The Memoirs of Lt. Henry Timberlake: The Story of a Soldier, Adventurer, and Emissary to the Cherokees, 1756-1765

Professor Duane H. King's scholarly 2007 edition of THE MEMOIRS OF LT. HENRY TIMBERLAKE frames perfectly an important eye-witness narrative of 18th Century Cherokee - British interactions. In 1762, 26 year old Virginia militia Lieutenant Henry Timberlake accompanied the Emperor and two Chiefs of the Cherokee nation to London for an audience to confirm peace with 24 year old King George III. Britain was about to triumph in its Seven Years War with France. France was to lose almost all of its Canadian possessions to Britain. Great Britain seemed poised to be the paramount North American power forever. ***Seemingly the Cherokees had chosen well in rejecting their earlier preference for the French (who treated the Indians as equals) and choosing the cross-culturally tone deaf English for their new friends. But the British would soon lose the American Revolution. And the trimphant Americans would make Cherokees pay dearly for remaining stubbornly loyal to that gracious "last King of America," who had hospitably honored them in London during the summer of 1762. *** Thanks to Lt. Timberlake's accurate observations of Cherokee games, war dances and folk ways (a fair amount later lost), 21st Century Cherokees have now revived some of what seemed gone forever, especially the great war dance. TImberlake ruined himself financially in personally paying the expenses of the visiting Cherokee delegation. He was not well treated by either colonial or central British governments. But he lives on in his MEMOIRS, published just before his death in 1765 at age 29. -OOO-