Tennessee History

Tennessee History - Outline

Carole Bucy, Volunteer State Community College

I. Course introduction - Why do we need Tennessee history?

different ways to look at history

The Geography of Tennessee and Its Impact on History

I. Boundaries of Tennessee

II. Geological history of the state

III. Rivers

A. Tennessee

1. Holston - Virginia

a. South Fork

b. Watauga

2. French Broad - North Carolina

a. Nolichucky

b. Pigeon

3. Clinch

4. Hiwassee

5. the Muscle Shoals

B. Cumberland River - Kentucky source

1. Obey

2. the Caney Fork

3. the Stone River

4. the Harpeth River

5. the Yellow River

C. Mississippi River

Forked Deer

IV. Topographical (the earth’s surface) regions of Tennessee

A. Central Basin

1. Geographic center of Tennessee

2. Limestone

B. Highland Rim

1. Iron mining, smelting

2. Ridgetop

3. Old Stone Fort

4. Cumberland Caverns

C. Western Valley of the Tennessee River

D. Plateau Slope of West Tennessee

1. Chickasaw Bluffs

2. Cotton

E. Cumberland Plateau

Cumberland Gap

F. East Tennessee’s Great Valley

Knoxville

G. Flood Plain of the Mississippi River

1. New Madrid earthquake

2. Reelfoot Lake

3. Chickasaw Bluffs

H. Unaka Range of the Appalachians

1. Stone

2. Unakas

3. Bald

4. Great Smokies

a. Clingman’s Dome - 6643’

b. Mount Guyot - 6621’

c. Mt. LeConte - 6493’

5. Unicoi

IV. Natural Resources of Tennessee

V. Location of Tennessee cities

The First Tennesseans - Native Americans

I. Prehistoric Indians

A. Ice Age - Nomadic Hunters of the Ice Age

1. Highland Rim area - fluted spearpoints & stone tools

2. Destruction of vegetation - led to extinction of mammoths

B. Archaic Era - secnd immigration to New World

Mesolithic - Middle Stone Age

1. Eva Group - Benton County

2. Big Sandy phase

3. no flint until late in the Archaic Period

C. Woodland Indians - 1000 BC to 500 BC

1. life based on agriculture

2. domestication of plants and animals

a. cultivated corn

b. lived in circular huts

c. Indian mounds

d. transition from hunters & gatherers to well-organized

tribal, agricultural societies; lived in towns

C. Burial Mound Builders

Mississippi Period - 900 - 1600 A. D.

1. Solicitude for the dead

2. Preparation for life after after death

3. growing role of chieftains

4. West Tennessee along river

5. Two large language families

a. Caddoan

b. Muskhogean

6. Harpeth River site - H. L. Gordon farm in Brentwood

D. Historic Indians

1. Muskhogean language group

a. Creeks

b. Chickasaw

2. Caddoan

a. Shawnee

b. Yuchi - “faraway people”

