonged to someone else, the Chickamauga Cherokee, who weren't going to let it go without a fight.  Bledsoe chose a sight between two creeks that would come to bear is family name.  His brothers were also early pioneers to the area.  Bledsoe Lick Creek was especially important, as it was near a salt lick, where animals would come to get water and lick the rocks seeking mineral intake.  Native hunters had known about this area for centuries and there are mounds in the area, suggesting how long they had used this hunting range.  Because of the site's proximity to the Cumberland River, Bledsoe's home became a popular stopping off point for settlers traveling into the area.  They could tap his knowledge of the surrounding conditions, get water, allow any livestock or burden animals to graze, and trade.  Soon, Isaac Bledsoe was prosperous enough to fortify the area around his home, making it a potential gathering point in the event of an attack. 

He would not have long to wait, on October 1, 1792, a combine war party of Chickamauga Cherokee and Shawnee including Cheeseekau (Chiksika), the older brother of Tecumseh, swept down on Bledsoe's Station during the day, when most of the men would be outside tending the fields and watching over grazing animals.  A sharp skirmish ensued, during which Cheeseekau was mortally wounded and Isaac Bledsoe received a gunshot wound in the thigh.  The men were able to regroup in the stockade and drive off the attackers with loss to both sides, but the Natives were not about to give up.  Another fortification nearby, Ziegler's Fort was overrun and Morgan's Station was burned to the ground.  Several Bledsoe relatives lost their lives, including two of Isaac's nephews would be killed in an ambush near what is now Hendersonville.  Bledsoe himself would be killed in 1793, caught while outside the fort tending to his fields.  Not until the Treaty of Tellico Blockhouse in 1974 would hostilities end, for the time being.

Bledsoe's Fort itself has long since fallen down and the timber either burned or repurposed over the years.  Archaeological digs have uncovered the outline of the Fort, which is now a state park.  Several other buildings from the area also occupy the site, giving an idea f what frontier life in those times would have been like.  An artist's rendering of Bledsoe's Station, based on the archaeological evidence, is below.

Great Warrior: Cheeseekau of the Shawnee

If one of the defining traits of character is the impact left on others, today's Great Warrior was a man among men.  A leader and warrior in his own right, sometimes ranked with Native commanders such as Dragging Canoe and Blue, the son of a noted Shawnee chief and warrior and mentor to two famous younger brothers who were a credit to him in every way. 

Cheeseekau (c 1760-1792) was born to Pukeshinwa and Methoataske along the Tallapoosa River in what is now Alabama.  HIs name is sometimes given as Chiksika, but the spelling on a commemorative coin issued by the Shawnee Nation gives it as Cheeseekau and also accords him the title of chief, so we'll use those identifiers here.  Pukeshinwa was the chief of the Kispoko, a division of the Shawnee and a skilled warrior in his own right.  Some have speculated that Methoataske was Creek, perhaps because the family initially lived in Alabama before returning to Ohio after Cheeseekau was born.  However, the Shawnee ranged far and wide throughout the frontier, so their location is no definite proof.  Pukeshinwa and Methoataske had several children.  The older ones, Cheeseekau and Tecumpease were born several years ahead of their younger brothers, as they wee already adults when Pukeshinwa was killed at the Battle of Point Pleasant in Lord Dunmore's War in 1774.  Methatoaske left the family and went back to Alabama, living for several years with the Creek.  This left Cheeseekau and Tecumpease to raise Tecumseh, at least two other younger brothers and Tenskwatawa (Lalekawitha), who was a baby and the sole survivor of a set of triplets.

Descent among the Shawnee was reckoned through the male line, meaning that Cheeseekau, who was still a young man, succeeded his father as chief of the Kispoko Division.  He led his people as far as Missouri, seeking to keep a distance between himself and White settlers, but it was not to be.  If the Shawnee wanted to live in freedom and peace on their own land, they would have to fight for it nonstop.  H

e allied himself and his people with Dragging Canoe's Chickamauga Cherokee.  Cheeseekau would learn a great deal from the older man, and from older colleagues among the Shawnee such as Blue Jacket.  There was plenty of work for a young warrior and war leader during the Cherokee-American war (1776-1795) and Cheeseekau had a younger brother who was bright and eager to learn.  Tecumseh began riding with his brother's war parties when he was a young teenager.  He was in his mid-twenties when tragedy struck.  Cheeseekau was killed during the Battle of Bledsoe's Station, near present-day Nashville, TN on October 1, 1792.  Tecumseh would pick up his people's struggle against White encroachment on their land where his father and brother had left off.