Why it the connection to ancestry important in the Native American tradition?
ANCESTRY AND CONNECTION: My grandfather, Oscar Rogers was of the Walkingstick family. That family was from one of the seven mother towns. Prior to the “unsettlement period” when American was beginning to be settlements, our town or was one of the Overhill Settlements in Poke County, Tennessee. It was called the Great Hiwassee or “Ay uh wa si Eg wa hi” near Savannah Ford. There was a strong connection of these families on the Ocoee River near the junction with the Hiwassee River, or “Ug wa hi” and with Chestua or “tsi stu yi” or called Rabbit Place near the mouth of the Chestua Creek at the Hiwassee River in Poke County, Tennessee. While there were many small villages in the Overhill Settlements, eventually it was all lost to expansion of the non-native people. The Middle Settlement of “Kituhwa” or the towns on the headwaters of the Little Tennessee, the Tuckaseegee, and the Tuckaleechee were considered the first settlement. It was the place of refuge for the lower and valley settlement