c. Cherokee - “Principal People

3. First Europeans come into Tennessee

a. 1540 Hernando DeSoto

b. Jesuits

III. Life among the Cherokees at the time of the European exploration

A. Tribal organization

1.. towns

2. matrilineal and matrilocal

B. Attakullahkullah to England - 1730

C. Battle of Taliwa - 1755

1. Cherokees and Creeks

2. Nancy Ward

IV. Early Relationships with the Europeans

A. Building of Fort Loudon - 1756-57

B. French and Indian War

European Settlement of Tennessee

I. French and Spanish traders

Timothy DeMonbreum - 1760

II. English in the New World

A. Virginia Cavaliers

B. the Scots-Irish

1. Religion of the Scots-Irish

a. Test Act of 1703

b. Presbyterians

2. Indentured servants

a. Pennsylvania - 1717

b. North Carolina - 1740-1756

C. Dr. Thomas Walker - 1750 - the Cumberland Gap

III. French and Indian War - The “Great War for Empire”

A. Fall of Fort Loudon

B. Proclamation of 1763

IV. Settlers begin to cross Appalachians

A. The Long Hunters

1. Daniel Boone - first map - 1769 - Tennessee & Cumberland rivers

B. William and Lydia Bean - from Pittsylvania Co., Virginia

1. Holston River

2. Squatters

3. visit of James Robertson - 1770

C. Regulators - Alamance Courthouse - May 16, 1771

D. Articles of Friendship - 1772

1. Robertson and Bean

2. Lease of Land

E. Written Articles of Association - May, 1772

1. Five magistrates

2. Land speculators

Richard Henderson

1. Daniel Boone

2. to purchase land for English colony

V. Treaty of Sycamore Shoals - 1775

A. Dragging Canoe

B. Colony of Transylvania - 4 settlements

1. Proprietary colony

2. Constitutional Convention - 1775

a. no property requirement to vote

b. no religious test

VI. Early settlers come to Middle Tennessee

A. Kaspar Mansker - 1770

B. Isaac Bledsoe

C. Thomas Sharp “Big Foot” Spencer”

VII. Petition of Watauga - 1776

Document

Petition of 1776

The American Revolution in Tennessee

I. Tennessee at the time of the American Revolution

A. Response to Continental Congress

B. Concerns - Indians

C. Robertson & Cocke “tar and feather” a British captain

D. Appointment of Committee of Safety

1. Organization of militia

2. Robertson and Carter

E. the Washington District

F. Conditions in Virginia and North Carolina

1. Petition

2. Fincastle Revolutionary Committee

II. Cherokee War of 1776

A. Cherokees join loyalists

Henry Stuart meets with Dragging Canoe

B. Wataugans offered land in West Florida

C. Battle of Island Flats - July 21, 1776

1. Nancy Ward

2. Old Abram

3. Anne Robertson Johnson; Kate Sevier

4. Dragging Canoe - Chickamaugans

III. New Relationship with North Carolina

A. Delegates to Constitutional Convention - John Carter, John Sevier, Charles Robertson, John Haile, Jacob Womack

B. Washington District

IV. the Great Leap Westward - the Settlement of Middle Tennessee

A. James Robertson

1. Relationship with Henderson

2. Plans for settlement

B. The Journey - Donelson

C. The Cumberland Compact

D. Attack on Buchanan’s Station

V. Rendezvous at Sycamore Shoals” September 25, 1780

A. John Sevier and Isaac Shelby

A. Major Patrick Ferguson to North Carolina

B. Battle of Kings Mountain

The State of Franklin

I. John Sevier - “Nolichucky Jack”

II. Sevier’s raids against Cherokee

III. Situation in west of the Appalachians at the end of the American Revolution

A. Sullivan County - 1779

B. Greene County

IV. Relations with North Carolina

A. Needs of settlers

B. Land Grants for vterans

C. Governor Alex Martin

ordered squatters off Indian land in 1782

D. No superior court across the mountains

V. Confederation Congress’s western land policy

North Carolina’s Act of Cession - June, 1784

VI. Wataugans - 3 meetings in 1784

A. to form a “separate and distinct state, independent of North Carolina”

B. Declaration of Independence

C. North Carolina repeals Act of Cession - November 20, 1784

1. new judicial district - David Campbell - judge

2. military district - Sevier - brigadier general

3. William Cocke - convinces Sevier to support separation

D. Decision to form separate state - December 14, 1784 - meeting

1. NC’s constitution implied consent to separation

2. NC had provoked Indians to hostile acts

3. Congressional resolutions

VII. State of Franklin

A. Jonesboro meeting - March 1785

1. Legislative assembly created

a. land titles

b. tax and money laws

c. admit new counties

d. treaties with Indians

e. Constitutional convention - August 1785

2. Sevier - governor

B. Constitutional Convention

1. state of Franklin

2. Greeneville - capital city of Franklin

C. Application for Statehood

1. Governor Martin - NC

2. Confederation Congress

a. Land Ordinance of 1785

b. Northwest Ordinance of 1787

D. End of the state of Franklin

1. Treaty of Hopewell

2. Establishment of White’s fort

3. Development of strong anti-Franklin Group in Washington Co.

August, 1786 - John Tipton

4. North Carolina to collect taxes

5. Negotiations with Spain

6. Sevier’s last days as governor - feud with Tipton

7. U. S. Constitution written; George Washington becomes President

The Southwest Territory Becomes the 16th State

I. Years after the Declaration of Independence in 13 colonies

II. North Carolina’s ratification of the U. S. Constitution - November, 1789

Second cession law

III. Creation of the “Territory of the United States South of the River Ohio”

A. terms of Northwest Ordinance

B. Kentucky

C. boundaries:

1. 36”30’

