The Long Cane Massacre Site is located in a rural area of northern McCormick County, South Carolina. Included in the nominated property is a gravestone which attests to the fact that this was the site of the 1 February 1760 massacre which claimed the lives of Catherine Calhoun and twenty-two other settlers.
Although the land has been cleared for farming in the past the Long Cane Massacre Site is presently wooded, primarily with pine, cedar and scrub growth. It is located in a secluded area; access to the site is gained by means of an unpaved road which leads to a footpath. A small metal footbridge built ca. 1945 spans a small stream near the gravestone.
The rough hewn stone bears the following inscription:
Patk. Calhoun ESQ.
In Memory of Mrs.
Cathrine Calhoun
Aged 76 Years Who
With 22 Others Was
Here Murdered By
The Indians The
First of Feb. 1760
A footstone bears no inscription, but matches the headstone in design to a smaller scale. The absence of development of the area surrounding the Long Cane Massacre Site has preserved the site's historic integrity.
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The following is the text from the original National Register of Historic Places Inventory Nomination Form dated December 14, 1982.
The Long Cane Massacre Site, located in a rural area of northern McCormick County, South Carolina, is significant to the history of exploration and settlement in South Carolina and for its association with the Cherokee War of 1760-61 and the Calhoun settlement at Long Cane. The nominated property includes the gravestone which marks the place where twenty-three of the Long Cane settlers were killed in a bloody massacre by the Cherokee Indians on 1 February 1760. Among those killed was Catherine Calhoun, matriarch of the Calhoun family, who figured prominently in the settlement of upcountry South Carolina.
Additional Information: The Long Cane Massacre can be attributed in part to a boundary dispute between the Cherokee Indians and white settlers over a parcel of land lying between Long Cane Creek and Little River. In 1747 the government of South Carolina had purchased from the Indians, "all that tract or parcel of land lying and being south and easterly of a certain branch or stream of water commonly called Long Canes. This purchase encouraged rapid settlement of
the newly acquired land, and in 1756 a group of settlers including the Calhoun family of Augusta County, Virginia, arrived in South Carolina. They located west of Long Cane Creek in order to take advantage of the especially rich soil found between Long Cane to the east and Little River to the west. In an attempt to justify this settlement in light of the 1741 agreement, the grants often referred to Little River as the 'Northwest Fork of Long Cane (Creek). At least one plat refers to it as the "Northwest branch of Lone Canes and known by the name of Little River.
The Cherokees, however, were well aware of the actual boundary, and in August of 1758 asked the Governor of Georgia to use his influence to have the illegal settlements west of long Cane Creek removed. This request was unsuccessful, and the Indians were too busy with other matters at the time to follow it up with retribution of their own.
Other factors in addition to the illegal settlement led to the 1760 massacre, however. In 1758 several hundred Cherokees had been recruited and equipped to ight against the French at Fort Duquesne by the Colonial government. However on their way back through Virginia, several parties of Indians were involved in incidents of plundering and horse stealing. These raids triggered a series of skirmishes between Indians and colonists in which a number on both sides were killed.
In early October 1759 Governor Lyttelton planned an expedition to Indian country to demand satisfaction for the deaths of the colonists. At the same time a group of prominent Cherokees were on their way to Charleston to attempt a settlement. They met with the governor and Council on October 19 and indicated that they wanted peace, but did not offer to turn over the murderers to the colony. Governor Lyttelton was determined to stand firm on this demand,
however, and personally led the expedition to Fort Prince George. The Cherokees who had come to Charleston were promised a safe return, but in actuality were taken to the fort as captives pending the delivery of the murderers. Lyttelton's expedition was plagued with desertions’ and sickness, but the governor was nevertheless able to conclude a peace on December 26. The Indians turned over some of the murderers and agreed to the imprisonment of twenty-two Cherokees (some of whom were high officials) until the others were delivered, Trade between the Indians and colonists, which had been suspended, was reopened.
The frontier was peaceful for several weeks, but many of the Indians were dissatisfied with the terms of the treaty. On 19 January 1760 hostility was renewed when a group of Cherokees began a series of killing sprees across the frontier, one of the first victims being the trader John Elliott.
