John B. Welch

Origins

Seen as son of Oo-gum-ah ‘John’ Welch

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14011403/john-b.-welch

"s/o Isaac Delisie and Yen Acona" also listed as "Israel de Lisle and Elizabeth Betsy Quatsy Jane Yen Acona (Possibly Jane of Oconee)"

As an experienced Cherokee genealogist, its easy to see this was not done by a Cherokee. The name "Ogumma and Occunna with Badger and Attakullakulla are also listed"

Badger was the son of Attakullakulla. And Attakullakulla was not Cherokee and believed to be 1/2 Ottawa and white. Possibly a white person's attempt to understand Cherokee genealogy."

"NOTE: John B. Welch was thought to be half Cherokee and half French; listed on Mulloy Roll #164" Welch is not French.

Notes in Quotations were not added by Brent Cox and were added at an earlier date. As a Cherokee genealogist and historian, I will not add this to my research until I find this in primary sources or told to me by actual Cherokee.

Family

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Blythe-641

Elizabeth "Betty" Blythe was born in South Carolina in 1795. [1] She married John Welch, a Cherokee, about 1824. They were the parents of at least seven children,

1. Jonathan,
2. John,
3. Richard,
4. Martha,
5. Rebecca,
6. Lloyd, and
7. Stacy. [2]

She passed away in 1885. She is listed as white on all U.S. Censuses except 1880, when she was living with Indian relatives.

John Welch and Drowning Bear:

John Welch killed Drowning Bear’s brother in 1819 after (or during) a visit to the Red Clay Agency. When word of this reached Drowning Bear (Yona Guska), he vowed the tribal right of vengeance. Drowning Bear was the son of Big Bear (Yona Equa) of Nuquassi (near present-day Franklin, North Carolina).He was also a relative by marriage or blood to Will of Nuquassi, who is also known as Long Will, Halfbreed Will of Nuquassi, Long Fellow, and “Captain Will”: Will Emory (b.1744 d.1788), son ofWilliam Emory (d.1770) of Starr’s Cherokee genealogy.Long Will was a lifelong friend of John Watts, who was born c.1753 at Ninety-Six, South Carolina.Will’s only known son was Thomas (Emory), also known as Long Tom.The people of Drowning Bear, Will, and John Watts were Chickamauga warriors – that is, Cherokee who never surrendered.Those are the type of people who were after John Welch.He was considered a dead man in the tribe until his wife, Betty Blythe, pleaded in council for his life.She was not simply a sobbing half breed pleading for mercy on her half breed husband – the Cherokee could not ignore justice.She mounted a legal and persuasive argument based on tribal justice (perhaps the killing was already a killing of justice) and she was so effective that Drowning Bear, a man of justice, pledged that he would invoke blood vengeance on anyone who killed John Welch.

There was peace between the two families and both men would later play big roles in the Eastern tribe’s survival.However, as the stature of Drowning Bear increased in the tribe (he adopted North Carolina’s Indian Agent, William H. Thomas, as his son), the status of the Welch family in the tribe diminished, which is why many of them went out to Oklahoma after 1848.

Slaves

At the time of removal the Welches owned eight slaves. All that is known about them are their names and ages. The oldest was a man named Isaac, "about 40." He may have been married to one of two adult slave women owned by the Welches. Nelly, 36 years old, had a daughter named Jane and was pregnant in the summer of 1838. Phillis, 26 years old, had three children, Bill, Clarie (Claire?) and Henderson. There was also a boy, six years old, named Frank (Welch 1838a). The transfer of power of attorney to Blythe and Parker, recorded in June 1838, does not list Nelly's baby, born in late August or early September. Betty, because of her pregnancy, was not forced to march. However, all nine of the Welch slaves were marched from Valley River, across the Long Ridge mountains, to Fort Cass and then to the Cherokee agency in the nearby town of Athens. As Captain Powell warned the officers in charge, Nelly had delivered a baby 10 days before the march, and was unfit to travel.
66

Nelly, her 10 day old baby, and one of the boys died at the agency in Athens (Powell 1843b; Weeks 1843; Welch et al. 1843).

Death

“A Struggle for Cherokee Community: Excavating Identity in Post-Removal North Carolina” by Lance Greene. Page 121-122.

In the midst of these changes, an event occurred that hastened the demise of Welch's Town. On July 9, 1852 John Welch died (Elizabeth Welch 1855). The cause of death is unknown. However, it is almost certain that his death occurred from complications associated with his illness induced during his imprisonment at Fort Cass in the fall of 1838. The death of Welch would have elicited an emotional response from the Cherokees of Welch's Town. His support of their community had been visible for all to see; his blindness and "wasted flesh" was the direct result of his resistance to forced emigration for the Cherokees in the surrounding communities. It is odd that his death is almost absent in the documentary record. The only mention of the event occurs as a marginal notation in a per capita claim by Elizabeth Welch and several of her children: "John Welch the husband of Elizabeth died the 9th day of July 1852" (Elizabeth Welch 1855). His death is not otherwise recorded in the voluminous collection of personal correspondence, claims, or legal documents associated with the people of Valley River. This absence may indicate his isolation within the boundaries of the Welch plantation since the removal. Even before his death he was absent in the post-removal documents. Betty repeatedly appears as the sole owner and spokesperson of the plantation. Although John Welch may have gone largely unseen by the white inhabitants of Cherokee County and by various federal agents, he almost certainly stayed in close contact with the Cherokees in the area. As with Dickageeska and others, John Welch may have carried an unremitting bitterness for the treatment he, his family, and community suffered at the hands of the military (Dickageeska 1843).

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Asheville Citizen Times NC dated Sept. 8, 1888

Asheville Citizen Times NC dated June 8, 1893

References

1. Residence (1850) Cherokee, North Carolina, United States [3]
2. Residence (1860) Valley Town District, Cherokee, North Carolina, United States [4]
3. Residence (1870) North Carolina, United States, living with daughter Martha [5]
4. Residence (1880) Valley Town, Cherokee, North Carolina, United States, living with niece Mary Powell [6]
5. Death 1885, burial Welch-Blythe Cemetery, Marble, Cherokee County, North Carolina, modern stone [7]
6. 1840 Federal Census
7. NC Death Certificate
8. Oklahoma and Indian Land Allotments
9. https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/91087581/person/27...
10. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/14011403/john-b.-welch
11. “A Struggle for Cherokee Community: Excavating Identity in Post-Removal North Carolina” by Lance Greene. < link >