2. middle of the Mississippi River

3. 35”

4. Top of peaks of mountains

D. Major concerns:

1. Protection from Indians

2. massive debts from Revolution; sale of Western lands could retire debts if states ceded them quickly

3. NC did not want to be responsible for larger proportion of national debt

4. federal government’s need to control land won in War

E. Cumberland Settlements

1. 1786 - North Carolina subdivided Davidson County and created Sumner County

2. 1788 - Tennessee County

3. Mero District

4. Nashville meeting of Cumberland settlers - to petition NC to cede

August, 1789

F. William Blount

1. land speculator

2. territorial governor

3. arrival in Washington Co. October 23

a. meetings with leaders

b. Rocky Mount

G. Relations with Indians

1. Henry Knox - Secretary of War

2. Treaty of the Holston - - June, 1791

3. Nickajack expedition - 1794

H. Permanent Capitol - White’s Fort

I. Legislature elected when census was 35,691 - 1793

1. House of Representatives - 13 free men owning 50 acres

February 24, 1794

2. Council or Upper House

3. Dr. James White - delegate to Congress

V. Statehood for the Southwest Territory

A. Referendum

B. Statehood Convention - January 17, 1796 - Knoxville

1. Blount group - McNairy, Robertson, Jackson

2. Anti-Blounjt faction - fundamentalistic

C. New Constitution

1. Preamble

2. Legislative Authority - bicameral legislature

free males who owned at least 200 acres and had lived 3 or more years in state

3. Executive - Governor

a. 2 year term

b. limited to 3 consecutive terms

c. 25 years old, own at least 500 acres of land

4. Judicial - legislature to create courts

5. Declaration of Rights

6. Ratification

D. Congress in 1796

1. Federalists

2. Republicans

3. June 1, 1796

Early Days of Statehood

I. John Sevier as Governor

II. William Blount - U. S. Senator

1. land speculation

2. impeachment John Adams, President

3. death in 1800

III. Archibald Roane - election of 180

A. Rise of Andrew Jackson

1. Tennessee militia contest

a. Sevier

b. Jackson

c. Winchester

2. feud with Sevier

IV. Election of 1803

A. Sevier is elected Governor - 4th term

B. Louisiana Purchase

C. Jackson’s duel with Charles Dickinson

V. Willie Blount of Montgomery County

A. Capitol moved to Nashville

B. Earthquakes

The War of 1812 and Age of Jackson

I. Tennessee’s interest in expansion - Felix Grundy and the War Hawks

A. Tecumseh and the idea of Indian unification

B. Tennessee’s attitudes toward Indians

II. Jackson sent to Florida

III. General James Winchester to Canada

IV. Battle of Horseshoe Bend

1. Sam Houston

2. Davy Crockett

3. Red Sticks

4. William Weatherford

5. Fort Mims Massacre - August 1813

6. Call for Volunteers

7. Tallapoosa River

V. Treaty of Fort Jackson

VI. Battle of New Orleans - January 8, 1815

VII Jackson Purchase

VIII. McMinn administration - 1815-1821

A. Development of Banking

B. Depression of 1819

C. Emancipator

William Carroll, Sequoyah, the Trail of Tears

I. Sequoyah

A. Childhood - George Gist

B. War of 1812

C. Language - alphabet

D. Move to Arkansas

E. Lost Tribe of the Cherokees

II. William Carroll

A. Partisan Politics in Tennessee

1. John Overton

2. Senator John Williams

B. 1821 Election

1. Edward Ward

2. Jackson runs for Senate in 1823

III. Sam Houston

IV. Ann Rogers Grundy and the Sunday School Movement

V. Presidential Election of 1824

VI. Frances Wright

VII. Constitutional Convention of 1834

VIII. Trail of Tears

Rise of the Whigs; Two-party politics in Tennessee

I. Impact of Jackson’s Presidency on Tennessee

II. Opposition to Andrew Jackson

A. William Carter, John Williams, Newton Cannon, David Crockett

B. Commercial classes

C. John Bell -

Contest for Speaker of the House in 1834 with Polk

III. Panic of 1837

A. Bank and Improvement Act by the legislature

B. Turnpikes

C. Separate statehood movements

D. Quart Law

IV. Rise of James K. Polk

A. election of 1839

B. Whigs organize in Nashville

