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Mention has already been made in discussing the terms of the treaty of September 22, 1816, of the complications arising out of the question of disputed boundaries between the Cherokees, Creeks, Choctaws, and Chickasaws. These disputes related chiefly to an adjustment of boundaries within the Territory of Alabama, rendered necessary for the definite ascertainment of the limits of the Creek cession of 1814. But as a result of the Cherokee cession of 1817 and the Creek cessions of 1818, 1821, 1826, and 1827, the true boundary between the territories of these two latter nations became not only a matter of dispute, but one that for years lent additional bitterness to the contest between the people of Georgia and the Indians, especially the Cherokees. Prior to the Revolution, the latter had claimed to own the territory within the limits of Georgia, as far south as the waters of Broad River, and extending from the headwaters of that river westward. Some of this territory was also claimed by the Creeks, and the British Government had therefore in purchasing it accepted a cession from those tribes jointly.374

At the beginning of the Federal relations with the Cherokees, a definition of their boundaries had been made by treaty of November 28, 1785, extending on the south as far west as the headwaters of the Appalachee River. Beyond that point to the west no declaration as to the limits of the Cherokee territory was made, because, for the purposes of the Federal Government, none was at that time necessary. But when in course of time other cessions came to be made, both by the Cherokees and Creeks, it began to be essential to have an exact definition of the line of limits between them. Especially was this the case when, as by the terms of the Creek treaty of February 12, 1825,375 they ceded all the territory to which they laid claim within the limits of Georgia, and although this treaty was afterwards declared void by the United States, because of alleged fraud, Georgia always maintained the propriety and validity of its negotiation.

As early as June 10, 1802, a delegation of Cherokees interviewed Colonel Hawkins and General Pickens, and after demanding the removal of certain settlers claimed to be on their lands, asserted the boundary of their nation in the direction of the Creeks to be the path running from Colonel Easley's, at High Shoals of the Appalachee, to Etowah River. This they had agreed upon in council with the Creeks. A delegation of the Creeks, whom they brought with them from the council, were then interrogated on the subject by Messrs. Hawkins and Pickens, and they replied that the statement of the Cherokees was correct.

In the spring of 1814 (May 15) Agent Meigs had written the Secretary of War that the Cherokees were sensible that the Creeks ought to cede to the United States sufficient land to fully compensate the latter for the expenses incurred in prosecuting the Creek war. However, they (the Cherokees) were incidentally interested in the arrangements, and hoped that the United States would not permit the Creeks to point out the specific boundaries of their cession until the division line between the two nations had been definitely determined. In the following year, in a discussion of the subject with Colonel Hawkins, the Creek agent, Colonel Meigs declares that the Cherokees repel the idea entertained by the Creeks that the Cherokee or Tennessee River was ever their southern boundary. On the contrary, the dividing line between the territories of the two nations should begin at Vann's Old Store, on the Ocmulgee River, thence pursuing such a course as would strike the Coosa River below the Ten Islands. This claim was predicated upon the assertion that the Cherokees had in the course of three successive wars with the Creeks driven them more than a degree of latitude below the point last named. Another Cherokee version was to the effect that at a joint council of the two nations, held prior to the Revolutionary War, the boundary question was a subject of discussion, when it was agreed to allow the oldest man in the Creek Nation to determine the point. This man was James McQueen, a soldier who had deserted from Oglethorpe's command soon after the settlement of Savannah. McQueen decided that the boundary should be a line drawn across the headwaters of Hatchet and Elk Creeks, the former being a branch of the Coosa and the latter a tributary of the Tallapoosa. This decision was predicated upon the fact that the Cherokees had driven the Creeks below this line, and it had been mutually agreed that it should constitute the boundary.

In contradiction of this it was asserted by the Creeks that in the year 1818 it had been admitted at a public meeting of the Creeks by "Sour Mush," a Cherokee chief, that the Creeks owned all the land up to the head of Coosa River, including all of its waters; that the Tennessee was the Cherokee River, and the territories of the two nations joined on the dividing ridge between those rivers. In former times, on the Chattahoochee, the Cherokees had claimed the country as low down as a branch of that river called Choky (Soquee) River. Subsequently they were told by the Coweta king, that they might live as low down as the Currahee Mountain, but that their young men had now extended their claim to Hog Mountain, without however any shadow of right or authority.376

With a view to an amicable adjustment of their respective rights a council was held between the chiefs and headmen of the two nations at the residence of General William McIntosh, in the Creek country, at which a treaty was concluded between themselves on the 11th of December, 1820. In the first article of this treaty the boundary line between the two nations was fixed as running from the Buzzard's Roost, on the Chattahoochee, in a direct line to the Coosa River, at a point opposite the mouth of Wills Town Creek, and thence down the Coosa River to a point opposite Fort Strother. This boundary was reaffirmed by them in a subsequent treaty concluded October 30, 1822.377

The Cherokee treaty of 1817 had assumed to cede a tract of country "Beginning at the high shoals of the Appalachy River and running thence along the boundary line between the Creek and Cherokee Nations westwardly to the Chatahouchy River," etc.

