John Carter of Watauga: A Forgotten Founder of the American Frontier
In his video presentation "John Carter - Watauga: The Forgotten History," Joe W. Carter, a descendant of Colonel John Carter, a member of the Kings Mountain Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution, and author of the book "The Carters of Watauga: A Tennessee History from the First Settlers to the Civil War," tells the story of a man whose life became intertwined with some of the most important events on the southern frontier before and during the American Revolution.
John Carter was a pioneer, merchant, military officer, legislator, landowner, and political leader. More importantly, he helped establish and lead the remarkable community on the Watauga River that governed itself years before American independence was declared. Carter was a self-made man who rose from humble beginnings to become one of the most influential leaders of the early Tennessee frontier. Yet today, his accomplishments are largely forgotten.
Searching for John Carter's Origins
Around 1780, John Carter built what is now known as the Carter Mansion near present-day Elizabethton, Tennessee. The house remains one of the oldest and most historically significant homes in the state. Unfortunately, a fire during the 1820s, when Carter's grandson George Washington Carter occupied the home, reportedly destroyed many of the family's early records. Without those documents, later generations were left uncertain about John Carter's origins.
Because of his prominence and accomplishments, descendants eventually assumed that he was connected to the wealthy and influential Carter family of eastern Virginia associated with Robert "King" Carter. No documentary evidence, however, was found to establish that relationship. During the 1870s, John Carter's great-grandson Samuel P. Carter, who achieved the unusual distinction of attaining the rank of Rear Admiral in the United States Navy and brevet Major General in the United States Army, commissioned an extensive genealogical investigation. Researchers examined more than 4,000 members of various Carter families but were unable to connect John Carter of Watauga with any of them.
Modern Y-DNA research has provided an intriguing new answer. DNA testing of descendants through John Carter's sons Landon and John revealed a distinctive paternal line matching another Carter family from Maine. That family had a son named John who was born at approximately the same time as the Watauga pioneer but disappears from the Maine records after about age fifteen. Conversely, records concerning John Carter of Watauga reveal little about his life before young adulthood. Taken together, the matching Y-DNA and complementary gaps in the historical records provide compelling evidence that the young John Carter who disappeared from Maine and the John Carter who later appeared on the southern frontier were the same man.
A Young Man Goes West
According to this reconstruction of his early life, John Carter was the eldest son of John and Hannah Carter and was expected to inherit the family's successful blacksmithing business. Instead, he rejected the secure future that had been prepared for him and left the business to a younger brother. Following the deaths of his parents in 1754, the approximately fifteen-year-old Carter left New England and traveled south and west.
He eventually followed the Great Wagon Road into Virginia. By 1759, he was living near present-day Lexington, Virginia, where he became acquainted with Captain Isaac Nathaniel Taylor and his family. Carter married Taylor's daughter Elizabeth, and in 1760 their son Landon Carter was born. Elizabeth apparently died as a result of childbirth. Landon Carter would later become an important political figure in his own right and play a major role in the establishment of Tennessee. John Carter spent roughly a decade in Virginia developing the relationships, experience, and resources that would eventually allow him to pursue opportunities farther west.
The Road to the Tennessee Frontier
One event during this period fundamentally changed the future of the region. In 1760, Virginia forces under Colonel William Byrd moved southwest during the Anglo-Cherokee War in an effort to reach Fort Loudoun, near present-day Knoxville. As the troops advanced through the wilderness, they improved a route that could carry men, wagons, and supplies. By November, the expedition had reached the Long Island of the Holston, in present-day Kingsport.
The Long Island was an important Cherokee gathering place and a major crossroads along the Great Indian Warpath. Fort Robinson was constructed nearby, and the improved road effectively created a transportation corridor between the established colonies and the western country. For pioneers such as John Carter, that route opened a gateway into what would become Tennessee and Kentucky.
Defying the King's Proclamation
In 1763, King George III issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763, attempting to prohibit colonial settlement west of the Appalachian Mountains. Men such as John Carter went west anyway. By about 1769, Carter and his business partner William Parker established a trading post near the Long Island of the Holston in the area that became known as Carter's Valley.
Their enterprise challenged British regulations governing trade with Native Americans. British officials objected because Indian commerce was supposed to take place through authorized traders and designated locations. Even Cherokee leaders were reportedly encouraged to discourage trade at Carter and Parker's establishment. Nevertheless, the business flourished. The Virginia Gazette reported on the growing trade and the increasing number of settlers traveling west and using the river system. A boatyard was eventually established in the area, contributing to the development of the settlement that became Kingsport.
