High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Black Warrior River is a waterway in west central Alabama in the southeastern United States. The river rises in the extreme southern edges of the Appalachian Highlands and flows 178 miles (286 km) to the Tombigbee River, of which the Black Warrior is the primary tributary. The river is named after the Mississippian paramount chief Tuskaloosa, whose name meant Black Warrior in Muskogean. The Black Warrior is impounded along nearly its entire course by a series of locks and dams to form a chain of narrow reservoirs, which not only provide aid to navigation, but hydroelectric power and drinking water.