Joseph Vann

Infobox Person
name = Chief Joseph "Rich Joe" Vann

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caption = Chief Joseph "Rich Joe" Vann
birth_date = birth date|1798|2|11|mf=y
birth_place = Spring Place, Georgia
dead=dead
death_date = death date|1844|10|23|mf=y
death_place = near Louisville, Kentucky
occupation = Chief Vann House Owner, Cherokee Leader
spouse = Jennie Springston, Polly Blackburn
religion =
website =
footnotes =

Cherokee Chief Joseph H. Vann, (11 February, 1798 – 23 October 1844). He was a Cherokee leader who owned Chief Vann House, many slaves, taverns, and steamboats that he operated on the Arkansas, Mississippi, Ohio, and Tennessee. He born Spring Place, Georgia on February 11, 1798. Joseph was the son of James Vann and Margaret "Peggy" Scott. His grandparents were Clement Vann, a Scottish trader who came from South Carolina, and Mary Christiana (Wah-Li or Wa-wli). Joseph was his father's favorite child and primary recipient of his father's estate and wealth.

Death of James Vann, Joe's inheritance

Joseph was 11 years old in the room when his father, James, was murdered, in Buffington’s Tavern in 1809 near the site of the family-owned ferry. Before he was killed, James Vann was a powerful chief in the Cherokee Nation and wanted Joseph to inherit the wealth that he had built instead of his wives, but Cherokee law stipulated that the home go to his wife, Peggy, while his possessions and property were to be divided among his children. Eventually, the Cherokee council granted Joseph the inheritance in line with his father's wish; this included convert|2000|acre|km2 of land, trading posts, river ferries, and the Vann House in Spring Place, Georgia. Joseph also inherited his fathers gold and deposited over $200,000 in gold in a bank in Tennessee.

Eviction from Georgia and afterward

After being evicted from Diamond Hill, Joe moved his family to Tennessee, where he owned a large plantation on the Tennessee River near the mouth of Ooltewah Creek that became the center of a settlement called Vann's Town (later the site of Harrison, Tennessee). In the Cherokee Removal, he transported a few hundred Cherokee men, women, children and horses on his steam-boat, including the families of John and Lewis Ross.

In 1839, he became the first Assistant Chief of the Cherokee Nation under the new 1839 Constitution that was created in Oklahoma, serving with Principal Chief John Ross.

Death of "Rich Joe"

On October 23, 1844, while his steamship "Lucy Walker" was headed to New Orleans during during a drinking party and an impromptu steamboat race on the Ohio river, he was falling behind in the race and almost out of fuel to stoke the burner so he gave the order to throw on some of the fat sides of pork that were nearby. The stoker, a freed-slave, protested, but in his drunken state, Joe displayed a pistol for emphasis. The stoker did as he was told and then jumped overboard. A boiler exploded sinking the ship, killing him and more than 60 other passengers near Louisville, Kentucky. The stoker was the only survivor.

ee also

*James Vann
*Chief Vann House

References

* [http://thorpe.ou.edu/constitution/cherokee/index.html 1839 Cherokee Constituiton]
*Vann, Joseph H., "Cherokee Rose: On Rivers of Golden Tears", 1st Books Library (2001), ISBN 0-75965-139-6.
*Malone, Henry Thompson, "Cherokees of the Old South: A People in Transition", University of Georgia Press, (1956), ISBN 0670034207.
*McLoughlin, William, "Cherokee Renascence in the New Republic", Princeton University Press, (1986), ISBN 0691047413.
*Perdue, Theda, "The Conflict Within: The Cherokee Power Structure and Removal," ("Georgia Historical Quarterly") 73 (Fall, 1989), pp. 467-91.
*Young, Mary., "The Cherokee Nation: Mirror of the Republic", ("American Quarterly"), Vol. 33, No. 5, Special Issue: American Culture and the American Frontier (Winter, 1981), pp. 502-524

External links

* [http://ourgeorgiahistory.com/ogh/Joseph_'Rich_Joe'_Vann Our Georgia History]
* [http://www.cherokeebyblood.com/vannfamily.htm Cherokee By Blood]
* [http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.com/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2494&hl=y New Georgia Encyclopedia]