Page:Archæologia Americana—volume 2, 1836.djvu/121

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SECT. III.] SOUTHERN INDIANS EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI. 85 advanced within fifty miles of Charleston, but were finally re- pulsed ; and Governor Craven, with almost all the militia, marched against the Yamassees and their southern confederates, defeated ihem in a bloody engagement, and drove them across the Savannah out of the province. They were vell received by the Spaniards, and still committed hostilities on the frontiers. The warfare continued several years in that quarter. Peace was restored by Governor Nicholson ; and that which lie made with the adjacent small tribes northeast of Charleston, of which no subsequent notice is taken, does not appear to have been ever after disturbed.* It may be that the small tribe called Yamacraw, which the first settlers of Georgia found near the site of Savannah, was a remnant of the Yamassees. Of the small tribes northeast of Charleston, both in South and North Carolina, we know hardly any thing but their names. Lawson, who, in 1700-1, travelled from Charleston to the set- tlement at the mouth of Taw River on Pamlico sound, left the seashore at the mouth of the Santee, and proceeded north- wardly to the hilly country, and thence eastwardly to Pamlico or Pamlicough. He mentions the Sewees, Santees, Wyniaws, Congarees, Waterees, and Waxsaws, as very small tribes, resid- ing principally on the waters of the Santee. He left on his right the Cheraws and Cape Fear Indians, whom he does not mention. In his progress northwardly he came to an Esaw town, which appears to have been situated on the Pedee. The Esaws were the only powerful nation till he came to the Tuscaroras. They amounted to several thousands, and within twenty miles of their town Lawson found that of the Kacla- paws, in which we recognise the name of Catawbas. As no further mention is made of the Esaws, and no other populous nation is ever after alluded to in that quarter but the Catawbas, there cannot, it seems, be any doubt of their identity with the Esaws of Lawson, who probably mistook a local for the gen- eric name of the nation. Between them and the Tusca- roras of the river Neuse, he places the Saponas on a branch of Cape Fear River,f and in their vicinity the Toteros and

  • Nicholson became Governor in 1721. He is said by He watt to have

treated with the Creeks and Cherokees. The permanent peace with the small tribes is inferred from the silence of He watt and Ramsay. f Or rather of the Great Pedee, which he does not mention, and some branches of which he evidently mistook for tributary streams of Cape Fear River.