The Creek War of 1813 and 1814

T. H. BALL,
Historical Secretary of the Old Settlers' Association of Lake County, Indiana;
Honorary member of Lake County Teachers' Association; Active Member of Indiana Academy of Science;
Corresponding Member of Wisconsin State Historical Society;
Honorary Member of Trinity Historical Society of. Texas.
Author of
Lake County, 1834-1872, Lake of the lied Cedars, ClarTie County, A labama, Notes on Luke's Gospel Poems and Hymns Annie B., &c., &c.

H. 5. HALBERT,
Member of Mississippi State Historical Society;
Member of Alabama State Historical Society;
Contributor to American Antiquarian;
Contributor to Alabama Historical Reporter.

THE
CREEK WAR
OF
1813 AND 1814.
BY
H. S. HALBERT AND T. H. BALL.
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS: DONOHUE & HENNEBERRY.
MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA: WHITE, WOODRUFF, & FOWLER.
1895.

e
H
COPYRIGHT, 1895, BY
H. S. HALBERT AND T. II BALL,
DONOHUE & HENNEBERKY, PRINTERS AND BINDERS, CHICAGO.

PREFACE.
W HEN this work was commenced, several years ago, it was not expected that it would become in size what it has grown to be. It was then expected only to give facts in regard to the Creek war as connected with the white settlers in what is now South Alabama, giving especially a fuller account of the attack on Fort Sinquefield with other gathered reminiscences and traditions. But when large libraries were examined and many his torical works were consulted, and so little that was really reliable could be found in regard to that bor der war, and its real beginning seeming to be alto gether unknown to Northern writers, it was thought best to make thorough research and to prepare a somewhat voluminous work for the sake of those, or for the use of those, who, in years to come, in the North as well as in the South, might justly be expected to be interested in a work as full, and, in some respects, as minute in details, as this.
If, therefore, any readers should think that some of the chapters, as those in regard to Tecumseh and Fort Mims, are more full than was needful, or that, in some others, too many personal, biographical inci dents and sketches or notes are given, let them please bear in mind that the work is designed for more than one classo of rea.d^s; let the more critical charitably trust" that trh^fa will _-b,e some readers interested ,m:tH^ minute details ^ami^ the apparent

10

PREFACE.

digressions; and let all who may read rest assured that the authors have, with the idea of different classes of readers before their minds, endeavored faithfully to obtain and impartially to present his toric truth.
November 19,1894.

Well may the inhabitants of Alabama, especially, say in regard to the Ked men,

"Though "mid the forests where they roved, There rings no hunter's shout,
Yet their names are on our waters,

And we may not wash them out;"

for well, of the Indian tongue, as speaking in the

flowing waters, does an Alabama poet say,

'' 'Tis heard where CHATTAHOOCHEE pours

His yellow tide along;

It sounds on TALLAPOOSA'B shores, And OOOSA swells' the song;

Where lordly ALABAMA sweeps, The symphony remains;

And young CAHAWBA proudly keeps The echo of its strains;

Where TUSCALOOSA'S waters glide, From stream and town 'tis heard,

And dark TOMBECKBEE'S winding tide Repeats the olden word;
Afar, where Nature brightly wreathed Fit Edens for the free,
Along TUSCUMBIA'S bank 'tis breathed,

By stately TENNESSEE; And south, where, from CONECUH'S springs,

ESCAMBIA'S waters steal, ; -_

The ancient iriejckly stiH^in^?, ^ /-

and MOBILE." r -V--,--

v

CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
CHAPTBK I. The Choctaw-Muscogee Tribes. CHAPTER II. Causes of the Creek "War. CHAPTER III. Tecuraseh among the Chickasaws and
Choctaws. CHAPTER IY. Tecumseh among the Creeks. CHAPTER Y. The War Cloud Gathering. CHAPTER YI. The Stockades. CHAPTER YII. Inter-Tribal Councils of the Creeks and
the Choctaws. CHAPTER YIII. The Battle of Burnt Corn. CHAPTER IX. FortMiins. CHAPTER X. The Kimbell-James Massacre. CHAPTER XI. Attack on Fort Sinquefleld. CHAPTER XII. The"Night Courier. CHAPTER XIII. Incidents of the War in the Fork. CHAPTER XIY. Choctaws and Chickasaws join the
American Army. CHAPTER XY. The Bashi Skirmish. . CHAPTER XYI. Beard and Tandy Walker. CHAPTER XVII. The Canoe Fight. CHAPTER XVIII. Battle of the Holy Ground. CHAPTER XIX. The War in the Indian Country. CHAPTER XX. Closing Events, 1814.
CONCLUSION.
APPENDIX.
03476

INTRODUCTION.
THIS work proposes to give as accurate an account as can now be obtained from written and printed records, from traditions, and from personal observation, of that portion of American history known as the Creek War of 1813 and 1814.
Of these Creek Indians says BREWER, author of a history of Alabama: "In 1813 and 1814 they waged the bloodiest war against the whites any where recorded in the annals of the United States."
Says MEEK, one of Alabama's talented orators and poets: " Time as it passed on and filled these solitudes, with settlers, at last brought the most sanguinary era in Alabama history."
And PICKETT, recognized as Alabama's leading historian, says: "^Everything foreboded the exter mination of the Americans in Alabama, who were the most isolated and defenseless people imagin
able." The reader who comes to our " Conclusion"
may be disposed" to change BREWER'S statement; but he will not question the statements of PICKETT
and MEEK. But this work does not propose to give in full
that .part of the conflict waged in the Indian coun try which broke the power of the fierce Muscogees; but rather that part which has not been as yet so fully given, connected with the white settlers in what is now South Alabama. This portion of our
13

14

INTRODUCTION.

American history, as connected with Indian border warfare, the authors of this work believe will be given more accurately and fully than has ever been done before. They propose to do justice to the Indians and justice to the whites.
For this portion of history they hope to make this work an authority. And for this they suggest the possession of some special fitness;
H. S. Halbert is a member of the State Historical Societies of Alabama and Mississippi. He was born in Alabama, and was, in a great measure, educated by the late Dr. J. H. Eaton, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee. He spent a portion of his early manhood in Indian campaigns on the western frontier, where he became familiar with the sight of the wild warrior with his bow and quiver, his paint and feathers; and there he conceived an abiding interest in the strange his tory and destiny of the American Indians. He has also been not a little among the civilized tribes of the Indian Territory. After four years of service in the Confederate army, he was for a number of years engaged in teaching in Texas, Mississippi, and Ala bama. While pursuing his profession in the two latter states he devoted much of his leisure to histor ical researches. He visited the homes and inter viewed some surviving soldiers and contemporaries of the Creek war of 1813 and noted down their varied recollections, thereby collecting much new material for the history of that war. He was espe cially fortunate in securing from these aged survivors a full account of the attack on Fort Sinquefield, of which only a meagre sketch is recorded in the his
tories of Meek and Pickett.

INTRODUCTION.

15

For a number of years past he has been engaged in educational work among the Choctaws of Missis sippi, with whose language, customs,and traditions he is familiar. From the immediate descendants of some of Pushmataha's warriors he has been enabled to res cue from oblivion a numberof incidents in the career of that noted Mingo, and many facts in regard to Tecumseh's Southern visit. He has, in short, been interested largely for years in studies and investiga tions connected with the Southern Indians, and has visited in person'and examined with care the Burnt Corn and Holy Ground battlefields. The Alabama Historical Keporter for January, 1885, said : " Mr. II. S. Halbert is now doing more than any man in the South, perhaps, in collecting everything con nected with the Southern Indians in the shape of history, tradition, romance, legend, etc."
T. H. Ball had an early home in the state of Georgia, before 1833, not far from the Savannah Kiver, and learnedjlome of the customs and ways of the South; but in 1837, when eleven years of age, his home was transferred to the then almost untenanted solitudes of Northwestern Indiana (where the great prairie region of the West joined the wood land growth that extended to the Atlantic) and to the banks of a beautiful lake in the region then but lately occupied by the Pottawatomie Indians, some thirty-six miles from the old Fort Dearborn of Lake Michigan, some seventy-two miles from the Tippecanoe battle ground. He gained in those years of boyhood some knowledge of the Indians Indians that had been associated with French missionaries and with fur traders as he saw them in their wig.

16

INTRODUCTION.

warns, on their ponies, in their large birch-bark canoes, and when returning from the chase, and took a deep 'nterest in Indian history and in pioneer and hunter life. His young footsteps followed the wild game and his rifle secured it where his almost immediate predecessors had been Indian hunters.
From 1851 to 1855 he resided as a teacher in Clarke county, Alabama, and was there again no small part of the time in 1859 and 1860, and from 1874 to 1883. With the region around the old Fort Sinquefield he became thoroughly familiar, exam ined carefully the location of Fort Madison and Fort Glass, saw the location of Fort White, and became well acquainted with all that early center of white settlement and of once crowded stockades.
Eggleston relies much upon Meek for localities and for facts in Clarke county, saying that he was fa miliar with that region. But neither Meek, nor even Pickett, seems to have had any personal knowledge of that fifteen hundred square miles of area now con stituting Clarke county, Alabama. No other writer on this portion of history, has, so far as appears, been on the very ground of these forts and so has had a personal knowledge of the geography and topography of this region. Knowledge thus gained, and applied in some portions of this history, is what is meant by "personal observation" in the first sen tence of this "Introduction." And not only did this writer have an opportunity to examine these localities well, but he was an inmate for several months in the home of Major Austill of the Canoe Fight, then re siding near the old Fort Carney, was well acquaint ed with Isham Kimbell, Esq., a survivor of the

INTRODUCTION.

17

Kimbell-James massacre, and with others who as men and women or as children were in the differ ent forts, and who passed through the trying scenes of the summer and fall of 1813.
In a valuable history of Indiana, by DeWitt C. Goodrich and Professor Charles K. Tuttle, a table is given, with names and dates, of "Sixteen American Wars." Among these are named King Philip's 1677, Tecumseh's 1811, First Seminole 1817, Black Hawk's 1832, Second Seminole 1845; but of the Creek "War no mention is made. Did the writers forget that war? Or did they consider it of no importance?
That the Creek war should be better known at the South than in the North is natural; and that there, at least, it should be considered quite as deserving of a name and place among American Wars as Black Hawk's War or 133 Tecumseh's, is also natural. But surely the time has come, especially now, since that gathering of the millions on Lake Michigan's shore at the Columbian Exposition, the great World's Fair of 1893, when those who read and study our his tory in all parts of the land should be restricted to no localities and influenced by no prejudices in look ing at our various conflicts with the Indian tribes.
The youth of the South should know something of the Pequods and the Narragansetts and of King Philip and of Black Hawk and of Pontiac, as should those of the North of Weatherford and of Big War rior, and of Choctaws, Seminoles, and Muscogees.
Of the authors of this history it may be noticed that one was born in New England and the other in the South; that one was with the Confederates in that war that opened in 1861, and the other was, in

18

INTRODUCTION.

the years of that strife in New England and Indiana, graduating at the Newton Theological Institution in 1863, standing constantly under "the stars and stripes;" that both have spent years in the South and have many friends there; and that both, as true Americans, and' as interested in all facts connected with the aboriginees of this country, having devoted years of life to teaching, have here united their ef forts to prepare for those who are now and who are yet to be, in the East and the West, in the North Central States and in the South, a readable, a full, an accurate account of that truly "bloody" Creek War. These statements are made as suggesting that the writers of this volume, both as free as any who can easily be found from local and educational prejudices and favoritisms, each having pursued his own line of research, are not without some special qualifica tions for the work which they have undertaken.
H. S. H.
T. H. B.

