Along with his several of his brothers, William Colbert was important leader of the Chickasaw people in the 18th and 19th centuries.
[2] The Chickasaw were aligned with the British during the American Revolutionary War, and William joined his father in capturing Spanish ships on the Mississippi and the Battle of Arkansas Post in 1783.
[4] On February 14, 1804, Andrew Jackson, U.S. District Court Judge John McNairy, surveyor William T. Lewis, and Tennessee pioneer James Robertson were "subscribers" to a contract between John Gordon (later Jackson's personal spymaster in the wars of the 1810s) and William Colbert of the Chickasaw Nation, agreeing to establish and jointly operate a stand and ferry across the Duck River along the Natchez Trace.
[7] According to Mississippi judge and local historian George H. Etheridge, writing in 1939, "Chooshemataha was a military leader of importance.
He fought for the Chickasaws against the Creeks in numerous wars, the accounts of which seem never to have been recorded, was generally successful and had high prestige among his tribe.