This then was the situation, when on 1 February 1760 the Cherokees attacked the Long Cane settlers. The settlers were fleeing to refuge at Fort Moore, near Augusta, and had already crossed over to the east side of Long Cane Creek when the Indians overtook them. Reports vary as to the number of settlers in the party as well as to the number killed. Several contemporary accounts exist which nevertheless point to the conclusion that the Long Cane Massacre was one of the most tragic incidents of the Cherokee War.
The earliest published reference to the massacre appeared in the South Carolina Gazette on 9 February 1760 and was based on the report of Aaron Price who had arrived in Charleston from Ninety Six. The article states, "Yesterday se1’nnight the whole of the Long-Cane Settlers, to the Number of 150 Souls, moved off with most of their Effects in Waggons; to go towards Augusta in Georgia, and in a few Hours after their setting off, were surprized and attacked by
about 100 Cherokees on Horseback, while they were getting their Waggons out of a boggy Place: They had amongst them 40 Gunmen, who might have made a very good Defence, but unfortunately their Guns were in the Waggons; the few that recovered theirs, fought the Indians Half an Hour, and were at last obliged to fly: In the action they lost 7 Waggons, and 40 of their People killed or taken (including Women and Children) the Rest got safe to Augusta; whence an Express arrived here with the same Account, on Tuesday Morning.
The South Carolina Gazette of 23 February 1760 reported that Patrick Calhoun placed the number of settlers at 250, of which about 55 or 60 were fighting men. He estimated the loss at about 50 people), primarily women and children, as well as thirteen loaded wagons and carts. The article further stated,. "that, he had since been at the Place where the Action happened, in order to bury the Dead and found only 20 of their Bodies. Most inhumanly butchered; that the
Indians had burnt the Woods all around, but had left the Waggons and Carts there empty and unhurt; and that he believes all the fighting men would return to and fortify the Long-Cane Settlement, were part of the Rangers so stationed as to give them some Assistance and Protection.
At a later date Patrick Calhoun placed the number killed at twenty-three, as is evidenced by the marker which he had erected at the massacre site, and which remains today. The inscription reads "Patk. Calhoun, Esq.: In memory of Mrs. Cathrine Calhoun aged 76 years who with 22 others was here murdered by the Indians on the first of Feb. 1760." The Long Cane massacre was followed by several similar attacks and provided impetus for the construction of many small stockade forts across the frontier. The historian Robert L. Meriwether concluded that construction of these forts "prevented wholesale slaughter in South Carolina" and suggested that had the
Long Cane settlers built a stockade rather than fled, the massacre could have been prevented.
The war continued with numerous casualties on both sides for over a year until an expedition led by Lieutenant-Colonel James Grant and Colonel Thomas Middleton determined to put an end to it. On 27 May 1761 their combined forces of about 2,800 reached Fort Prince George, where the powerful Indian Attakullakulla (Little Carpenter) tried to make peace to no avail. On June 7 the troops left the fort and three days later battled the Cherokees near the village of Echoe. After three or four hours of fighting the Indians withdrew, and the troops moved into the town. Here Grant left Middleton with about 1,000 men to guard the provisions while he took the remainder and proceeded to
destroy fifteen towns and about 1,400 acres of corn and beans. He encountered no resistance and returned to Fort Prince George on the ninth of July.
This devastated the Indians, and caused them to sue for peace. An agreement was reached, and on 18 December a treaty was signed by Attakul1akulla and eight other Indian leaders. Perhaps the most substantial concession gained by the treaty was the establishment of a new boundary line which would be drawn at a distance forty miles from the town of Keowee. (This line was not surveyed until 1766, however; it is presently the boundary between Abbeville and Anderson Counties.)
The colony, therefore, gained much territory by this treaty, including the rich area between Long Cane Creek and Little River which had been the site if the Long Cane settlement, as well as all of the area which would later be known as the Abbeville District. Soon after the agreement had been reached, many of the
original Calhoun settlers returned to their former homes and were joined by an influx of new settlers. The South Carolina Gazette of 2 April 1763 reported that over 1,000 families from northern colonies had settled in the Long Cane region in 1762 and 400 more families were expected.
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