THE CREEK WAR,
CHAPTER I.
THE CHOCTAW-MUSCOGEE TBIBE8.
THE Creek War of 1813 and 1814 is remarkable from the fact that all the branches of what ethnologists style the Choctaw-Muscogee stock of Indians were involved therein and took a part, on one side or the other, of that bloody conflict. As these tribes acted a prominent part in the early history of the Gulf States, a brief notice of their topographic location and ethnic affinites may, perhaps, be of interest to the general reader.
From incontrovertible linguistic evidence, it is certain that the habitat of the tribes composing the Choctaw-Muscogee Jamily was much the same in the days of De Soto, in 1540, as it was in more recent historical times. If the Creeks, or any or all their congeners, ever migrated from Mexico, it must have been centuries before the advent of the Spanish invader. Whatever may be thought of Le Clerc Milfort's migration legend, the fact stands that De Soto found towns bearing Muscogee names in Alabama. Dr. A. S. Gatschet, the distinguished Indianologist, after a thorough study of the dialects of the Choctaw-Muscogee tribes, has subdivided the family into four branches.
The first and most prominent of these branches is the Creeks or Muscogees proper, whose settle-
19

20

THE CREEK WAR.

ments were upon the Coosa, the Tallapoosa, and the Chattahoochee. During the entire existence of the Creek Confederacy in Alabama, those living on the Coosa and Tallapoosa bore the appellation of Upper Creeks, Whilst those on' the Chattahoochee were known as Lower Creeks. The Seminoles of Florida
\
are only a body of seceded Muscogees. ] The second branch is tlie Hitchitees, whose
towns were on the Chattahoochee, and who, livingnearer the Lower Creeks, were assigned to that polit ical division of the Creek Confederacy. The Mickasukees of Leon county, Florida, are an off shoot of the Hitchitees and speak the same lan guage. The Apalachees, who were a numerous and powerful people in Florida in the days of De Narvaez and De Soto, spoke a language closely related to that of the Hitchitees. The last remnant of the Apalachees were living in Louisiana, in 1830s numbering forty six souls perhaps, now, all extinct.
The third branch is the Alibamos and Coshattees, (less correct form Coosawdas,) whose homes were mostly situated on the Alabama River, just below the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa. Politically, these two tribes belonged to the Upper Creeks. When the French abandoned Fort Tou louse, in 1T63, many of the Alibamos followed them across the Mississippi into Louisiana. These seceders eventually settled in Polk county, Texas, where they have a settlement to this day. Towards the close of the eighteenth century, many of the Coshattees also emigrated west and finally settled near the Alibamos. The language of both tribes is substan-

THE CBOCTAW-MUSCOGEE TBIBES.

21

tially the same. The Alibamos that remained in their native seats occupied, at the outbreak of the war .of 1813, six villages, viz : Wetumka, situated on the Coosa, Muklasa, on the Tailapoosa, Ecunchattee, now a part of the city of Montgomery, Towassa on the same side of the river, three miles below Ecunchattee, Pawoktee, two miles below Towassa, and Autaugee, four miles below Pawoktee, but on the north bank of the river and near the mouth of a creek of the same name. The language of the Alibamos approximates nearer to the Choctaw than to the Muscogee, and their tribal name is undoubt edly of Choctaw origin and signifies Vegetationgatherers, i.e. gatherers of vegetation in clearing land for agricultural purposes. Alba, vegetation, amo, gather. From this tribe, the Alabama River received its name, and the state, from the river. Alibamo is the correct form of the word, having,as noted above, the prosaic signification of vegetation-gatherer ; for modern research has forever annihilated the romance of Here we rest. The Coshattees, the kinsfolk of the Alibamos, lived, in 1813, on the northern bank of the Alabama River, three miles below the conflu ence of the Coosa and Tailapoosa. The present American town of Coosauda occupies the site of the,old Coshattee town.
The fourth or western branch of the ChoctawMuscogee stock of Indians are the Choctaws and Chickasaws, whose homes were mostly in the present state of Mississippi, the Choctaws occupying the central and southern, and the Chickasaws, the north ern part. Both tribes speak the same language. The country between the Tombigbe and the Black

22

THE CREEK WAR.

Warrior, from time immemorial, had been disputed territory between the Choctaws and the Creeks, though Choctaw settlements, more or less tran sitory, always existed on the east side of the Tombigbee.
There is no doubt but the territory of the Choctaws, in the days of De Soto, extended farther to the east than in more recent times. The people of the town of Mauvila, destroyed by De Soto, were of Choctaw lineage, as is evidenced bythe name of their chief, Tascalusa, Black Warrior. Mauvila, too, may be the Choctaw Moelih, a plural of action, signifying to row, to paddle, toscutt, and the inhabitants of the town, as we may conjecture, may have received this name, the rowers, in consequence of their riparian sit uation, which necessitated a constant use of boats in navigating the river. Mobile, a French abbreviated corruption of Mauvila, is called by the modern Choctaws, Mo-il-la, a form bearing a close resemblance to both Mauvila and Moelih.* The people of the province of Pafallaya were also Choctaws a fact attested by the name itself Pafallaya, by elision from Pashfallaya, the long-haired.
The Chickasaws, who occupied not only North Mississippi, but also a part of Northwest Alabama, were a more martial people than their Choctaw kin dred. No enemy, white or red, ever defeated them in battle. They made a fierce resistance to the in vasion of De Soto and their subsequent wars with the French have added a luminous chapter to the annals of the Southwest.

* In Moelih oe must not be considered a diphthong. Both vowels

must be separately and distinctly pronounced.

H. S. H.

THE CHOCTAW-MUSCOGEE TRIBES.

23

But not all the peoples living within the territo rial bounds of the Choctaw-Muscogee tribes were of kindred blood. Living within and forming a com ponent part of the Creek Confederacy were some allophylic elements. The lichees, who claim to be the most ancient inhabitants of the country and whose language has no affinity with any other Amer ican tongue, were, in the eighteenth century, incor porated into the Confederacy and enrolled as Lower Creeks. In like manner, among the Upper Creeks, were enrolled many Shawnees,a people of the Algonquin stock. Sawanogee, on the Tallapoosa, was a Shawnee town, subject to the Creek laws. A rem nant of the celebrated Natchez tribe also lived among the Upper Creeks, having a village on Tallahatchee Creek, a tributary of the Coosa.
Of the Choctaw-Muscogee tribes, the Creeks, or Muscogees proper, stood pre-eminent over all the others, not only for prowess in war, but for political sagacity. The begiis&ingof their famous Confederacy is lost in the depths of antiquity. The Muscogees, it seems, having gained, in ancient times, a supremacy over the contiguous tribes, adopted the custom of receiving into a political system tribes that they had subjugated in war, or else, broken or fugitive tribes that applied to them for protection. A district was forthwith assigned to the new allies, who were al lowed to retain the use of their own language and customs, but were required to furnish aid for the maintenance and defense of the Confederacy. To wards the close of the eighteenth century a tradition was current among the Creeks that the Alibamos were the first tribe received into the Confederacy,

24

THE CREEK WA.R.

then the Coshattees, then the Katchez, and last, the lichees and Shawnees.
When the French first came in contact with the Southern Indians, early in the eighteenth century the Creek Confederacy already had a vigorous exis tence. Its power continually strengthened, until, in the early years of the nineteenth century, it stood forth, able to confront, for near ten months, the trained armies of the Federal Government and to threaten even the very existence of the numerous American communities within the present states of Mississippi and Alabama.

CAUtiES OF THE WAR.

25

CHAPTER II.
CAUSES OF THE CBEEK WAE.
'T'HE part of Alabama, with which, mainly, this 1 work has to do, has had a peculiar history and also some peculiar inhabitants. It may be well to rehearse briefly this history.
Every well informed American knows that Spain at first claimed and afterwards held Florida by " right of discovery," and its northern boundary was undefined; that Georgia, as the last of the thir teen colonies, was sailed by the English in 1733; and that the French came down the Mississippi as early as 1682, and claimed from the Great Lakes to the Gulf. In 1763 France ceded to Great Britain nearly all her claims east of the Mississippi and Spain ceded Flor ida to Great Britain.* The English divided Florida into two provinces, calling one East and the other West Florida. The latter extended as far north as latitude 32 28', which was the southern boundary of the English province called Illinois. As early as 1700-1699 the French commencing settlements on Mobile Bay, claimed what is now Alabama, and they held it for sixty-four years. They made
*The year 1763, the young reader will remember, marked the elostf of the French and Indian war by the treaty of Paris,

26

THE CREEK WAR.

some settlements up the Mobile and Ten saw rivers. In 1777 Anglo-Saxon or American settlements com menced along these rivers and up the Tombigbee. In 1783 West Florida went again into the posses sion of Spain, and the Spanish officials did not retire south of latitude 31 until 1799. During the War of the Revolution, and so long as Spanish rule con tinued, this river region attracted settlers from the Carolinas who were not satisfied with American independence. But after 1800, following the royal ists or tories, came also the loyal and true American pioneers. The flags of three nations therefore, of France, of England, and of Spain, had waved over the waters of these rivers before the stars and stripes, in 1799 were here unfurled.
Before proceeding further in the history we may look at some of the peculiar inhabitants.
Of this whole south-eastern portion of the coun try a characteristic feature was, in the latter part of the eighteenth century, the residence of white trad ers in every large Indian town, and 'at points well adapted for commerce and for intrigue. At Fort Toulouse on the Coosa river, established by the French in 1714, Captain Marchand was at one time commander. He was killed there in 1722. He had taken as a wife a Muscogee or Creek maiden of the Clan of the Wind, called the most powerful clan of the Creek nation. He had a beautiful daughter called Sehoy Marchand.
There came from a wealthy home in Scotland a youth of sixteen to see the wonders of this land. His name was Lachlan McGillivray. He landed in Carolina, joined the Indian traders about 1735, saw

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

27

at length the young Sehoy Marchand, "cheerful in countenance, bewitching in looks, and graceful in form," then herself about sixteen years of age, mar ried her, some say about 174:5, when he had gained some property, spent nearly fifty years as Indian trader and Georgia royalist in the American wilds, left his Indian children and his plantations, when the British left Savannah, about 1782, and returned to his native land, taking with him " a vast amount of money and movable effects." But of his Indian children, part Indian, part Scotch, part French, one, Alexander McGillivray, became noted, wealthy, and powerful. He was well educated at Charleston. He returned to the Indian country, took control of the Creek nation, received from the British the rank and pay of a British colonel in the War of the Rev olution, in 1784 went to Pensacola and made a treaty with Spain as being " Emperor" of the Greets and Seminoles, in 17|0 at New York made a treaty with the American -government receiving the rank of brigadier-general with a salary of twelve hun dred dollars a year, and afterwards was appointed by Spain Superintendent-General of the Creek na tion with a salary of two thousand dollars a year, which was increased in July, 1792, to thirty-five hundred. He was at the same time a member of a wealthy commercial house. He died in Pensacola February 17, 1793. One of his sisters, the beautiful and talented Sophia McGillivray, married Benjamin Durant, who was of Huguenot descent, who came from South Carolina and as early as 1786 was settled on the Alabama River. Another Indian trader, Charles Weatherford, some say from Scofc.

