90 An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States
transport. He wrote: "War will cost the United States much money,
and some lives, but it will destroy the existence of your people, as a
nation, forever." The remaining Chickamauga villages agreed to al
low the settlers to remain in Cherokee country.
In squatter settlements, ruthless leaders like Sevier were not the
exception but the rule. Once they had full control and got what they
wanted, they made their peace with the federal government, which
in turn depended on their actions to expand the republic's territory.
Sevier went on to serve as a US representative from North Carolina
and as governor of Tennessee. To this day, such men are idolized
as great heroes, embodying the essence of the "American spirit." A
bronze statue of John Sevier in his ranger uniform stands today in
the National Statuary Hall of the US Capitol.^20MUSKOGEE RESISTANCE
The Muskogee Nation officially had remained neutral in the war be
tween the Anglo-American settlers and the British monarchy. None
theless, many individual Muskogees had taken the opportunity to
raid and harass squatters within their national territories in Georgia,
Tennessee, and South Carolina. When the United States was formed,
the Muskogee Nation turned to Spanish Florida for an alliance in
trying to stop the flow of squatters into their territory. Spain had an
interest in the alliance as a buffer to its holdings, which at the time in
cluded the lower Mississippi and the city of New Orleans. The squat
ters believed that the Muskogees and the Spanish officials, as well as
the British, were in cahoots to keep them out of western Georgia and
present-day Alabama and considered the Muskogee Nation to be the
main barrier to their permanent settlement in the region, particu
larly Georgia. The Muskogees called the squatters ecunnaunuxulgee
-"people greedily grasping after the lands of the red people."
The federal government negotiated with the Muskogee Nation
for a new boundary and for more settlements and trade, in ex
change for $60,000 a year in goods. The squatters did everything
they could to provoke the Muskogees to war, while ignoring the
treaty's provisions. They slaughtered hundreds of deer in the Mus-