The Creek treaty of 1818378 in turn ceded a tract the northern boundary of which extended from Suwanee Old Town, on the Chattahoochee, to the head of Appalachee River, and which overlapped a considerable portion of the Cherokee cession of 1817.

The Creek treaty of 1821379 ceded a tract running as far north as the Shallow Ford of the Chattahoochee, which also included a portion of the territory within the limits of the Cherokee domain, as claimed by the latter.

By the treaty of 1825380 with the Creeks they ceded all their remaining territory in Georgia. Complaint being made that this treaty had been entered into by only a small non-representative faction of that nation, an investigation was entered upon by the United States authorities, and as the result it was determined to declare the treaty void and to negotiate a new treaty with them, which was done on the 24th of January, 1826.381

By this last treaty as amended the Creeks ceded all their land east of the Chattahoochee River, as well as a tract north and west of that river. In the cession of this latter tract it was assumed that a point on Chattahoochee River known as the Buzzard's Roost was the northern limit of the Creek supremacy.

The authorities of Georgia strongly insisted that not only had the treaty of 1825 been legitimately concluded, whereby they were entitled to come into possession of all the Creek domain within her limits, but also that the true line of the Creek limits toward the north had been much higher up than would seem to have been the understanding of the parties to the treaty of 1826.

In the following year the Creeks ceded all remaining territory they might have within the limits of Georgia.382 This left the only question to be decided between the State of Georgia and the Cherokees the one of just boundaries between the latter and the country recently acquired from the Creeks.

The War Department had been of the impression that the proper boundary between the two nations was a line to be run directly from the High Shoals of the Appalachee to the Ten Islands, or Turkeytown, on the Coosa River.383 On this hypothesis Agent Mitchell, of the Creeks, had been instructed, if he could do so, "without exciting their sensibilities," to establish it as the northern line of the Creek Nation.

Georgia, on the contrary, claimed that the proper boundary extended from Suwanee Old Town, on the Chattahoochee, to Sixes Old Town, on the Etowah River; from thence to the junction of the Etowah and Oostanaula Rivers, and following the Creek path from that point to Tennessee River. In pursuance of this claim Governor Forsyth instructed384 Mr. Samuel A. Wales as the surveyor for that State to proceed to establish the line of limits in accordance therewith. Mr. Wales, upon commencing operations, was met with a protest from Colonel Montgomery, the Cherokee agent,385 notwithstanding which he continued his operations in conformity with his original instructions.

This action of the surveyor having produced a feeling of great excitement and hostility within the Cherokee Nation, rendering the danger of collision and bloodshed imminent, the United States authorities took the matter in hand, and, by direction of the President, General John Coffee was appointed and instructed386 to proceed to the Cherokee Nation, and from the most reliable information and testimony attainable to report what, in his judgment, should in justice and fairness to all parties concerned be declared to be the true line of limits between Georgia, as the successor of the Creeks, and the Cherokee Nation.

General Coffee proceeded to the performance of the duty thus assigned him. A large mass of testimony and tradition on the subject was evoked, in summing up which General Coffee reported387 to the Secretary of War that the line of demarkation between the two nations should begin at the lower Shallow Ford of the Chattahoochee, which was about 15 miles below the Suwanee Old Town. From thence the line should run westwardly in a direction to strike the ridge dividing the waters running into Little River (a branch of the Hightower or Etowah) from those running into Sweet Water Creek (a branch of the Chattahoochee emptying about 2 miles below Buzzard's Roost). From this point such ridge should be followed westwardly, leaving all the waters falling into Hightower and Coosa Rivers to the right and all the waters that run southwardly into Chattahoochee and Tallapoosa Rivers to the left, until such ridge should intersect the line (which had been previously as per agreement of 1821 between the Creeks and Cherokees themselves) run and marked from Buzzard Roost to Wills Creek, and thence with this line to the Coosa River opposite the mouth of Wills Creek.

Two weeks later388 General Coffee, in a communication to the Secretary of War, alludes to the dissatisfaction of Georgia with the line as determined by him, and her claim to an additional tract of territory by remarking that "I have thought it right to give this statement for your own and the eye of the President only, that you may the better appreciate the character of the active agents and partisans of the Georgia claim, for really I cannot see any reasonable or plausible evidence on which she rests her claim."

The President, after a careful examination of the testimony and much solicitude upon the subject, decided to approve General Coffee's recommendation. The Cherokee agent was therefore directed389 to notify all white settlers living north of Coffee's line to remove at once. The governor of Georgia was also notified of the President's decision, and, though strongly and persistently protesting against it, the President firmly refused to revoke his action.390 The Cherokees were equally dissatisfied with the decision, because the line was not fixed as far south as Buzzard's Roost, in accordance with the agreement of 1821 between themselves and the Creeks.391