28

THE CREEK WAR.

land, some say from England, married a half sister of Alexander McGillivray, the daughter of a chief of pure Indian blood, who had been formerly mar ried to Colonel Tate, at one time a British officer at Fort Toulouse. We find here therefore the names of Tate, Durant, Weatherford, and McGillivray, as members of connected families of mixed blood, talented, wealthy, influential, with whom, as indivi duals, in the Creek-War history we shall become further acquainted. A number of other noted border men there were who need not here be named. But one more name should not be omitted.
General Le Clerc Milfort, a well educated Frenchman, was among the Muscogees from 1776 to 1796. and he also married a sister of Alexander McGillivray, who was sometimes called Colonel and in later life General McGillivray. Milfort was for some time a noted war chief among these Indians. He returned to France and published at Paris in 1802 a work known as u Gen. Milfort's Creek Indians." It does not appear that he left among the Indians any descendants
Mention has already been made of the settle ment of this part of the early West Florida, which became a part of the Mississippi Territory as that was organized in 1798 as far south as the thirty-first parallel of north latitude and extending north, as has been stated, to latitude 32 28'.* Spanish and British plantations had been along these rivers where indigo was largely cultivated, Spanish grants of land had been made to settlers, and French,

* Or from the mouth of the Yazoo River due east to the Chat' ahooeheei

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

29

Spanish, and British royalists had all become, in some sort, Americans.
In 1799, May 5th, Lieutenant McLeary, for the United States, took possession of the old Fort St. Stephens on the Tombigbee River, the Spanish gar rison marching out and descending the river below latitude 31 , the boundary line, this parallel, then hav ing been but recently surveyed. In July of that year Fort Stoddart* was established, three miles below the union of the Alabama and Tombigbee rivers, five by water, and about six above the Spanish line. Here was built a stockade with one bastion. Already, in Spanish times, quite a settlement had been made on Lake Tensaw, just east of the Alabama and the Cut Off and Nannahubba Island, largely by tories, where was opened "the first American school "in what became Alabama, John Pierce teacher, probably in 1799. Says Pickett: " There the high-blood descend ants of Lachlan Mcjrillivray the Taits, Weatherfords, and Durants the aristocratic Linders, the wealthy Mims, and the children of many others first learned to read. The pupils were strangely mixed in blood, and their color was of every hue."f
These early white settlements, including those of mixed blood, were on lands which the Indians had ceded to the British and Spanish authorities, and which, when Washington county was formed in June, 1800. belonged to the United States. Says Judge

*Written at first Stoddert.
t Captain John Linder was a native of Switzerland. He had been in Charleston as a British surveyor. He was aided by General McGillivray to settle with his family and a large num ber of colored servants at Tensaw Lake in the time of the Revo lution.

30

THE CREEK WAR.

Meek: "The various treaties of the French,British, and Spanish with the Indians made this region the resort of the first emigrants. The experiences of this back woods life, for more than twenty years, were quite as singular and wonderful as those of Boone and Kenton in Kentucky, or Sevier and Robertson in Tennessee."
These settlements, taking Judge Meek's quota tion from the American State Papers, were " thinly scattered along the western banks of the Mobile and Tombigbee for more than seventy miles, and extend ing nearly seventy-five miles upon the eastern bor ders of the Mobile and Alabama." For some time there was no actual civil government; there were no magistrates, no ministers, no marriage ceremonies. The young people were accustomed to marry them selves, that is they paired off, like birds, and lived together as husband and wife. Instead of weddings they had what were called pairings.
The reader may begin to think that the re hearsal of the history of this region with the notices of the peculiar inhabitants is not very brief; but surely the young reader, at least, will not object to tb is note, in which we will take a glance at a home where a very different scene will appear by and by. I quote: (The authority is Pickett, but not his words.)
" An instance is recorded of one couple who ob served a little more form than the others. It was Christmas night of 1800. Daniel Johnson and Miss Elizabeth Linder, at Lake Tensaw, were acknow ledged lovers. He was poor and she an heiress, so her parents objected, even in those wilds, to the 4 pairing.' A large party were that night assem-

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

31

bled at the house of Samuel Mims, and among these were the two lovers, enjoying the dance, the music, the festivities. During the evening a few young people, Johnson and Miss Linder among them, secretly left the house, embarked on board of some canoes, paddled down the lake and down the Alabama, and arrived at Fort Stoddart an hour be fore the dawn of day. Captain Shaumburg, a merry-hearted German, in command of the fort was called upon to perform the marriage ceremony. In vain he declared his ignorance of such ceremonies and his want of authority. He was told that he was placed there by the Federal Government to protect the people and to regulate their affairs, and that this little affair needed his sanction.
" At length the captain yielded to their solicita tions, and having the two lovers placed before him proclaimed : ' I, Captain Shaumburg, of the second regiment of the United States army, and commandant of Fort Stoddart, do hereby pronounce you man and wife. Go home, behave yourselves; multiply, and replenish the Tensaw country.' They re-entered their cagl>es, returned to the Tensaw Boat Yard, and the whole settlement pronounced them to be 'the best married people they had known in a long time.'"
In 1801 the inhabitants were estimated at seven hundred and fifty, (five hundred being whites), in these river settlements. In 1802 a trading house was established at St. Stephens. There were American settlers now between the rivers, and new ones on the west, from Georgia and the Carolinas, from Tennes see and Kentucky.* Settlers came in rapidly until

* By a supplementary act of Congress in 1804 there was added to the Mississippi Territory all the" tract of country" south of the State of Tennessee between Georgia on the east and Louisiana on the west. From Mississippi, Statutes in the library of Colonel J. W. Portia of/Suggsvttle, Clarke county, Alabama.

32

THE CREEK WAR.

1812, when it became evident that trouble with the Indians was near. In 1810 the population of Wash ington county was, whites 733, and blacks 517. Of Baldwin, formed in December, 1809, the population was, whites 667, and blacks 760. In the north, bor dering on Tennessee, there was then one county only, Madison." In December of 1812 Clarke county was formed by act of the territorial legislature, be ing the fourth county in what became Alabama. It may readily be seen that these river settlements were well called "completely insulated." South of them,between latitude 31 Q and the Bay, between the Perdido River and the Mississippi,were the Spaniards; on the east, between them and Georgia, were the Creeks ; on the west, between them and the Natchez and the Yazoo settlements, were the Choctaws; and on the north were the Chickasaws and Cresks between them and the nearest settlements in the bend of the Tennessee River. The reader will see therefore why this history is largely of the Creek War in South Alabama, although no Alabama state or ter ritory existed then; for in what became South Ala bama, then a part of the large Mississippi Territory, were then living the white settlers, about two thousand in number, with nearly two thousand blacks, who were deeply interested in this war, to whom it was indeed a matter of life or death.
And now we can more intelligently and with larger interest, having looked at some of these in habitants, examine the CAUSES of this Creek War. It was considered at first, a war upon the whites ; it became, at length, and mainly, a war, almost of ex termination, against the Indians.

ES SE E
S. S.I SIIS

-30

30--

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

33

The opening paragraph of the fifty-third chapter
of Ramsay's History of the United States, pub
lished in 1818, contains statements so just and
appropriate that they are repeated as an introduc
tory paragraph here.
"In treating of the causes and conduct of a war, maintained by a savage against a civilized nation, we are aware that the greatest caution ought to be observed, lest an undue degree of moral or physical superiority be ascribed to the latter. Between the contradictory narratives of enlightened nations, differing, as they often do, in the most minnte, as well as in the most important statements, the truth may generally be found. When, however, the art of recording and perpetuating events, is possessed only by one party, it is natural that misrepresenta tion should occur, and the annalist to whom one source of information only is open, finds it difficult to delineate the principal features of such hostilities without deserving the charge of partiality. Passion,, prejudice, the love of gain, and contempt for the rude ||id uninformed people by whom they are sur rounded, operate strongly to incite the frontier inhabitants of the Republic to hostilities, and to exaggerate the merit and importance of their triumphs over these undisciplined tribes. On the other hand, causes no less powerful, have long kept the greater part of the Indian people in a state of virtual warfare with the United States.
"The influence of feelings, common to all man kind in a similar situation, the desire of revenge, and the hope of re-possessing those happier seats, from which their ancestors were driven, added to the sense of their diminution, through the power and arts of their civilized neighbors, had, previously to the war of the United States with Great Britain, produced a spirit of irritation and animosity, which that event soon kindled into a flame."

34

THE CHEEK \VAR

That the Creek Indians should have been ready
for war when opportunity offered is by no means
surprising. That the Indians did not all unite and
sweep off the white settlers from all the Alabama
portion of the Mississippi Territory, is almost re
markable. From the time of the Spanish discover
ies the tread of the white man on American soil has
-usually meant aggression. The white man crowds.
He wants the choicest lands; he wants, in fact, the
whole. The Indian is hospitable for a time; he
yields; and then he tries to fight his way back.
In 1(521 Edward Winslow of Plymouth wrote to
a friend in London,
"We have found the Indians very faithful to their covenant of peace with us, very loving and ready to pleasure us. We often go to them, and they come to us.
"We entertain them pleasantly and familiarly in our cabins, and they, as friendly, bestow their veni son on us."
But as settlements advanced a change came. Mar-
tyn writes for 1637, as introducing his account of
the Pequod troubles,
"But now this old epoch was buried; a new one dawned. The Indians surveyed the in-coming pale face tide which seemed always to flow and never to ebb. They asked each other: 'Where will this end?'" And the Pequod war the extermination of the Pequods, resulted. Often history repeats itself.
The Indians known in this history as the
CREEKS, then occupying western Georgia and
what is now eastern and central Alabama, a
region watered by the Chattahoochee, Coosa,
Tallapoosa, Cahawba, and Alabama rivers, had seen
the growth of the settlements eastward of them in

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

35

Georgia. They knew something of the white settle ment in Tennessee. And since the year 1800 they had seen a brisk migration of white families from Georgia and the Carolinas, directly through their country, to the Mississippi Territory. They knew that white families were living east of the Tombig bee river, between that and the Alabama river, in what is now the county of Clarke, and that some even settled east of the Alabama. They themselves claimed west of the Alabama to the water :shed line, and this line bounded Clarke county on the east when it was set off from Washington county, December 10,1812. They had claimed ajso to the Tombigbee River, although the Choctaws claimed to the water shed ; and when in 1802 a treaty was made with the Choctaws and a tract of" land was ceded by them to the United States, a Creek chief, the Mad Wolf is reported to have said: "The people of Tombigbee have put over their cattle in the Fork, on the Alibamo hunti||j grounds, and have gone a great way on our lands. I want them put back. We all know they, are Americans."
These Alibarno Indians were the nearest of the Creek tribes and would naturally claim to the Tom bigbee river. They would at once feel the encroach ment of these white settlers. Thirty chiefs and warriors of the Greek nation were in Washington in the fall of 1805, and, through the influences brought to bear upon them there, they had'grauted the right " of using a horse path through their country." The chiefs agreed even to build bridges across the streams or to have ferry boats and to open houses of enter tainment for travellers. In this same year the Choc

36

THE CREEK WAR.

taws ceded five million acres of their land to the United States, including that which the Creeks claimed west of the water shed. Instead of fighting with the Choctaws for this strip of land it was agreed to leave the question of ownership to be decided by an Indian game of ball. One game was played by men and the Choctaws won the game. The Creeks were dissatisfied. The Choctaws then proposed that the women of each side should play. To this the Creeks agreed, and the Choctaw women won the game and held the land. This boundary line was surveyed in 1808, Creeks and Choctaws assisting in the work. Starting from what was afterwards called Hal's Lake, the line was to cross no water ; and the corner post was driven near the north line of Clarke county, the locality being called the Choctaw corner. Not far away a village is now situated called Choctaw Corner.
In 1811 Lieutenant Luckett with a party of soldiers cut out a road, called the " Federal Road," through the Creek country, from a point on the Chattahoochee River to Minis' Ferry on the Alabama, and this road was soon, in the language of those who knew the facts of that migration, ''filled from one end to the other" with parties of white families bound tor the river and the western settlements.
The " horse path" was now a government wagon road, and the Creek Indians could not fail to see that the whites were beginning to build up a large and permanent settlement on their very borders. It was evident that they would encroach more and more upon the Alibamo hunting grounds. Choice hunting grounds these were between the two

