Ustanali had been established in 1777 by refugees from the Cherokee Lower Towns in northwestern South Carolina. In that year, Old Tassel and several other Cherokee leaders were murdered by whites while under the flag of truce, while visiting representatives of the short-lived State of Franklin in present-day Tennessee. In response, warriors across the frontier increased attacks on European-American settlers. The Chickamauga Cherokee, a band led by Dragging Canoe, were already carrying out armed resistance to European-American settlement along the Holston River in northeastern Tennessee.