ParisTimes Pioneers

Ancestry & Family Background

Mountain Creek (McGill Creek)

According to Lucille Bates book, "On December 15, 1807, William McGill purchased from John Hackett for two hundred dollars, two hundred acres of land in Rhea County on Mountain Fork of Sale Creek. The northern boundary of Indian Territory and the Southern boundary of Rhea County in 1807 were approximately the same. This line followed fairly well Mountain Creek, later known as McGill Creek, through this area. Some of the settlers lived across the line or used fields that had been abandoned by the Indians across the creek."

A well-known historian of Hamilton County (Mrs. Penelope J. Allen) learned in her research that the Sale Creek pioneers bought land in an area known as the "Fields Settlement". It was known as the home of a famous Cherokee Chief (Richard Fields). According to Lucille Bates research completed in 1971, "There is still evidence of a settlement on the west bank of Sale Creek that extends toward Coulterville from its confluence with McGill Creek."

It has been told that Fields sold out his improvements to a group of settlers and left Tennessee in 1808 when he moved on to Arkansas and then Texas where he became the leader of the Texas Band of Cherokees.

According to Mrs. Bates, "William McGill lived in southern Rhea County from 1807 to 1823. His name appears on the tax list of Capt. Joseph Brook's Company for Rhea County in 1808, in association with the names of Robert Means, Robert Patterson, and Robert and Charles Gamble. He is also listed as owning two hundred acres of land and two slaves. McGill served as a member of the grand jury for the July Session of the Rhea County for the year of 1808."

William McGill became a Captain of a militia company in 1817, succeeding William Alexander. They did not have a Fort at the Indian Boundary with regular soldiers for protection. The settlers lived with an emphasis on security, and the militia company consisted of a captain and three or four men with specific duties, which served as a cadre to organize the settlers when the need arose. The Cadre also functioned as a taxing and census agency.

William's younger brother (John McGill) came to southern Rhea County where he made his home with his kinsman until he married. John's name first appears as member of Captain McGill's Company in 1819. He was entered as a single white person on the tax roll of Rhea County for that year.

John McGill married Elizabeth Patterson (daughter of Robert and Rhoda Witt Patterson). elizabeth was born November 25, 1798, in Mecklenberg County, North Carolina. John and Elizabeth's first child (William Mulligan McGill) was born in 1821. It is assumed that John and Elizabeth were married in 1820.

William McGill's Wife, Nancy. . .

It is not uncommon in the early days of the country for many marriages to be performed by traveling preachers who did not find it convenient to record the ceremony.

William and Nancy built their home near McGill and Sale Creeks, close to the trail that led northward to Knox County and southward to Ross's Landing. This path that was used by both the red and white man in the early settlement of Tennessee, has now become the Federal Highway Number 27 and connects Chattanooga with Knoxville, Tennessee.

Along the bottomland that ran along the creek such crops as corn, tobacco, and wheat were grown and the surplus products were freighted by the brother's to Patterson's Place on Opossum Creek. The surplus crops were then sold and Patterson would dispose of them through trade on the Tennessee River.

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