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

37

rivers, even as late as 1850. This wagon road of 1811 and this stream, of migration passing through the Creek nation awakened in many of the Creek warriors strong discontent. While efforts had been made to introduce civilization among them, and with some success, yet many were restless amid the restraints which were increasing around them. The Spaniards also disliked these river settlements, and they excited still more the discontent of the Creek warriors. As Pensacola was at this time the great place of trade for the Indians and for these white settlers, it was very easy for these Spanish traders to learn the growth of the settlements and to arouse hostility in the minds of the Indians. Pensa cola, to some extent, was responsible for the Creek War. But perhaps the most active agent in stirring up strife, outside of the Creek nation, was the noted Indian chief, Tecumseh, well called great, who came like a blast from the North, endeavoring to lead the Southern tribes to join his great con federacy. As he will be fully mentioned in other chapters two sentences only in regard to him will be given here.
" Brave, sagacious, and enterprising, he left no means untried to retard at least, if he could not prevent, the approaching extermination of his tribe.'3
" He visited, in person, all the tribes west of the Mississippi, and on Lakes Superior, Huron, and Erie, exciting them to hostilities by the appeals of religion and interest."
There is also another fact to be considered here. Alexander McGillivray who has been already men tioned, born at Little Tallassee, four miles above the

38

THE CREEK WAR.

present Wetumpka, in 1746, Drake says, about 1739 commencing his public life as early as 1766, had held a very firm control over these Indians. Brewer speaks of him as the controlling mind in that region,
the most distinguished native then born, and at the
head of the Muscogee confederacy, which was more compact and formidable at that time than at any other known period of its history. Brewer further says, that he wielded an influence over his people "not felt since the days of Tuskaloosa. He was a diplomatist and scholar among a nation of savages."
Pickett speaks of him as possessing the most marked ability of any man born or reared on Ala bama soil. He was now dead ; and there was no one to take his place as a recognized head of the nation. In that year after his death, 1793, such was the commotion among Indians, Spaniards, and Americans, (and some very bad Americans were
among the Indians), that Pickett wrote, "It appeared that the evil one himself was stalking through this wild region." Native Indian chiefs were now again coming forward to exercise their rights of govern ment, such as Big Warrior, as Menawa, and others; while leaders of mixed blood were also exerting their influence. There was no head. The United States Agent, Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, residing for some time among them, was not their ruler, and it is not strange that a conflict broke out among them selves. Some of them continued on friendly terms with the whites, but others became very hostile.
From these statements it appears that the great ) exciting cause of this war was, the large and
growing settlement of white pioneers along the

CAUSES OF THE WAR.

39

Tombigbee and the Alabama rivers. Encroach ments upon the Indian hunting grounds and rights were of necessity made. The great wagon road was an encroachment; the. presence of so many white families with their cattle and hogs and horses was an encroachment. It needed not Tecumseh's stirring words to assure them that they must before long give up their Indian life, cultivate the ground, and accept the white man's civilization; or they must migrate; or they must break up this settlement of sturdy frontier families on their western borders. Their proposed attempt thus to do, encouraged by the Spaniards, by Tecumsehand the British, brought on the disastrous Creek War.

40

THE CREEK WAR.

CHAPTER III.
TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHICKASAWS AND CHOCTAWS.
I N the summer of 1811, the celebrated Shawnee chief, Tecumseh, at the head of twenty armed and mounted warriors, visited the Southern Indians. His object was to induce these tribes to join the Indian Confederacy which he was forming to act in concert with the British troops in the war then impending with the United States. In company with Tecumseh was his kinsman, Seekaboo, who was to act the role of prophet and interpreter in the Southern councils.
Seekaboo was, probably, born in the Creek na tion, had certainly once lived there, and in early life had emigrated north with some Shawnees. He was, at the time of Tecumseh's visit to the South, about forty years of age, a brave warrior, an eloquent orator, and gifted linguist, speaking English, Shawnee, Choctaw, and Muscogee, by which attainments he exercised great influence in the Indian councils. Seekaboo was related to Tecumseh in this manner : His mother's mother was a sister of the mother of Tecumseh. His father was a half-breed, the off spring of a white man with a Creek woman.
Save one meager incident, both history and tra dition are silent as to the details of Tecumseh's visit

TECUMSEU 'AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

41

to the Chickasaws, what places he visited and how long be tarried among them, only that his mission was in vain. The tradition that has been handed down is that in the upper part of the Chickasaw nation, Tecumseh and his warriors came to the house of George Colbert. He made known to Colbert the object of his-visit, and that he wished the Chicka saws to join the confederacy, and that at the proper time all the tribes were to go to war against the Americans, and he wished Colbert to use his influ ence with his people in effecting this object. Col bert, in reply, told Tecumseh that the Chickasaws were, at peace with the whites and wished to remain so; and that he certainly would not use his influence towards involving them in any war. Tecumseh, see ing that Colbert would give no countenance to his designs, took his departure.
On leaving the Chickasaw nation,'as a tradition runs, Tecumseh crossed the Oktibbeha Creek, the Choctawand Chickasaw boundary, some three miles southwest of the present site of West Point, Missis sippi, near Dick's old ferry, and there taking the Six Towns' trail, which led southerly, he camped, his first night in the Choctaw nation, in a grove on a hill, in the southwestern part of Lowndes County, about two miles from the Noxubee County line and about two hundred yards from that of Oktibbeha. This place is now occupied by the residence of the late Alien Brooks. The next morning, Tecum seh continued his southward march in the Six Towns' trail, which crossed Noxubee Elver, about six hun^ dred yards above Bugg's ferry, and about seven miles beyond, he arrived at the residence of Mingo

42

THE CREEK WAR.

Moshulitubbee, the present Mashulaville, in Noxubee County.
Tecumseh remained at Moshulitubbee's house for several days, and a number of Choctaw mingoes and warriors came to see him. It seems that no regular council was held here, and Tecumseh made known the object of his visit, but it was received with no favor by the Choctaws present.
Tecumseh and his Shawnees then went to the village of a noted warrior, named Hoentubbee, Mo shulitubbee sending a warrior with him as a guide. The village of Hoentubbee was situated near the present residence of Eli as Round tree, in the north western part of Kemper County, some six hundred yards north of Ben Dick Creek and about two miles from the Neshoba County line. Hoentubbee, in after years, in speaking of Tecumseh and his war riors, stated that all were armed, dressed, and painted alike. Their arms were rifles, with tomahawks and scalping knives in their belts. Their dress was a buclaskin hunting shirt, a cloth flap, with buckskin leggins and moccasins profusely fringed and beaded. All wore garters below the knees. Their hair was plaited in a long cue of three plaits hanging down between the shoulders, while each temple was closely shaven. The heads of all, except Tecuraseh, were adorned with plumes of hawk and eagle feathers. Tecumseh wore, depending from the crown of his head, two long crane feathers, one white, the other dyed a brilliant red. According to Indian symbol ism, the white feather was an emblem of peace, peace among the various Indian tribes. The red feather was a war emblem, war to their enemies,

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

43

the Americans. They wore silver bands on each arm, one around the wrist, one above and one below the elbow, and a few wore silver gorgets suspended from their necks. Around the forehead of each, encircling the head, was a red flannel band about three inches wide, and over this a silver band. Semi circular streaks of red war-paint were drawn under each eye, extending outward on the cheek bone. A small red spot was painted on each temple, and a large round red spot on the centre of the breast.
Tecumseh remained a number of days at the vil lage of Hoentubbee, and at his request, many of the noted Choctaws came there to meet him in council and listen to his talk. Among those present, were Pushmataha and Moshulitubbee, mingoes, respec tively, of the southeastern and northeastern districts. The Shawnees first danced their national dance, and after this the council convened near Hoentubbee's house. Tecumseh arose and through Seekaboo made a long talk. He spoke much of the bad con duct of the white people, how they were seizing the Indians' lands and reducing them to poverty, and he urged the Choctaws to join him in a general war against the oppressors. He urged, too, upon the Choctaws the duty of living at peace with the other Indian tribes ; and that all the tribes ought to quit their inter-tribal wars and unite in a general con federacy; that by this means they could keep their lands and preserve their nationalities. Tecumseh also spoke of the impending war with Great Britain, and that the.Choctaws must unite with the other tribes and all declare themselves allies of Great Britain. If we are to credit one of our Choctaw

44

THE CREEK WAR.

informants, Tecumseh also, in this talk, as well as in subsequent talks, spoke very earnestly against the Indian custom of killing women and children in war. This custom they should renounce, and henceforth, in all wars, the lives of women and children should be spared.
Such are some of the traditions of Tecumseh's talk, and among these, his reprobation of a barba rous war custom of his race is creditable to his hu manity. Some of this talk was, by no means, dis pleasing to the Choctaws. They approved of the idea of the different tribes renouncing their inter tribal wars and living at peace with each other. And they by no means objected to his advice that all Indians should renounce the custom of killing women and children in war; but they were sus picious and wary of his proposal to declare them selves allies of Great Britain. Their relations with the Americans had ever been harmonious, and they disliked any proposal that would sever those ties of peace.
Pushrnataha replied to Tecumseh, and in his talk told his people not to think of going to war; that the Choctaws had never shed the blood of white men in war ;* that they had ever been at peace with them and must continue so; that there was no cause of war with the white people, and that a war with them would end in the ruin of their nation; that the white people were the friends of the Choc-

* It is true that the Choctaws fought against the Spaniards at Mauvila and Cabusto. But it must not be supposed that Pushmataha knew anything about these, to him, prehistoric matters.
H. S. H.

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

45

taws, and they must not make enemies of them by taking the talk of Tecumseh.
The council dissolved and Tecumseh's talk was all in vain. Not one Choctaw was disposed to take his talk. During his stay at this village, which was several days, Tecumseh seems to have conceived a warm regard for Hoentubbee. Before his departure, he presented the latter a silver ornament or gorget, which Hoentubbee kept for a long time until it was destroyed by the burning of his house many years afterwards. An aged son of Hoentubbee, still living, states that Tecumseh also gave his father a written or printed paper or parchment, to which a red seal or stamp was affixed. The nature of this document must be left entirely to conjecture. As Tecumseh was connected with the British authorities, could this have been a paper authorizing the holder, in case he should join the hostiles, to draw military supplies from the Spaniards at Pensacola ?
Tecumseh and his warriors, after leaving Hoentubbee's village, next went to Yazoo, situated in Neshoba County, about eleven miles south of east of Philadelphia, now known as Yazoo Old T,pwn. The mingo of this place was named Tanampo Eshubbee. The Shawnees remained here three or four days, in which they danced their national dance, and another council was held and another talk was made by Tecumseh with reply by Pushmataha, both of the same nature and with the same result as at the village of Hoentubbee.
Tecumseh and his warriors then went to Mokalusha. This was one of the most noted and popu lous towns of the Choctaws. It was situated upon

46

THE CREEK WAR.

a plateau on the headwaters of Talasha Creek, about twelve miles southeast of Philadelphia. The houses of the town, with the small fields interspersed, covered an area three miles long, north and south, and a mile and a half wide, east and west. During the farming season, the boys of the town kept the horses and cattle herded out on the range be yond the suburbs, to prevent their- depredating on the crops, which were mostly cultivated by the women, while the men generally spent their time in hunting. Such was the division of labor in Mokalusha. Mokalusha is a corruption of Imoklasha, which signifies " Their people are there." About 1824, this ancient town was, in a great measure
abandoned on account of the ravages of the small pox.
The Shawnees remained about a week at Moka lusha, and the same Ghoctaw mingoes came hither who had attended the former councils. After the Siiawnees had danced their national dance, a coun cil convened on a hill situated about the centre of the eastern edge of the town, This hill is now occupied by the residence of the late Colonel James Wilson. Tecumseh here through Seekaboo made his talk, to which Pushmataha again replied. The Shawnee chief a third time failed to make any im pression on the Choctaws.
After this council, the Shawnees, travelling down the east side of Talasha Creek, went to Chunky Town, which was situated on the west side of Chunky Creek, half a mile below the confluence of Talasha and Chunky creeks, and about five miles above Hickory Station. It is stated that Push ma-

