Tootemastubbe Colbert (1764 - 1839)

Born 1764 in Chickasaw Nation

Husband of Sa-Li-Tsi (Cherokee) Colbert — married before 1790 in Cherokee Nation

Descendants

Died 7 Jan 1839 at about age 75 in Towson, Choctaw Nation, Indian Territory, United States

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Biography

George/Tootemastubbe Colbert was the second oldest of five mixed-blood sons of the trader James Logan Colbert and his second wife, Minta Hoya. George was born in the Chickasaw Nation (present-day Alabama) about 1764. He first appears in records in 1788. ^[1]

George's military service brought him into contact with George Washington and Andrew Jackson. He served as a major under Arthur St. Clair in 1791 and Anthony Wayne in 1794 ^[2] and was commissioned a colonel by Washington. By about 1800 he was de facto chief of the Chickasaw. He also helped raise 350 Chickasaw auxiliaries and served under Jackson in the Creek War of 1813-14.

By the early 1800s George Colbert had established Colbert's ferry near Cherokee, Alabama. It was a significant crossing of the Tennessee River along the Natchez Trace, an important trade route, From 1801 through 1819, he became a wealthy planter and a leader of a powerful political clique. The U.S. government was forced to negotiate first with the Colberts at every treaty council through 1834, and Colbert received several tracts of land. ^[3] He emigrated west to Indian Territory with his family and 150 enslaved people in 1838 establishing farm near Fort Towson. ^[4] He died there on 7 November 1839. ^[5]

Marriage and family

Colbert married three times, was the father of at least six children and an adopted son, Pitman. He was married concurrently to a Cherokee woman named Saleechee/Salitsi and her unnamed sister, both daughters of Cherokee Chief Doublehead. They married before 1790 (based on child's birthdate). The sister died before 1818 and was buried at the Colbert home near Colbert's Ferry. Researcher Don Martini has corrected a long-standing error that the sister's name was Tuskiahooktoo. Tuskiahooktoo was a Chickasaw woman, a widow when she married George Colbert. It is believed that Saleechie and George were the parents of all of the children. ^[6] As listed on the 1818 Chickasaw census, the children were: John, Vicy(Levica, Sukey (Susan), George, Vina, and Jenny (Jane). George also had an adopted son named Pitman (Samuel).

John has no further record; Vicy married John McDonna; Sukey married John McLish and Robert Jones; George was killed before 1838 when thrown from a horse; Vina has no further record; Jenny married Andrew Frazier.

Disputed Children

The following children previously attached to George do not appear in Chickasaw records. They have been detached.

Hettie Hollinger

Nancy Tharp

William

Sarah

Colbert County, Alabama is named in honor of George Colbert and his brother Levi.

Research Notes

George Colbert, or Tootemastubbe, was perhaps the most prepossessing of the Colbert brothers in appearance and manners. He was supposedly opposed to innovation, and an enemy to education, missions and whiskey. He lived on Wolf creek four miles south of Booneville. Shullachie, or Saleechie, was the name of his wife. She lived where Tupelo is now. He had two sons, Pit-man and George, and one daughter, Vicy. He “was illiterate but had some influence and stood tolerably fair; talked very common English. His son, Pitman, had a very fair education.” George Colbert himself moved to the West.

Win. Henry Gates is authority for the following statement:

“My father, William Gates, went to McNairy county, Tenn., and bought the running gear for two six-horse wagons, sold them to Colbert, and the latter moved to the nation in them.”Edwin G. Thomas says:

“In 1836 I attended the land sales at Pontotoc. The first night in the nation I stayed at Saleechie (or Shullechie) Colbert’s four miles west of where Tupelo now stands. She was a woman well-fixed up, had a good house, and gave good fare.”The author of Cotton Gin Port and Gaines’ Trace, in the Publications of the Mississippi Historical Society, VII., 269 appears to be mistaken as to Selitia Colbert being “one of the wives of Levi Colbert.

In 1821 Alexander Dugger first became acquainted with the Indians at Cotton Gin. George Colbert lived near Harrisburg, in what is now Lee county, on a place afterward owned by Shannon. Pitman Colbert lived with his father on the same place. They were very wealthy, working 140 hands; had a large farm near Colbert’s Ferry in Alabama. Vicy Colbert was an educated woman, and wealthy, as wealth was counted in those days. She owned three sections of land, all of which Colonel Doxey sold to Wm. Duncan for $13,000. She lived south of the old Chickasaw King, though she lived for a while in the Cherry creek neighborhood. She went west with the Indians .(http://www.natchezbelle.org/ahgp-ms/chiefs/chiefs1.htm)

Martha Ann Hargett who married Robert Duncan (source: Elizabeth D. Pearson material; “History of AL and Dictionary of AL Biography” by Thomas M. Owens, Vol. III; pg. 516-9.) and Mary Hargett who married John Duncan, is related to George and Saleechie Colbert. The father of John Duncan, William Duncan, married Vicy Colbert, daughter of Genl. Chief George Colbert of Muscle Shoals, AL, and his wife, Saleechie, daughter of “Chief Doublehead”, Lauderdale Co. AL. (source: “The Morketts Anne (Duncan) Smallwood Lineage” from notebooks of Kay D. Hampton). (http://www.elvisandhistory.com/hargett.html).

Sources

1. ↑ Martini, Don. Who was Who Among the Southern Indians. Don Martini, Falkner, Mississippi, 1998. p. 137
2. ↑ American State Papers, Indian Affairs. Image at Major
3. ↑ American State Papers, Indian Affairs. Image at land.
4. ↑ National Archives and Records Administration, Miscellaneous Indian Removal Rolls, M1831, Chickasaw Emigration Roll 01A, roll 144, frame 134.
5. ↑ Martini, "Who was Who," p. 138 citing "Army and Navy Chronicle, Jan. 10, 1840.
6. ↑ Don Martini, The Chickasaw Colberts: Corrections to Colbert Family Genealogy, 2015.

• see also:
• Grant Foreman, The Five Civilized Tribes: Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, Seminole (Norman: University of Oklahoma, 1934).
• Grant Foreman, Indian Removal: The Emigration of the Five Civilized Tribes of Indians (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1932).
• Arrell M. Gibson, The Chickasaws (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1971).
• Colbert's Ferry [1]
• OK Historical Society [2]
• Wikipedia [3]
• CHICKASAW CHIEFS AND PROMINENT MEN Colbert
• Carolyn Murray Greer Remembering the Shoals
• http://www.natchezbelle.org/ahgp-ms/chiefs/chiefs1.htm
• http://rememberingtheshoals.wordpress.com/tag/saleechie-doublehead/
• http://www.natchezbelle.org/ahgpms/chiefs/chiefs1.htm
• rememberingtheshoals.wordpress.com
• todayifoundout.com