Christian was born in Staunton, Virginia, a descendant of a Manx family which had settled in Ireland. His parents, Israel Christian and Elizabeth Starke, had emigrated to Virginia in 1740, where they ran a general store. At about the age of 20, William served as a captain in the Anglo-Cherokee War under Colonel William Byrd. In the mid 1760s, he worked in the law office of Patrick Henry, and married Henry's sister Anne.
In 1775, with the approach of the American Revolutionary War, Christian served on the Fincastle Committee of Safety, and attended the March 20 and July 17 meetings of the Virginia Conventions. On 13 February1776, he was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the 1st Virginia Regiment of the Continental Army, and was promoted to colonel in March. When Cherokees under Dragging Canoe and Oconostota went to war with Virginia in 1776, Christian resigned his commission in July 1776 and accepted a commission as colonel of militia from the Virginia Council of Defense. Christian led an expedition against the Cherokees which saw little action but compelled some of the chiefs to agree to peace. He served as a commissioner which negotiated the Treaty of Long Island with the Cherokees, which was signed on 20 July1777. He was a commissioner in a second treaty with the Cherokees in 1781. William Christian and his wife established Fort William where he directed the defense of what is now Louisville from Indian attacks.[1]
McCormick, Thomas Denton. "William Christian" in the Dictionary of American Biography, vol. III, p. 96, edited by Dumas Malone. New York: Scribner's, 1936; revised 1964.