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

47

taha and the other mingoes, from some cause, did not follow Tecumseh to Chunky. In Tecumseh's day, and down to the treaty of Dancing Rabbit, in
1830, the long peninsular strip of country, into which Tecumseh entered after leaving Mokalusha, and which lies between Talasha and Tallihatta creeks and thence continuing southward to the con fluence of Tallihatta and Chunky creeks, was under the jurisdiction of a, mingo named Iskifa Chito, Big Axe. His residence was on the west bank of Tal lihatta, near which spot is now Day's mill. This peninsula is still known by the old Choctaws as Iskifa Chito in Yakni, Big Axe's Country.
Pierre Juzan, a noted -French Indian country man, at this time was living at Chunky Town. He had settled among the Choctaws in early life, and had married a Choctaw woman, a niece of Pushmataha, and raised an Indian family. He spoke Eng lish, French, and Choctaw with equal fluency. Juzan had several trading houses among the Choctaws, one being at Coosha Town, situated three or four miles southeast of old Daleville, on the right bank of Issuba in Kannia bok (Lost Horse Creek), and another at Chunky. His dwelling house at Chunky was on the west side of the creek and about two hundred yards from it. He had here an apple orchard, a rare thing in an Indian country the trees or scions for which he had brought from
C3
France. He also had another residence at Coosha. Juzan died about 1840, at Tuscahoma, on the Tombigbee. Some time after his death, his family, with the exception of a daughter, emigrated west.
On the day of their arrival at Chunky, Tecumseh

48

THE CREEK WAR.

and Seekaboo called upon Juzan and had a long interview with him, in the course of which they endeavored to persuade him to use his influence with the Choctaws to induce them to join the Indian Confederacy. Juzan became greatly indignant and spurned the Shawnees3 proposition. He turned away and would hold no further conversation with them. It so happened that same day that Okla homa, a noted mingo from Ooosha, a nephew of Pushmataha and brother of Juzan's wife, was in Chunky with a number of his warriors. He was soon informed by Juzan of the object of Tecumseh's visit, whereupon he became greatly enraged and forthwith ordered his warriors to mould bullets and prepare to make battle against the Shawnees. He also sent a messenger to Iskifa Chito, to inform him of the situation and to urge him to prepare for war against the Shawnee intruders. Tecumseh, whose object was to harmonize all Indians, saw the drift of affairs, and wishing to avoid any hostile collision, he summoned his warriors and quietly withdrew from the place. The Choctaw traditions here vary. According to one tradition, Tecumseh with all his warriors then returned to Moshulitubbee's. But according to another, the Shawnees after withdrawing from Chunky, divided into two parties, one party, under Tecumseh, returning to Moshulitubbee's, whilst the other party, under Seekaboo, went down south into the present Jasper County among the Six Towns Indians, who were considered the fiercest and most warlike of all the Choctaws. Here some talks were made. Thence, making a detour to the northeast, Seekaboo's party

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS,

49

went to Coosha. Whether at this place they again encountered the hostility of Oklahoma, we have no information. From Coosha, Seekabo went to Yahnubbee Town, situated on Yahnubbee Creek, eight miles south west of DeKalb. The present DeKalband Decatur road traverses the site of the old town. Making but a short stay at Yahnubbee, Seekaboo thence returned to Moshulitubbee's, where the two Shawnee parties again re-unitect.
In some way that cannot now be ascertained, it seems that by mutual agreement, there was to be a final council of the Choctaws with Tecumseh, and another residence .of Moshulitubbee, situated in Koxubee County, about five miles northeast of Brooksville, was selected as the council ground. In going to this council, Tecumseh with his warriors travelled back the same route that he came until he crossed Koxubee River. There he left the Six Towns trail and took another, which led northeast and terminated at this second home of Moshulitub bee. Here the Shawnees remained full two weeks, and all the great mingoes and principal men of the Choctaws came hither to hear the talk of the great Tecumseh. Of these, tradition has preserved the names of Pushmataha, Moshulitubbee, Puckshenubbee, Mingo of the western district, Hoentubbee, David Folsom, and John Pitchlyn.
A few words as to this locality, which is now embraced in the Chester plantation of the late Colonel Thomas G. Blewett. The house of Moshuli tubbee stood upon the crest of a hill, about a quarter of a mile westerly of the dwelling house of the plantation. About one hundred and twenty-five

50

THE CREEK WAR.

yards west of the dwelling house, stood a large red oak, with broad spreading leafy branches. Under this tree the council took place. It was the inten tion of Colonel Blewett to have this tree preserved on account of its historic associations. But in 1855, without the Colonel's knowledge, and to his great regret, the overseer had it destroyed.
When the appointed time came and the Shawnees had finished their dance, the council convened under the oak, and Tecum'seh, through Seekaboo, made his talk. From the best information now attainable, the ideas of Tecumseh's talk at this coun cil were much the same as in the harangue at Hoentubbee's; in fact, his harangues everywhere among the Choctaws were substantially the same. As a patriot, though it may be, a misguided one, Tecumseh saw the necessity of the tribes uniting in a con federation, so as to preserve their lands and their nationalities. To effect this purpose, he urged that it was necessary for them, under the circumstances, to take the side of the British in the inevitable con flict. A born savage, though he was, the great Shawnee had an innate humanity that caused him to reprobate all unnecessary barbarity in war, and in every council, he told his wild Indian fellow country men to renounce the custom of slaying women and children in war. The expression in Tecumseh's speech at Tuckabatchee, recorded in Claiborne's Sam Dale "Slay their women and children" is an error, a mis take. At no period in life, in none of his war speeches, did Tecumseh ever give vont to such a sentiment.
This was Tecumseh's last talk to the Choctaws. The next day, Pushmataha made his reply. He

TEGUMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

51

spoke of the long existing friendship of the white people and the Choctaws, between whom no wars had ever occurred, and the Choctaws could truly say that they had never shed the blood of white men in war. There was no war, or cause of war with white people, and the Choctaws must not be led into any war by Tecumseh. In closing his speech he turned to the mingoes present and said that if any Choctaw warrior should take the talk of Tecumseh and join the hostiles, and should he not be killed in battle, he must be put to death on his return home.
The other mingoes also made talks after Pushmataha, and all concurred in his opinion that if any warrior should take the talk of Tecumseh, he must be put to death. All the mingoes seemed willing to follow the lead of Pushmataha, who from the very beginning, had taken a stand against Tecumseh. John Pitchlyn and David Folsom also used an active influence against the Shawnees. The statement in Claiborne's Mississippi that some of the Choctaw mingoes were hostile or inclined to take Tecumseh's talk is altogether erroneous. As to the hostility of Hopaii Iskitini, Little Leader, it is sufficient to say that he was a mere boy at that time, probably about twelve years of age.
After all the speeches were made, the mingoes held a private conference in regard to Tecumseh, after which they informed him of their decision, which was that if he did not leave their country they would put .him to death. They also commis sioned David Folsom to take a band of warriors and see Tecumseh safe across the Tombigbee. It is not known how soon after Tecumseh obeyed this injunc-

58

THE CREEK WAR.

tion. But both parties, Tecumseh and his Shawnees, and Folsom with his Choctaws, all mounted and equipped, in due time, marched towards the south east and arrived at the Tombigbee, near the present little village of Memphis, in Pickens County, Ala bama, where they camped. Hoentubbee was with Folsom's party, and also two or three white men. The next morning all went to work to make rafts to cross the river. The rafts were made by tying logs together with grape vines. The warriors seated themselves on the rafts, and while some would pad dle, others would hold the horses by the bridle and make them swim in the rear. By sunset, a part of the Shawnees had launched their rafts and crossed over, Tecumseh among the number. Folsom re mained with the other party on the western bank.
The ensuing night, it happened that a large party of marauding Creek warriors crossed the river below, came into Folsom's camp and stole several Choctaw and Shawnee horses. They took them several miles below, tied them in a swamp, then taking the back trail, they hid themselves in the cane, about two miles below Folsom's camp. The next morning, finding several of their horses missing, some of the Choctaws and Shawnees, part mounted and part afoot, went in search of them. They soon discovered the marauders' trail and were eagerly following it up when they came near the Muscogee ambuscade. Here, all at once, they received a gall ing fire from the wily foe, by which some were killed and some wounded. The remainder returned the fire, then fled, hotly pursued, back to the camp. Ill the retreat, a horse was shot in the shoulder.

TECITMSEH AMONG THE CHOCTAWS.

53

His rider, a Shawnee, then leaped to the ground and continued his flight afoot. Without further casualty, the party arrived at the camp. The Muscogees took possession of a hill which stood to the south of the camp, and now from hill-top to valley, the fight began to rage, the Choctaw and the Shawnee pitted against the martial Muscogee. The camp on the other side of the river heard the firing, and Tecumseh's warrior spirit was aroused. All crossed over to the relief of the beleauguered camp, and the fight raged with greater fury. The smoke of battle soon darkened the field, enveloping the Muscogees on the hill and settling down on the cane-brake which sheltered the Choctaws and the Shawnees. The Creeks made several efforts to drive their enemies from their cover. At one time two daring warriors, making a flank movement, had even penetrated to the Choctaws' rear, but were there discovered and slain. All day, with rival bravery, the warriors of Tecumseh and Folsom fought the common foe. About sunset, encouraged by Tecumseh, an assault was made up the hill, the Muscogees were disloged and put to flight, and the shouts of the victors resounded over the field. Both sides had a considerable number killed and wounded, Folsom, whilst standing behind a tree, in the act of shooting at a warrior in his front, received a rifle ball through the right shoulder from another hostile warrior, who had taken a position in front of the Choctaw right flank. Hoentubbee also received a wound, though a slight one, being struck by a spent ball. "While fighting bravely against the enemy, a rifle ball struck a large cane in his front and glanc-

54

THE CHEEK WAR.

ing struck the warior with considerable force on the breast. For a moment supposing himself smitten with a mortal wound, Hoentubbee cried out with a loud voice, "Saliishke! " "I am dead!" But he soon realized that he was not so dead after all. This little incident afforded much amusement to the Choctaw warriors. The Creeks, according to their national custom, bore off from the field all their wounded, and as many of their slain warriors as they could with safety to themselves. But they were compelled to abandon a few, whom the Choctaws plundered and scalped without compunction. The Shawnees took no part in this act, perhaps, by the command of Tecuniseh, since the fight was a necessity forced upon them. The next morning, the victors buried their dead, then all able to do so crossed the river, -Folsom, notwithstanding his wound, crossing over with his people. Folsom's mission was now accom plished. He had seen the Shawnees across the Tombigbee, and they now separated, the Shawnees continuing their course towards the domains of the Muscogees and the Seminoles.
The Choctaw warriors now resolved not to re-cross the Tombigbee until they had retaliated upon the Muscogees for the loss of their horses and the death of their warriors. Folsom returning to Moshulitubbee's on account of his wound, the fierce braves selected another leader, went over to the Black War rior, and there wreaked their vengeance to the full. They burned a number of the houses of the Mus cogees, slew their warriors, and seized their horses. By a strange freak of fortune, they recovered, in a cane brake on the Black Warrior, the very game

TECUMSEH A.MONG THE GHOCTAWS.

55

Choctaw and Shawnee horses that had been captured on the Tombigbee. At last, enriched with booty and scalps, they recrossed the Tombigbee in triumph, thence went to the house of Mingo Achillitubbee, (in Neshoba County, half a mile north east of the Bogue Ohitto bridge), where they under went those ceremonies of purification customary, in ancient times, among the Choctaws on their return home from the war path.

NOTES.
The above sketch of Tecumseh's visit to the Chickasaws and Choctaws has been worked out from original and authentic sources. The greater part of the information was received from Charley Hoentubbee, of Kemper County, a son of the warrior, Hoentubbee. In 1880, the writer had repeated con versations with Charley Hoentubbee, who related to him all the facts that he had ever heard from his father in regard to Tecumseh's visit to the Choctaws. He stated that he had often heard his father talk about this visit. Hoentubbee, the warrior, died in Kemper County, in 1860. In 1885, the writer also interviewed the aged Hemonubbee, of Neshoba County, in regard to Tecumseh. Hemonubbee stated that he was a boy about twelve years of age, when Tecumseh passed through the Choctaw iNation; that his father, Fillamotubbee, attended several of the, councils; and in after years, he had often heard his fa ther and other Choctaws converse about Tecumseh's visit. Hemonubbee's statements were substantially the same as Hoentubbee's, though not so much in de tail. Neither Hoentubbee nor Hemonubbee, however, was very familiar with the incidents of Tecumseh's visit to Chunky. For these incidents, the writer is indebted to the late Mr. James Cassels of Newton

56

THE CREEK WAR.

