The Bowl (Chief)

The Bowl (also Chief Bowles); (Cherokee: Di'wali) (ca. 1765 – July 16, 1839) was one of the leaders of the Chickamauga Cherokee during the Cherokee–American wars, served as a Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation–West, and was a leader of the Texas Cherokees (Tshalagiyi nvdagi).

Di'wali was born around 1765 in Little Hiwassee, a Cherokee town in current-day North Carolina. His mother was Cherokee, and his father was a Scottish trader. Emmet Starr, an early historian of the Cherokee, describes Bowles as "being decidedly Gaelic in appearance, having light eyes, red hair, and somewhat freckled."

Di'wali was a follower of Dragging Canoe, one of the founders of the Chickamauga Cherokee who supported the British during the American Revolutionary War, and Di'wali fought under Dragging Canoe and John Watts during the Cherokee-American Wars. During this time, Di'wali had attained the chief of the Running Water Town (present-day Muscle Shoals, Alabama). After the destruction of the Chickamauga settlements by the Americans in 1794, Di'wali returned to Little Hiwassee.

In order to enjoy better hunting grounds and escape the pressures of growing white settlements in the southern states, Di'wali led the first large Cherokee emigration west across the Mississippi River in 1809, where he and his followers settled in the St. Francis River valley, near present-day New Madrid, Missouri. When the government was organized the next year, he was elected the first Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation–West. In 1812-13, Di'wali moved his people south into the Arkansaw Territory near present-day Conway, Arkansas. Di'wali was succeeded as the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation–West in 1813 by Degadoga.

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