Hi everyone, In my research on Adam Starr and his roots I have come up with some interesting information (new to me at least) that I want to share with you and see if you have any further information of this type. We know that on the 1850 census he is down as having been born in Virginia about 1799. I found the following in a couple of pages of a book I copied some time back and stuck away--glad I did now. Anyway, the book is "The Buffalo Ridge Cherokee. A Remnant of a Great Nation Divided". In it for one thing it says (quoting Martin "Walkingbear" Wilson, Chief of the Amonsoquath Tribe of Cherokee in Missouri): "The 'Treaty of Hopewell ceded or gave the Cherokee land to the British. The British passed a few trinkets to the Indians and took land. The very act, the Treaty of Hopewell," (1785) "caused the Chickamauga Cherokee to split from the main body of the Cherokee." (From other sources we learn that a few years later most of these Chickamauga Cherokee rejoined the mainline Cherokee.) "They went to Missouri and Arkansas with Chief Bowles. After the Treaty of Hopewell, they split off into many sections. Some are in Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, West Virginia, Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, New Mexico, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Virginia, and other states." He goes on to say, "A goodly part of the Amonsoquath Tribe left (Virginia and North Carolina) and went to Missouri in 1793. Some stayed in the southwestern Virginia area. They are in Cedar Bluff, Tazewell, and other cities in southwest Virginia. A large part of Cherokee who could pass themselves off as white did so. It was called survival. Our people are still in southwest Virginia today, on ancient grounds and will stay. They decided to learn the white man's ways and raise their children in traditional ways. They would live and multiply, and go as white, if necessary. If you can go for white and profit from it, then you will." Now, if Adam was born in Virginia in 1799 it stands to reason that his family was one that was in this group and stayed in Virginia. Another book (I forgot to write down the title, but will go back to the library and get it, Sorry.) says about the Cherokee War in 1759-1761, "Although the Cherokee War involved mainly South Carolina, it started in Virginia. Virginia had recruited four hundred Cherokee warriors to accompany the British-American expedition against the French in western Pennsylvania in 1758. Unpaid for their services (they had been promised pay), the major part of the Cherokee contingent defected from the army and drifted home through western Virginia...." It goes on to say that in Nov. of 1761 they "concluded peace with Osteneco, Oconostota, and other tribal leaders representing the Overhill Cherokees (the northernmost branch of the tribe)." Apparently there were three basic groups of Cherokee towns in the early days (1500's, 1600's, early 1700's). The northernmost group was the upper or Overhill. Most of this area is in the eastern Tennessee mountains and in the headwaters of the Tennessee River northward in the Appalachian mountain range. The Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma has retained the Overhill dialect. (The Qualla Cherokee in North Carolina has preserved the dialect of the middle-valley towns, and the lower town dialect has disappeared.) I also found references to a Vivian Wilson Santini, Chief of the Northern Tsalagi Tribe of Southwest Virginia, who has "conducted extensive research on the Cherokee of Southwest Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina." I am in the process of trying to find out more about her research and findings. Do any of you have anything about this? I would love to see what you know about them. I really think that this is the only way we will ever solve the mystery about our Starrs and their Cherokee background. On Ancestry.com I found many Starrs on the 1790-1870 Census records. I made a map and marked where they were living. Many of them were clustered in the southwestern part of Virginia and across the line into West Virginia (which at the time, of course, was a part of Virginia). Interesting stuff when considering the information above. A seperate reference states that Starr is a traditional Cherokee name and was also sometimes translated "Isbell". I know that many folks think that the only Cherokee Starrs had to descend from Caleb Starr, the Irishman who married a Cherokee; but I think that's just not true. I think that there must have been other Starrs even before Caleb came to Indian territory. I'm sure going to try to find out. I know this is long. I hope you make sense of it and let me have your input. I have ordered "The Buffalo Ridge Cherokee, A Remnant of a Great Nation Divided" by interlibrary loan and should be getting it soon as well as a couple of other books. I'll let you know what else I find in them. Crystal