County and Jack Amos, a Choctaw, of the same county. Both related the same identical facts, Mr. Cassels receiving the information fromPierre Juzan,
and Amos, from Oklahoma. Amos is a nephew of Oklahoma and grand nephew of Pushmataha, being a grandson of Nahotima, a sister of Pushmataha. In 1877, Mr. G. "W. Campbell, of Noxubee County, re
lated to the writer some facts about Tecumseh's visit, he receiving the information, in early life, from.
Stonie Hadjo, one of Moshulitubbee's captains, who died in Noxubee County, about 1838. Stonie Hadjo's
statements, as far as they went, agreed with those of Hoentubbee and Hemonubbee. Mr. Campbell and Hoentubbee, however, could not recollect the name of Tecumseh's interpreter, Seekaboo, Mr.Campbell simply remembering Stonie Hadjo's statement
that he was a relative of Tecumseh's mother. But Mr. Cassels, Jack Amos, and Hemonubbee remem bered the name distinctly, Amos stating besides that the Choctaws were astonished at Seekaboo's famil
iarity with their language. Hemonubbee gave the precise relationship of Seekaboo to Tecumseh, which fact, Seekaboo must have related to the Choctaws. The Choctaws' informants all agree in stating that
Tecumseh and his warriors were mounted. From a short biographical sketch of David Fol-
som, in the bibliography of the Muskhogean lan-
faages, the inference might possibly be drawn that olsom was too young to be a man of affairs in Te cumseh's day. In reply to this possible objection, the writer will state that he has been informed bv an old citizen of Mississippi, who knew David Folsom well, that Folsom had grown children at the
time of the treaty of Dancing Eabbit, in 1830. This would surely make Folsom old enough to be a man
of some influence among the Choctaws in 1811, nineteen years before the treaty. The writer be sides closely questioned Charley Hoentubbee on this
special point, and he stoutly contended that David

TECUMSEH AMONG TEE CHOCTAWS.

57

Folsom was the man that conducted the Shawnees

across the Tombigbee.

The meager incident of Tecumseh's Chickasaw

visit was received from the late Mr. W. G. Harris,

of "Winston County. Mr. Harris stated that in 1833

'he spent a night at the house of George Colbert, on

Shookatonche Creek, and that in their conversation

Colbert related to him this incident.

The best documentary evidence has been followed

in giving twenty as the number of Tecumseh's war

riors, but Hoentubbee's tradition makes them much

more numerous.

After sifting and comparing all the information

given by the above parties in regard to Tecumseh's

Southern visit, the writer is satisfied that all the

statements which he has recorded in the above chap

ter are substantially correct.

The topographical matter is the result of per

sonal observations.

H. S. H.

58

THE CREEK WAR,

CHAPTEK IY
TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.
THE visit of this noted chief to the Creek Indians has been named as one of the causes leading to the Creek War.
Some notice of this visit seems to be desirable in this history, although not a part, strictly, of the war record.
It is singular that there is so much discrepancy among good and, in the main, reliable historians in regard to the time of this visit; but as one pushes researches onward with thoroughness in almost any line of investigation he finds that, in regard to man, it is more than easy to make mistakes. Some of these mistakes can be, some of them cannot be, cor rected.
Eamsay says, and he is an excellent and careful historian, speaking of the Southern Indians : " In the spring of the year 1812, they were visited by the celebrated Tecumseh, whose designs appear to have been of the most extensive nature. The bold and enterprising genius of this chief led him to pene trate into the most remote quarters in the further ance of his great object. With an ardent, but sav age, eloquence he endeavored to excite them to

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

59

resistance against what he represented as a flagrant oppression."*
Many writers since have evidently followed Ram say or Alabama's leading historian, Pickett. In " Indian Wars of the United States * * From the Best Authorities," by "William Y. Moore, pub lished by R. W. Pomeroy, 1841, under the heading " The Creek War," the first sentence is the follow ing : " In the spring of 1812 the Southern Indians were visited by the celebrated Tecuinseh, who, with an ardent but savage eloquence, urged them to take up arms against the whites." (Moore has again fol lowed Ramsay in saying that in Fort Mims were three hundred persons and that only seventeen escaped.)
An effort was made, as will appear in the notes on this chapter, to obtain some documentary evi dence from state papers at Washington. The officials of the War Department, finding no desired document,referredas competent authorityto Lossing's "Field Book of the War of 1812." This was examined and the statements were found,page 745,that Tecumseh had visited the Southern Indians "as early as the spring of 1811," and that " in the autumn of 1812 * * * Tecumseh went again to the Gulf Region." Also that he took his brother, the Prophet, with him and about thirty men. He seems to rely largely for his authority on Pickett. He gives yet another date. Speaking of thq year 1813, he says: "* * * that in the spring of that year Tecumseh (who was slain on the Thames a few
* See Ramsay's United States, published May 1, 1818, "Sec ond Edition, Revised and Corrected," vol. 3, page 35 j.

60

THE CREEK WAR.

months later) went among the Southern tribes, to

arouse them to wage war upon the white people."

Lossing's U. S. History for families and libraries,

page 427.

Lossing is a good, in the main no doubt,a reliable

historian, but made, as all are liable to do, some mis

takes.

Parton says, in his " Life of Jackson," published

in 1870: " In the spring of 1811 Tecumseh, leaving

his affairs in the hands of the Prophet, as Moses did

in those of Aaron when he ascended the Mount,

went to the South preaching his crusade. Far and

long he travelled, sowing the seeds of future wars."

He speaks of his being among the Seminoles, the

Creeks, the Cherokees, and the tribes of the Des

Moines; how " he held the war council, delivered his

impassioned TALK, and strode away." He adds:

"The fall of 1812 again found Tecumseh, accom

panied by the Prophet and a retinue of thirty war

riors^, haranguing the Creeks in the midnight council,

and this time with prodigious effect. Now he could

point to the successes of the British in the North;

now he could give certain promises of assistance

from the English and Spaniards in Florida; now he

spoke with the authority of a British agent and offi

cer. "

Francis S. Drake, in his " Indian Tribes of the

United States," 2nd volume, 1884, also says: *' In

the spring of 1811 Tecumseh, leaving his affairs in

the hands of his brother, the Prophet," he omits

the allusion to Moses " went to the South preach

ing his crusade." And ao-ain he savs : " The fall of

O

O

*/

1812 again found Tecumseh, accompanied by the

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

61

Prophet and a retinue of thirty warriors, haranguing the Creeks in the midnight council, and this time with prodigious effect." It is needless to quote further. The words are the same as the words of Parton. Both Parton and Drake write the same words without any marks of quotation. Evidently some of the historians are too credu lous, some too imaginative, and some are too careless.
Even Pickett says that Tecumseh went in the spring of 1812 and was south as late as October of that year.
Eggleston rather strangely says, for one who might be supposed to be very accurate, "A careful comparison of dates shows that Tecumseh started to the South in the spring of the year 1811, and returned to the North soon after the battle of Tippecanoe was fought."
McKenney wisely says, Tecumseh went South "about the year 1811," It is no wonder that one who looks over the various works in which Tecum seh and the Creek War are briefly treated should! feel it prudent many times to say "about."
But researches continued for several months seem now to leave, on this one point, no further room fordoubt.
In C. R. Tuttle's "History of the Border Wars of Two Centuries" there is a reference to Charles, De Wolf Brownell's Indian Races of North and South America, in which Tecumseh's visit to the Creeks is placed in 1811. This year is certainly the correct date. The following statements will prove this and also show the month and the day.

62

THE CREEK WAR,

It is well established in Indiana history that the movements of Tecumseh and his brother, called the Prophet, retarded the settlement of Indiana Terri tory in the year 1810. The sagacious Indian chief was then endeavoring to perfect what became known as "Tecumseh's Confederacy." August 12, 1810, Tecumseh with some seventy warriors visited General Harrison, then territorial governor, at Vincennes. The conference lasted till August 22nd. August 20th, Tecumseh delivered his celebrated speech, in which he gave to the white people the alternative of restoring to the Indians, whom he claimed to represent, their lands, or of meeting those Indians in battle. Before this date, in 1805, the Prophet, who was called Law-le-was-i-kaw, or the Loud Yoice, had assumed the name Pemsquat-a-wah, or the Open Door, and in the spring of 1808 he had removed from Greenville, Ohio, to the "Wabash valley of In diana^ where he established what was called the Prophet's Town, and in August of 1808 he had vis ited Governor Harrison at Yincennes. Early in 1811 the British agent for Indian affairs adopted measures to secure the support of as many Indians as possible in the war that even then seemed to be unavoidable. That these measures included confer ences and arrangements with Tecumseh seems prob able, although no certain evidence has been found.
July 27th, 1811, Tecumseh again visited Governor Harrison at Vincennes. He objected persistently to the treaties that had been made, wherein lands were said to be sold to the United States by single tribes of Indians. He claimed that one tribe could not

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

63

sell lands belonging more or less, as he claimed, to all the tribes in common. (In 1807, at Chillicothe, he had occupied between three and four hours in the delivery of a speech which was said to have been "eloquent and masterly, and showed that he possessed thorough knowledge of all the treaties which had been made for years."* "He was at this time one of the most splendid specimens of his tribe celebrated for their physical proportions and fine forms." He is described as having been v' tall, athletic, and manly, dignified and graceful * * * the beau ideal of an Indian chieftain.")
As he and General Harrison could come to no perfect agreement at their conference, Tecumseh then said that he was going to visit the Southern Indians and would return to the Prophet's Town, and that the next spring he would visit the President at "Washington and settle all cause of difficulty.
With twenty warriors he started immediately for the South. He left Vincennes August 5,1811, and went down the Wabash River, f Of his journey south of the Ohio, till he reached the Chickasaws, there seems to be no record. Governor Harrison wrote to the "War Department early in August, 1811, " that Tecumseh said he would be back next spring, but I am told in three months he will return. For four years he has been in constant motion."
That Tecumseh was in Indiana Territory in

* See Brice's History of Fort Wayne, page 175. I place large confidence in local histories. T. H. B.
f How the statement originated that he left Detroit with thirty men mounted on horses, I have not ascertained. It is surely not correct history. I infer rather that he left Vincennes in boats, for he " descended the Wabash." T. H. B.

64

THE CREEK WAR.

July, 1811, is certain. That he left Yincennes in August is beyond question.* That either in August or early in September of 1811 he was among the Chickasaws is also very certain.
For confirmation of these statements see the fol lowing extracts from American State Papers, copied April 26, 1894:
[FEOM INDIAN AFFAIBS.]
Extracts from letters addressed to the War Depart ment. " Dated at YINOENNES, August 6,1811. " Tecumseh did not set out till yesterday; he
then descended the Wabash attended by twenty men, on his way to the southward. After having visited the Creeks and Choctaws he is to visit the Osages and return by the Missouri." [Page 300.]
"NASHVILLE, Sept 10, 1811. " As I passed through the Chickasaw nation a respectable man of the nation informed me that a deputation of eighteen Northern Indians and two Creeks were on their way to the Creek nation, but would not tell their business. * * * The party consisted of six Shawnees, six Kickapoos, and six of some tribe far in the Northwest, the name of which they refused to tell. * * * ."
"NASHVILLE, Sept. 9,1811. " There is in this place a very noted chief of the Chickasaws, a man of truth, who wishes the Presi dent shouid be informed that there is a combination of the Northern Indians, promoted by the English, to unite in falling on the frontier settlements, and are inviting the Southern tribes to join them." [Page
301.]___________________________
* See Billon's Indiana, also History of Indiana by Goodrich and Tattle.

