Stone Gardens: Lieutenant Redbird “Tor-gu-wah” Sixkiller helped shape the dynamics of the Cherokee Nation

on June 21, 1807, in the shadow of Lookout Mountain, Georgia, Redbird “Tor-gu-wah” Sixkiller entered a world already shifting under the weight of treaties and forced removals.

The son of Rufas “U-li-s-ka-s-di” Sixkiller and Gu-er-tsa Smith, Redbird was part of a large and storied Cherokee family whose names--Cricket, Frog, Soldier, Tail--reflected a tradition of naming children after the first sight seen by their mother after birth. These names weren’t mere tokens; they were living echoes of Cherokee memory and identity.

As a boy, Redbird walked seven miles over rugged terrain to attend school, once lighting a fire with flint and pine knots to ward off a panther in the dark woods. Later, he received a scholarship from the Quaker Guess family and studied law and philosophy in Delaware. This education would shape his later roles as a judge, statesman, and defender of Cherokee sovereignty.

In 1837, Redbird and his first wife Permelia Whaley endured the Trail of Tears, settling in the Going Snake District of Indian Territory. There, they built a cabin and raised a family that would carry forward his legacy:

• Capt. Samuel Sixkiller (1842–1886), Union soldier and lawman

• Mary M. Sixkiller Holt (1845–1926)

• Rachel Jane Sixkiller Knight (1848–1919)

• Luke Sixkiller (1851–1925)

• Martin "Tall" Sixkiller (1856–1900)

• Henry P. Sixkiller (1858–1890)

• Joseph “Joe” Sixkiller (1867–1941)

• Elizabeth “Quatie” Sixkiller Grass (1874–1949)

  
  

Tragedy struck during the Civil War when bushwhackers killed Permelia and her infant child. Their daughter Mary, just 18, kept the family together until Redbird returned from service.

During rhe Civil War he commanded a regiment composed of Native volunteers. He rose to First Lieutenant, commanding Troop L alongside his son Samuel. After the war, he was elected to the Executive Council of the Cherokee Nation in 1865, later serving as a district judge and ultimately as a justice on the Cherokee Supreme Court.

He was also a survivor of the Goingsnake Massacre of 1872, a violent clash that underscored the tensions of post-war Indian Territory.

Redbird later married Elizabeth Foreman, with whom he continued to build a legacy of family and leadership. He died on October 21, 1898, in Locust Grove at the age of 91, and was buried in Sixkiller Cemetery, surrounded by generations of his family.