The trading post was eventually attacked and burned by Shawnee warriors. Parker returned east, but Carter remained committed to the western country and moved his family to the Watauga Old Fields, near the junction of the Watauga and Doe rivers. There, John Carter's life entered its most historically significant period.
The Watauga Association
The settlers of the Watauga Valley occupied land beyond the boundaries recognized by the British government. When colonial officials ordered them to leave, they refused and instead organized themselves. In 1772, the Watauga settlers established what became known as the Watauga Association, adopting written articles for their government and selecting thirteen commissioners. Five served as a court, and John Carter was elected chairman.
In practical terms, Carter had become the principal civil leader of one of the earliest self-governing communities established by American-born settlers beyond the authority of the colonial governments. The establishment of the Watauga Association became one of the most important and often overlooked episodes in the early political history of the American frontier. These settlers were not rejecting government. They understood that without law, courts, and a mechanism for resolving disputes, their community could descend into disorder. Their response was to create their own representative government.
British officials took notice. Virginia Governor Lord Dunmore warned officials in London that the Watauga settlement was effectively functioning as an independent government. Its example was potentially dangerous to British authority. If one group of settlers could establish a government independent of royal authority, others might do the same. Years later, Theodore Roosevelt praised the frontier settlers in The Winning of the West, emphasizing the significance of their decision to establish a written system of government for themselves.
The Battle of Point Pleasant
John Carter's story soon became connected with another major event on the western frontier. Tensions between settlers and Native American nations intensified during 1774 in what became known as Dunmore's War. Virginia organized military forces for a campaign against a confederation of Native warriors, particularly the Shawnee. Frontier settlers from the Watauga, Holston, and surrounding regions joined the campaign.
On October 10, 1774, Virginia forces commanded by General Andrew Lewis fought Shawnee warriors under Chief Cornstalk at the Battle of Point Pleasant, where the Kanawha River enters the Ohio River. The fighting was exceptionally fierce. Men frequently fought from behind trees and rocks at extremely close range, sometimes resorting to hand-to-hand combat. The Virginia force suffered heavy casualties but ultimately held the field, and John Carter was among the western frontiersmen who participated.
The Battle of Point Pleasant has sometimes been presented as the opening military confrontation of the American Revolution. Theodore Roosevelt advanced a similar interpretation and regarded Dunmore's War as an opening act in the larger struggle that ultimately ended at Yorktown. Whether viewed as the final great frontier conflict before the Revolution or as its opening engagement, Point Pleasant brought together many men who would soon become prominent Patriot officers, including leaders later associated with the Battle of Kings Mountain.
The Treaty of Sycamore Shoals
Only months later, hundreds of settlers and Cherokee gathered at Watauga for negotiations that culminated in the Treaty of Sycamore Shoals in March 1775. Among the transactions negotiated there were the famous Transylvania Purchase and several other land agreements, and John Carter was deeply involved.
He and Robert Lucas or Lewis, as identified in various accounts, participated in the purchase known as the Path Deed. Carter reportedly used debts owed from his earlier trading operation as part of the transaction. The negotiations exposed growing divisions within the Cherokee Nation. Leaders favoring accommodation sought continued diplomacy with settlers, while Dragging Canoe and others vehemently opposed further land cessions and warned that continued settlement would bring war. That warning soon proved accurate.
Watauga Faces War
By 1776, Watauga's settlers knew an attack was likely. The community constructed and strengthened Fort Caswell, named for North Carolina leader Richard Caswell. Arms and ammunition were obtained wherever possible, and the settlers prepared to defend themselves.
On July 3, 1776, John Carter presided over a convention in which Watauga's settlers agreed to petition North Carolina for annexation. The petition was remarkable. More than a hundred frontier settlers signed it, representing people whose origins stretched across the American colonies and Europe. The following day, on July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence.
Events moved quickly. Cherokee allies friendly to the settlers, particularly the celebrated Nancy Ward, provided warnings of an impending attack, and families gathered inside Fort Caswell. Soon afterward, a large Cherokee force attacked. Between approximately 150 and 200 settlers were reportedly inside the fort, with about seventy-five fighting men under Lieutenant Colonel John Carter. The siege lasted for roughly two weeks. The defenders held their position until word arrived that reinforcements were approaching, after which the attackers withdrew. The survival of Watauga demonstrated that the isolated frontier settlement could defend itself.
From Watauga to North Carolina
North Carolina responded favorably to the Watauga petition. In August 1776, the settlers elected representatives to the Fifth North Carolina Provincial Congress. Three Watauga delegates were ultimately seated, including John Carter and Charles Robertson. Rather than passing a conventional annexation act, the congress effectively recognized the settlement by accepting its representatives, and Watauga became part of the Washington District of North Carolina.