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

65

In a former chapter we have seen this restless

chieftain among the Chootaws and Chickasavvs. It

is claimed that he then went through to Florida and

that he succeeded there in arousing the Seminoles

to make war upon the whites and to take the side of

the British when they should hear that the great con

flict between them and the Americans had com

menced. There is little knowledge in regard to his

visit among the Seminoles, except these two bare

facts, if facts these are. It is reported that he gave

them a bundle of prepared sticks, painted red, each

stick to represent a day, according to the number of

days to elapse before he wished them to enter on the

war path, one of which they were to throw away each

day that there might be no mistake ; and this is said

to have been the origin of the term " Eed Sticks " as

applied to the hostile Indians. But quite a differ-

erent origin of that term is also given.

That Tecumseh went among the Seminoles at all

is questionable when the chronology of his South

ern tour is closely examined. It took a little time

for his party to reach the Chickasaws in whatever

manner they travelled, in boats for a time, and then

on foot or on horses, and certainly some stop how

ever brief was made among them. Among the

Choctaws, according to the time records in the pre

ceding chapter, Tecumseh spent at least four weeks,

and he was among the Creeks by common agree

ment of the authorities in October. Surely he had

not much time to spend in Florida.

*

From Florida Tecumseh started northward and

made his noted tour among the Creeks. And again

we come among conflicting statements. But per-

66

THE CREEK WAR.

haps we will reach historic truth. 1. Before Teeumseh's visit, according to the Reminiscences of General Thomas Woodward, a white man came from Pensacola and made a visit to the Creek chief called Big Warrior, at Tuckabatchee. Woodward's informer was Weatherford, himself a noted Indian leader of mixed blood. The time of the interview was April, 1814. They were, says General Wood ward, beside a camp fire on the west bank of a stream called the Pinchgong. Weatherford thought the Pensacola man was Scotch. So he is sometimes called " the Scotch emissary." He held many con ferences with Big Warrior ."through a negro interpreter." Shortly after the disappearance of this man the oldest son of Big Warrior, Tuskanea or Tuskahenaha, " took a trip to the Wabash and vis ited several tribes." He brought back some Shawnee women whom General Woodward saw. Weath erford further related that not long after the return of Tuskanea, Tecumseh with a prophet called Seekaboo and with other stranger Indians appeared at the town of Tuckabatchee. " A talk was put out" by Big Warrior. This Weatherford and another Creek of mixed blood called Sam Moniac, the orif. inal name having been McKac,* attended. "No white man was allowed to be present." Weather ford reports, through General Woodward: "Tecum seh stated the object of his mission ; that if it could be effected the Creeks could recover all the country that the whites had taken from them; and that the British would protect them in their rights." To

*See Weatherford's letter in the notes to Chapter IX.

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

67

Tecumseh's speech Moniac objected. He said the talk was a bad one, and he said that Tecumseh " had better leave the nation." The interpreter was Seekaboo " who spoke English." Weatherford told the interpreter to tell Tecumseh that the whites and Indians were at peace, that the Creeks were doing well, that it would be bad policy for them to take either side if the Americans and English went to war, and if they did unite with either side they "had better join the Americans."
"After this talk Tecumseh left for home and prevailed on Seekaboo and one or two others to re main among the Creeks."*
2. Hodgson in " Letters from North America " says, that his host told him that he was then living with an Indian wife among the Creeks; that he was present at the midnight convocation of the chiefs; that Tecumseh made a most impressive speech. The year of this interview is not given.
3. In the "History of the Tribes of North America," a book in the Newberry library of Chi cago, the writer says he obtained his information at Tuckhabatchee in 1827; that Tecumseh went to the lodge of Big Warrior, " explained his object, de livered his war-talk, presented a bundle of sticks, gave a piece of wampum and a hatchet, all which the Big Warrier took;" and that then, perceiving the Creek chief would not unite with him in his plans, he declared that <when he returned to De-
* See " Reminiscences of the Creek or Muscogee Indians, "by General Thomas Woodward. These Reminiscences consist of letters published in a Montgomery paper in 1859 and-1860, after ward published in book form. The work, as an authority, will be again mentioned.

68

THE CREEK WAR.

troit he would stamp his foot and shake the earth. These accounts do not seem to have been copied the one from the other, but to be three independent accounts. They agree sufficiently to be truthful.
4. Two other accounts there are which are quite different from these. The one is by Pickett, (Albert James Pickett), published in 1851; the other is by J. F. H. Claiborne of Mississippi his large work entitled " Mississippi, as a Province, Territory, and State," having been published in 1880.
These two accounts are very similar, very "graph ic," very full.
Claiborne says, page 315, "entering the Creek terri. tory he harangued the warriors at Autauga and Coosanda and the Hickory Ground. Wherever he went crowds attended, painted for war, and danc ing the war dance." He adds. "In October the an nual grand council of the nation, in pursuance of immemorial usage, assembled at the ancient town of Tookabatcha.* These councils were always attend, ed by the United States Agent, by all the traders, by many strangers, and by the warriors and their fami lies. On this occasion the, fame of Tecumseh's visit, and his expected address, had assembled some five thousand persons at Tookabatcha." Claiborne de scribes the entrance of Tecumseh and his warriors into the town squaref the second day, their dress, arms, bearing, the passing of Big Warrior's pipe, and their departure from the square to a large cabin provided for them, and at night their war dance.

*Differant writers give different orthography for the same names. tAll Indian towns bad public squares. Villages had no squares.

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

69

Each morning a Shawnee warrior announced that his chief would speak at noon, and each noon the speech was put off till the next day, until Colonel Hawkins, the United States Agent, left the town. The next noon after the Agent's departure, amid im posing ceremonies, Tecumseh made his appearance and delivered his speech. The assembly continued till midnight. Claiborne gives as the year, 1811, and the month October. Pickett, a statement of whose account will be found in the notes on this chapter, gives the same month, but by some means has the year date 1812. Claiborne gives the speech of Tec umseh "compressed."
No reporter is named except "Captain SamDale," although "an intelligent witness" is referred to.
The speech as to its genuineness is much like the historic speech of John Adams, "Sink or swim," given by Webster, although unlike that in failing to give the sentiments of Tecumseh. There is no rea sonable evidence that it contains the substance of the statements of Tecumseh. It commences by claim ing that his party murdered whites as they came through their settlements.
"No war-whoop was sounded, no track was made," by thirty men on horseback "no fire was kindled, but see! there is blood on our war clubs!"
It urges the destruction of women and children, of which Tecumseh did not approve. It says: "Two mighty warriors across the seas will send us arms at Detroit for us, at Pensacola for you," ten months before Detroit came into the possession of the Eng lish. And in closing this murderous, vengeful, bar-

70

THE CREEK WAR.

barous, furious Tecumseh of imagination rather than of fact is made to say, "Soon shall you see my arm of fire stretched athwart the sky. You will know that I am on the war-path. I will stamp my foot and the very earth shall shake." Claiborne says, in a note appended to this " compressed" speech, "The British officers at Detroit had informed Tecumseh that a comet would soon appear, and the earthquakes of 1811 had commenced as he came through Kentucky." This note is surprising in view of these facts: that Tecumseh did not start south from Detroit, but from Yincennes, and no evidence has been found that in July of 1811 "British officers" were in Detroit what business had they, then, in that American post ? and no evidence that Tecum seh at that time had met with British officers ; that he must have passed through Kentucky, and through or across very little of it at most, in August, and there is evidence that the first earthquake shocks were felt at Louisville the last week in November ; and that the noted comet of 1811, the most remark able one that appeared in the first half of this century, was visible iti September and ceased to be seen when the earthquake shocks com menced.
In confirmation of these statements about the comet and earthquake are these extracts from an address before the Maryland Historical Society by Hon. J. B. Latrobe of Baltimore. He is describing the voyage of the- steamboat " New Orleans," the first to descend the Mississippi. " It was midnight on the first of October, 1811, that the 'New Orleans' dropped anchor opposite the town."

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

71

This was Louisville. "Tiiero was a brilliant moon. It was as light as day almost, and no one on board had retired. The noise of the escaping steam, then heard for the first time * * roused the population"and "there were those who insisted that the comet of 1811 had fallen into the Ohio and produced the hub-bub!" For weeks the boat waited for rains and for water to pass the falls. The time is now "the last week in November." And J. B. Latrobe says, "The comet of 1811 had disappeared and was followed by the earthquakes of that year." Also C. J. Latrobe, in his "Rambler in North America," speaking of 1811 as "the annus mirabilis of the West" on account of the overflow of rivers, the "unprecedented sickness," the migration of "a countless multitude of squirrels," adds: "The splendid comet of that year long con tinued to shed its twilight over the forests, and, as the autumn drew to a close, the whole valley of the Mississippi, from the Missouri to the gulf, was shaken to its center by continued earthquakes."
Now, as the facts concerning the comet and the earthquakes, in these quotations from the two Latrobes, were known to Olaiborne, for they are in his "Mississippi," his note is surprising as'explaining Tecumseh's speech. Tecumseh never made that speech. Aside from the absurdity, of its close, it does not breathe the well established humane spirit of Tecum seh. In order to obtain scientific as well as literary evidence in regard to the appearance of that comet, a letter of inquiry was sent to the astronomer at Har vard University, and, with the accustomed courtesy of the professors there, he soon returned the follow ing reply:

72

THE CREEK WAR.

HAEVAED COLLEGE OBSERVATOKY,
CAMBRIDGE, MASS., Nov. 26,1894.
DEAE SIR : Your letter of November 20th is at hand. The comet you mention was discovered on March 26, 1811, and was visible to the naked eye in April, but only with difficulty. Its orbit was soon sufficiently determined to show that it would be nearer, and therefore brighter, in autumn ; and it is possible that this knowledge may have reached De troit as early as July. During most of the summer the comet was too nearly in the same direction with the sun to be seen at all, but it reappeared August 20t,h, and by August 26th was easily visible to the naked eye; it continued to increase in brightness during September, coming nearest to the earth on October 15th. By December it had become very faint. It could be seen in this country as well as in Europe.
With that brilliant comet, its tail according to
Milne "132,000,000 miles long," shining over them
night after night all through September, and being
nearest the earth Octotober 15th, it is unreasonable
to suppose Tecumseh to have said to those Creek war
riors, " Soon shall you see my arm of fire stretched
athwart the sky." Tecumseh had too much good
sense to say that. Nor is it probable that he claimed
to be able to shake the earth. The Claiborne speech
is not given here, for it does no credit to Tecumseh.
It rests on no authority.
5. Leaving now these reports of Tecumseh among
the Creeks, this of Claiborne, and also the one by
Pickett which the reader will find in the notes, the
most satisfactory statements at last are those of
Dr. Ramsay.

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

73

He says, after mentioning Tecumseh's ardent but savage* eloquence, " He reminded them of the usur pation of their lands by the whites, and painted in glowing colors their spirit of encroachment, and the consequent diminution, and probable extinction, of the race of Indians; and contrasted their sedentary and unmanly occupations with the wild and fearless independence of their ancestors/' This sounds like Tecumseh, and it does not appear that anything more accurate can now be obtained than was secured before the year 1818 by that noble son of Pennsyl vania and South Carolina, Dr. David Ramsay.

A few statements may here be added to show that Tecumseh could not have returned again to the South, as some historians state, in 1812.
Instead of returning, as he proposed, to the Prophet's Town and in the spring of 1812 going to Washington to see the President and settle all difficulties, he found on his return to Indiana in December that the Prophet had gone contrary to his instructions, had fought and lost the battle of Tippecanoe November 7th, that the Prophet's famous town had been destroyed, that his great confederacy was breaking up, and he appeared in that same month of December, 1811, at Fort Wayne. He asked for ammunition. It was denied him. He said he would go to his British father. He " gave the war-whoop and went off." f
*A savage is not always cruel. When Proctor and Tecum seh were together as commanders of the British forces, Proctor was evidently the more cruel, bloody savage of the two.
fSee Brice's History of Fort Wayne, page 202.

