Nickajack

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For the dam of the same name, see Nickajack Dam.

Nickajack was the name of a proposed neutral state of Unionist areas of North Alabama and East Tennessee. In the period leading up to the American Civil War there was much talk of secession made by the politicians representing wealthy plantation owners in the Black Belt. Hill country residents were typically poor dirt-farmers and rarely slave-owners. They considered the war that would inevitably follow secession to be "a war for the rich, fought by the poor," and wished to have nothing to do with it.

On January 7, 1861, Alabama Governor Andrew B. Moore called delegates from Alabama to Montgomery for a convention to debate Articles of Secession. Delegates from South Alabama wanted the convention delegates to determine the vote, while Northern delegates wanted the issue put to a popular vote. Because the apportionment of delegates to the convention was based on total population (including slaves), the southern delegates effectively voted "on behalf" of the African-American slaves which made up a large proportion of the population in their region. In a popular vote, the balance of power would shift to the North, which was mostly white.

Ultimately, the Ordinance of Secession was passed by a vote of 61 to 39, split along geographic lines. In addition to Nickajack, Winston County, Alabama threatened to form its own Free State of Winston. These threats of internal separation never materialized, but men in the region fiercely resisted conscription into the Confederate Army; many even joined the Union Army.

The word Nickajack referred generally to the rugged Appalachian foothills in Eastern Tennessee and Northeast Alabama. John P. Brown, in Old Frontiers, states that "Nickajack" is a corruption of the Cherokee "Ani-Kusati-yi", which he says mean Coosa Town but more likely means Koasati Town.

Another less probable origin for the name is a town named after Jack Civil, a free black man who led a renegade band of white and black fugitives and Cherokee and Creek warriors. The group, calling themselves Chickamaugas settled in "Five Lower Towns" on the Tennessee River south of Chattanooga. One of the towns was called "Nick-a-Jack" after Jack Civil. This group was routed by Major James Ore's Nickajack Expedition of 1794, sent by orders from General James Robertson.

Nickajack Cave, formerly called "Tecallassee", near the site of the former town, was used as a hideout and cache by the Chickamauga. Its deposits of bat guano were mined by Confederate forces during the Civil War and the cave became one of the leading sources of saltpeter for the Confederate Powderworks at Augusta, Georgia. The road used to transport the material became known as the Nickajack Trail.

[edit] References

Brown, John P. (February 1939) Old Frontiers: The Story of the Cherokee Indians from Earliest Times to the Date of Their Removal to the West, 1838". Journal of Southern History, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp. 107-108
US Army Corps of Engineers, Nashville District. (2006) "Nickajack Lock" - accessed November 14, 2006