C. Election of 1841

1. James Chamberlain Jones

2. style of campaigns

3. issues - internal improvements

D. Election of U. S. Senators

1. Twelve Destructives

2. Immortal Thirteen

E. Election of 1843

F. Presidential Election fo 1844

V. Pemnanent location of Tennessee’s capitol

A. Nashville

B. William Strickland

C. Death of Andrew Jackson

Storm Clouds

I. Slavery in Tennessee

II. Memphis Convention of 1849

A. John C. Calhoun

B. Compromise of 1850

III. Nashville Convention - November 1850

Tennessee Resolutions

IV. Andrew Johnson Becomes Governor

V. Dred Scott decision

VI. end of the Whigs - Nativism in Tennessee

VII. Isham G. Harris becomes Governor

A. National Political Conventions of 1860

B. John Bell’s Constitutional Union Party

VIII. Election of Abraham Lincoln as President - 1860

A. Tennessee’s response to South Carolina’s secession

B. Role of John Bell

IX. Referendum to decide whether or not to hold a special session to deal with question of secession

A. state equally divided

B. Franklin Co. asks to be annexed to Alabama

X. Attack on Fort Sumter

A. Lincoln’s call for Troops

B. Governor Harris’s response - call for special session

C. “A Declaration of Independence....”

XI. June 8, 1861 referendum

A. Greeneville Convention

B. Senator Andrew Johnson’s response

The Civil War Years in Tennessee.

I. Recruitment of Army - Military Organization

A. Company

B. Regiment

C. Camps - Camp Trousdale in Sumner County

D. Provisional army of Tennessee

II. Lincoln’s strategy

Tennessee - the keystone of the Southern arch

1. railroads

2. rivers

III. Guerilla activity

A. William Blount Carter - bridge burning

B. Martial law imposed - Gen. Felix Zollicoffer to Knoxville

IV. Battle of Fishing Creek

V. Battle of Belmont

VI. Battles of Fort Henry and Fort Donelson

A. Ulysses S. Grant

B. location of the forts - plan of defense

C. Confederate surrender

D. Nathan Bedford Forrest

E. Surrender of Nashville

VII. Andrew Johnson as Military Governor - the Occupation of Nashville

VIII. Battle of Shiloh

A. General Albert Sidney Johnson

B. Ulysses G. Grant and William T. Sherman

C. Hornet’s Nest

IX. Fall of Memphis

X. Forrest’s Raids

Fort Pillow

XI. Battle of Stones River

A. General Bragg

B. General Rosecrans

XII. Battle of Chickamauga

A. General Braxton Bragg

B. Rock of Chickamauga

XIII. Battle of Chattanooga

XIV. Johnsonville

XV. Battle of Franklin

A. General John Bell Hood

B. battle strategy

XVI. Battle of Nashville

XVII. Champ Ferguson and Guerilla warfare

IX. End of the War

Andrew Johnson and Reconstruction

I. Assassination of Abraham Lincoln

A. Restoration of the Union

B. Reconstruction

II. Andrew Jackson becomes President

A. Ratification of the 14th amendment

B. Tennessee is restored to Union

C. Impeachment proceedings

III. William G. Brownlow as Reconstruction Governor

A. Unionists

1. Radicals

2. Conservatives

B. Ku Klux Klan

1. Nathan Bedford Forrest

C. Freedman’s Bureau

General Clinton Fisk

IV. Gubernatorial Election of 1869

1870-1896

I. Constitutional Convention of 1870

A. Redeemers

B. Bourbons

II. State Debt Issue

A. State Credit Wing

B. Repudiation of the debt

C. Low Tax Democrats

III. Populist Movement in Tennessee

Farmers Alliance

IV. Convict Lease System

V. Election of Alvin Hawkins

VI. Tennessee’s political factions

A. Bourbons

B. New South Group

C. small farmer elements

D. Republicans

VII. The “War of the Roses”

A. Robert Love Taylor

B. Alfred Taylor

The Gilded Age in Tennessee

I. Culture in Tennessee

II. Panic of 1893

III. Rise of the Railroads

IV. Centennial Exposition

V. Religion - Rise of the Church of Christ

The Era of Jim Crow in Tennessee

I. Plessy v. Ferguson - implications for Tennessee

II. Ida B. Wells

III. Mary Church Terrell

Progressives and Prohibition

I. Prohibition as a national issue

A. role of women

II. Edward Ward Carmack

A. Governor Patterson

B. Assassination

III. The Four Mile Law

World War I.