During the session, Carter received another important appointment. He was commissioned Colonel Commandant of the Washington District Regiment of Militia and was also entrusted with military supplies for establishing a public magazine to defend the frontier. The regiment and its successor, the Washington County Regiment, would participate in numerous Revolutionary War engagements across what became Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. John Carter had now progressed from frontier merchant to chairman of an independent association, militia colonel, government official, and representative in the North Carolina legislature.
Revolution on the Frontier
The American Revolution in the backcountry was not simply a struggle against British regular troops. It often became a bitter civil conflict between Patriot and Loyalist neighbors. In 1777, North Carolina confiscation laws targeted Loyalists who refused to pledge allegiance to the Patriot government.
According to accounts of the incident, Loyalists in the Watauga area planned to seize John Carter's public records and kill both Carter and John Sevier. The Patriot leaders responded by copying important records and concealing the originals in the woods. The Loyalist attempt was defeated, but the hidden records were reportedly never recovered. The episode illustrates the dangerous environment in which Carter operated. His responsibilities included not only military defense but also courts, government finances, public records, and land transactions.
The Road to Kings Mountain
John Carter's influence also extended indirectly to one of the decisive Patriot victories of the Revolutionary War. In 1780, British Major Patrick Ferguson threatened the inhabitants west of the mountains. He warned frontier leaders that if they continued resisting British authority, he would march across the mountains, hang their leaders, and devastate their settlements. Instead of frightening them into submission, Ferguson's threat produced the opposite result, and the frontier militia mobilized.
Men gathered at Sycamore Shoals before beginning the famous march across the mountains that culminated in the Battle of Kings Mountain on October 7, 1780. Normally, John Carter would have commanded the Washington County Regiment, but at the critical moment he was hundreds of miles away serving in the North Carolina Senate. Colonel Evan Shelby assisted in organizing the frontier forces but remained behind to protect the settlements. Operational command of the Washington County troops therefore fell to Lieutenant Colonel John Sevier.
There was another problem. Carter, as an important county official and entry taker, controlled public money that might have been used for supplies. With Carter absent, Sevier and Isaac Shelby sought assistance from Sullivan County entry taker John Adair. Adair reportedly agreed to release public money despite lacking legal authority, reasoning that if Britain conquered the country, the money and American liberty would be lost anyway. That money helped provision the men who crossed the mountains and defeated Ferguson at Kings Mountain.
The Final Days of John Carter
By the closing years of his life, John Carter had become one of the most trusted political, military, and economic leaders of the Watauga settlements.
He had served as:
Chairman of the Watauga Association
Justice and government official
Merchant and landowner
Lieutenant Colonel and later Colonel Commandant of the frontier militia
Representative to the North Carolina Provincial Congress
Member of the North Carolina legislature
Entry taker and public official for Washington County
His final recorded political act occurred in the North Carolina Senate at Halifax on February 13, 1781. Halifax was nearly 400 miles from his home on the Watauga, and no surviving record establishes that John Carter ever returned home. He was dead by August 27, 1781, when his eldest son, Landon Carter, appeared before the Washington County Court and received authority to administer his father's estate. The enormous bond associated with the administration of that estate provides some indication of the level of financial responsibility and property John Carter had accumulated during his lifetime.
The young man who had supposedly walked away from a blacksmith's forge and a predictable life had, within little more than two decades, become one of the most influential men on the American frontier.
A Forgotten Founder
Historian Goodspeed later described John Carter as the progenitor of one of Tennessee's most illustrious families. His significance, however, extends far beyond the prominent family that followed him. John Carter belonged to the generation that carried American settlement beyond the Appalachian Mountains. He repeatedly challenged restrictions imposed by the British Crown, established commerce where the government said commerce should not exist, helped create representative government where no colonial government existed, defended an isolated community during war, commanded Patriot militia, and helped bring the Watauga settlements into the emerging American political system.
Perhaps his greatest legacy is the story of Watauga itself. Years before the Declaration of Independence, settlers gathered on the banks of the Watauga River and decided that they were capable of governing themselves. They adopted written rules, elected representatives, established courts, defended their homes, and ultimately joined the revolutionary struggle. At the center of that community stood John Carter.
John Carter of Watauga was a self-made man and an early American success story, the kind of man who helped build this country, but whose story has largely been forgotten.
Refn: "The Carters of Watauga: A Tennessee History from the First Settlers to the Civil War" by Joe W. Carter, ISBN: 9798306931715