I. Alvin York

II. Tennessee’s industry supports the war

powder plant

role of women

III. Luke Lea's efforts to capture the Kaiser

Woman suffrage

I. Elizabeth Avery Meriwether - Memphis

II. Anne Dallas Dudley - Nashville - 1911

Catherine Kenny, Kate Burch Warner

III. Split among the Tennessee suffragists

IV. Sue Shelton White

V. Congress passes 19th amendment

A. Ratification process

B. Tennessee

1. Suffrage Organization

a. Catherine Kenny

b. Abby Milton

c. Frankie J. Pierce

2. Governor Albert Roberts

3. Special session called

4. August 9, 1920

a. Carrie Chapman Catt

b. Josephine Pearson

5. Battle in the Tennessee House

a. Opposition to suffrage

b. Seth Walker

C. Harry Burn

C. Election of 1920

Tensions and Transitions – The Twenties in Tennessee

I. The World Becomes Smaller – the Impact of the Automobile and the Radio

A. Memphis-to-Bristol Highway – 1911

B. WSM Radio – the Era of Traveling Salesmen

II. Clarence Saunders Decides to Change His Store

III. Austin Peay as Governor

A. Reorganization Act

B. Reelfoot Lake

C. Opposition to Peay

1. Stahlman and Howse

2. Edward Crump

IV. Butler Bill

V. The Scopes Trial

A. Dayton, Tennessee in 1925

B. Who was John T. Scopes

C. William Jennings Bryan

D. Clarence Darrow

E. Dayton, Tennessee

VI. Caldwell and Company

A.. Luke Lea

B. Governor Henry Horton

1. Failure of Tennessee banks

2. Impeachment

The Depression and the New Deal

I. Conditions of Tennessee farmers

II. Closing of Tennessee Banks

III. Election of Franklin D. Roosevelt

IV. the New Deal

A. Civilian Conservation Corps

B. Agricultural Adjustment Act

C. Works Progress Administration

D. State Welfare Commission

E. Tennessee Valley Authority

1. George W. Norris

2. damns on Tennessee River

3. opposition

F. Rural Electrification Administration

G. Tennessee Congressmen and the New Deal

1. Joseph Willington Byrns

a. majority leader

b. Speaker of the House of Representatives

2. Edward H. Crump

V. Highlander Folk School

A. Organized Labor

B. Myles Horton

VI. Gordon Browning

VII. General Neyland and the Tennessee Vols

The Crump Years.

I. The Crump Political Machine.

II. Prentice Cooper

III. World War II.

A. Anderson County project

1. Oak Ridge

2. Atomic Energy Commission

B. Cordell Hull

C. Cornelia Fort

IV. Jim McCord

V. Rise of Estes Kefauver.

Clement-Ellington Years.

I. Post World War II growth in Tennessee

II. Frank Clement

III. Buford Ellington

IV. Brown v. Board of Education

A. Response of Tennessee Congressmen

B. Kelley v. Board of Education

C. Nashville Plan

D. Bombing of Hattie Cotton School

V. Clinton High School

VI. Haywood and Fayette Counties

VII. Sit-In movement

A. Kelly Miller Smith, James Lawson, Diane Nash

B. Response of the Nashville African-American Community

C. Response of the Nashville White Community

D. Ben West

VIII. Integration of the University of Tennessee

IX. Baker v. Carr

X. Creation of Metropolitan Government for Nashville-Davidson County

XI. U. S. Senate Elections - 1964, 1966

A. Ross Bass

B. Howard Baker

XI. Assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

A. Memphis, Tennessee

B. Curfew in Nashville

Modern Day Tennessee Politics.

I. Modern two-party system in Tennessee

II. Election of Winfield Dunn

A. Republican party

B. John Jay Hooker

III. Ray Blanton

IV. Lamar Alexander

A. Defeat of the ERA

V. Albert Gore, Jr.

VI. New McWherter

VII. Don Sundquist

VIII. Tennessee Today

IX. Importance of Tennessee History Today