74

THE CREEK WAR.

In the spring of 1812 the Indians commenced active hostilities. May 15,1812, Tecumseh attended a council at Mississinaway, thirty miles below Fort Wayne. In June he visited Fort Wayne, then went to Maiden. In July he was at Maiden with his warriors ready for the war, and was in the summer aiding General Brock in the region of Detroit. In August he led the Indians in the attack at Brownstown, in the first action after the formal declaration of the War of 1812. August 16th, when Detroit was captured, he was at the head of the Indians. In August of this year he was appointed a British Brigadier General. In September he began to assemble his forces to reduce forts Wayne and Harrison. Tecumseh continued actively engaged in the ISTorth, and in December of 1812, with six hun dred warriors, he was near the Mississinaway towns. It is quite certain that he was not far from the scene of conflict when Frenchtown was taken January 22, 1813. In April, 1813, he was at Fort Meigs. The siege continued till May 9th:* He was again at Fort Meigs at the second attack in July, when he led "two thousand warriors." He was associated with General Brock and also with General Proctor, and was killed October 5, 1813, at the battle of the Thames, called also the battle of the Moravian towns.
It thus appears that Lossing, Parton, Drake, and others must be mistaken who claim that Tecumseh
* Says Ramsay (vol. 3, p. 280): "TheBritish force,including regulars and militia, during the siege, was supposed to have been upwards of one thousand. Their Indian auxiliaries were not fewer in amount. A.mong them the celebrated Tecumseh wag particularly distinguished. The American garrison seldom exceeded twelve hundred, a very small portion of whom were regulars."

TECUMSES AMONG THE CREEKS.

75

visited the Southern Indians a second time, making that visit in the fall of 1812 or in the spring of 1813. It is true that the actual presence of Tecumseh in the Indiana Territory has not been shown for the months of October and November of 1812; but that he could have been absent from the u seat of war,'' could have gone South and visited all those Southern Indians, and returned, in those two months, is hardly credible.

NOTES.
1. Mention has been made of an effort to obtain documentary evidence of Tecumseh's visit from the War Department. The following are extracts from a letter from a valued friend residing in Washing ton City, Mrs. Bessie Boone Cheshire:
" WASHINGTON, D. C., Nov. 29, 1892. "Your letter of 24th inst. duly received. It is a source of much pleasure to be of use to you in the work in which your are engaged. Though I fear the resources at my command are not so great as you may think. There is no documentary evidence of Tecumseh's visit to the Creeks. In fact there are now no documents of any of the older Indian wars. * * * The officials to whom I went were dis posed to be very helpful. However they told me that no outside parties were ever allowed to examine documents this was when I asked the privilege of examining the records but that they would exam ine and give me any desired information. I was told that " Lossing's Field Book of the War of 1812" would furnish all that I had inquired for. And when I told them it was not historical but docu mentary evidence that 1 wished, they told me there was absolutely none; that if you sent or had sent

76

THE CREEK WAR.

direct to the War Department for it they could only have referred you to Lossing, page 1ST.
" All this did not quite satisfy me, and having quite a near neighbor who is an officer in the Indian Bureau I went to him about it. He told me to address a letter to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, enclose yours to me, and send it through the mail, and then it would receive attention and what ever they found would be sent to you direct from the office and would be official. This in a measure, relieved me as there was really nothing left for me to do.
" This neighbor tells me that my letter with j'ours came to the Commissioner and was placed in his hands with a note from Commissioner Morgan in which he says:
"' Rev. T. H. Ball is a particular friend of mine and I shall esteem it as a personal favor if you will furnish him the desired information.'"
Under date of December 22d the letter states that the neighbor called that morning to say that the office had a man looking up such old records as remained.
2. In due course of time the following, through the hands of my friend, Mrs. Cheshire, a lady of culture, interested in historical research, came through the mail from Washington:
DEPARTMENT
OF THE
INTERIOR OFFICE OF INDIAN AFFAIRS.
WASHINGTON, December 31,1892.
Mrs. Bessie Boone Cheshire, 105 Eleventh St., S. E., City-- MADAM: I am in receipt of your letter of
December 1, 1892, forwarding a letter from Rev. T. H. Ball, of Crown Point, Indiana, dated .Novem ber 24, 1892, requesting definite information from

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

77

the records of this office as to the fact, whether or not the noted Indian Chief, Tecumseh, visited the Creek Indians in 1811, or in 1812, or both years, as Historical writers differ as to the time of said visit; but he had satisfied himself that Tecumseh was South at the time of the battle of Tippecanoe in 1811, but wished to know authoritatively if he went South again in 1812, and refers to the fact that Col. Benjamin Hawkins at that time had charge of Indian affairs in Georgia, and felt sure that in the records at Washington, his report of Tecumseh/s visit could be found, if made.
Rev. Mr. Ball gives as his reason for making this call for information, the fact that he, in com
pany with a friend in Mississippi, is preparing a work on the "Creek War in South Alabama," and that it has fallen to his lot to write up the chapter "Tecumseh's visit to the Creek Indians," and must have some documeatary evidence. State paper or official report that he was surely there in 1812.
In response to this request, I have caused the records of this office to be searched, but they fail to disclose any information on the subject. The pa pers on file in this office, of that period, are very meagre indeed; the files were kept in the War Department, and when the papers were transferred from that Department to this office in 1849, when the Interior Department was organized, and this office made a branch bureau thereof, but few of the records or files pertaining to such subjects were transferred, so that if this visit was officially report ed by Col. Hawkins, it must yet remain in the cus tody of the War Department
I would state however that reference is made in the American State Papers, of the visits of Tecum seh to the Southern Indians, and you? attention is invited to Volume 1, Indian Affairs, p. 799, where in a letter from General Harrison, dated Yincennes, December 4, 1811, to Wm. Eustis, Secretary of War,

78

THE CREEK WAR.

he speaks of Tecumseh's tour to the Southward; and on page 800, in letters addressed to the War Depart ment, mention is made in one from Yincennes dated August 6, 1811, that "Tecumseh did not set out till yesterday, he then descended the Wabash, attended by twenty men, on his way to the South ward. After having visited the Creeks and Choctaws, he is to visit the Osages and return by the Missouri."
In a letter from William Wells of Fort Wayne, dated March 1, 1812, to the Secretary of War, Mr. Eustis, he writes:
"In my letter of the 10th ultimo, I informed you that the Indian chief, Tecumseh, had arrived on the Wabash. I have now to state to you that it ap pears that he has determined to raise all the Indians he can, immediately, with an intention, no doubt, to attack our frontier. He has sent runners to raise the Indians on the Illinois and the Upper Mississippi, and I am told he has gone himself to hurry on the aid he was promised by the Cherokees and Creeks."
Idem, p. 806.)
In an extract from General William Clark, of St. Louis, dated March 22, 181-2, appears the follow ing, viz:
" The Winnebagoes, part of the Kickapoos, and some of the Pottawatomies are yet friendly to the Prophet and may join him again in the spring. His brother, Tecumseh, returned from the Southern tribes in December last. He made great exertions to get the Shawnees and Delawares of this territory to join the Prophet's army, but without success." (Idem p. 807.)
The History of Alabama, by Albert James Pick ett, published in 1851, in two volumes, at Charles ton, by Walker & James, has a chapter on Tecum seh (Chapter xsxi., Vol. 2.) After stating that his father and mother were of the Shawnee family, were born and bred at Souvanogee (old Augusta)

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CREEKS.

79

upon the Tallapoosa, in Alabama, who removed to the forest of Ohio, where Tecumseh was born in 1768, and referring to other visits to the Cherokees and Creeks, it states that
" After many conferences with the British, at Detroit, Tecumseh, in the spring of 1812, left that country with a party of thirty warriors mounted on horses, and shaped his course to the south. Passing through the Chickasaw and Choctaw Country, he was unsuccessful in arraying these tribes against the Americans. He went down to Florida and met with complete success with the Seminoles. In the month of October he came up to Alabama, crossed that river at Autauga, when he, for the first time, appealed to the Creeks in a long speech. Continuing to Coosawda, he had by this time collected many followers, who went with him to the Hickory Ground. Having from their boyhood heard of his feats in the buffalo chase, the bloody wars which, he had conducted, and of his fierce and transcendent eloquence, the warriors flocked to see him. He went to Tookabatcha, where Colonel Hawkins was then holding his grand council with the Indians. * * Tecumseh visited all the important Creek towns, enlisting all whom he could on the side of England. * * Tecumseh having made numerous proselytes, once more (November) visited the Big Warrior at Tookabatcha, whom he was particularly desirous to enlist in his schemes, but whom he had hitherto en treated to no effect, although his house was his headquarters. * * * The common Indians be lieved every word of Tecumseh's last speech, which was intended solely to intimidate the Big Warrior, and (in December) they began to count up the time it would take the Shawnee chief to reach Detroit, when he would stamp his foot, as he had declared."
It seems that he became very angry with Big Warrior, and pointing his finger in his face, emphat ically said, " Your blood is white. * * You do

80

THE CREEK WAR.

not believe the Great Spirit sent me. You shall

believe it. I will leave directly and go straight to

Detroit. When I get there I will stamp my foot

upon the ground and shake down every house in

Tookabatcha." It appears that a mighty rumbling

in the earth was heard soon after, which caused the

houses of Tookabatcha to reel and totter. The

people ran out, saying, " Tecumseh has got to De

troit ! Tecumseh has got to Detroit! We feel the

shake of his foot! "

In relation to this visit of Tecumseh to Alabama

the author makes this note on page 246, Yol. 2:

"I have consulted General Ferdinand L. Clai-

borne's MS. papers and Drake's Life of Tecumseh;

I have also conversed with Lachau Durant. Mrs. So

phia McComb, Peter Raudon, James Moore, and

others, who were ^at Tookabatcha when Tecumseh

arrived there."

The letter of the Kev. Mr. Ball is returned here

with.

Very respectfully

T. J. MORGAN, Commissioner.

3. Among other efforts to arrive at facts in regard to Tecumseh, I wrote to Hiram W. Beck with, Esq , of Danville, Illinois, who owns " what is probably the most valuable collection in the West on FrenchAmerican history," a library which he has been twenty-five years collecting from dealers on both sides of the Atlantic, and which, it is said, " contains nearly every known book on the language, imple ments, and manners of the aboriginal inhabitants, and their wars with the border settlers."
The Governor " appointed him one of the Trus tees of the State Historical Library, and his asso ciates selected him as President of their board."
From him, in answer to my special questions, I received the following statements, which, as he presents the same conclusions which my investiga tions have reached, giving authorities to which I

TECUMSEH AMONG- THE CREEKS.

81

have not had access, I think ought to be placed here, at the conclusion of this chapter. His letter is dated " Danville, Illinois, Dec. 16th, 1892." I omit the introduction:
" 1st, On the 27th of July, 1811, 'Tecumseh, with about 320 or 330 men, women, and children, arrived at Yincennes.' [Vide 'Memoirs of Gen. Harrison,' by Moses Dawson, Cincinnati, 1824, page 182.] This was the Shawnee's second personal visit to Gov. Har rison, the first having been on August 12th, 1810."
" 2d. 'A few days after' the conclusion of the conference of 1811, 'Tecumseh accompanied by twenty men went down the Wabash.' 'The day before he told Governor Harrison that after visiting the Creeks, Chickasaws, and Choctaws he would go to the Osages (in Missouri) and return by the Mis souri river.' 'He had given out the following spring as the time for his return, but the Governor had information that he intended to be absent no more than three months.' [ Vide same work, page 184.]
"Just how long he was in the South, or the exact time of his return, is a matter I am without any authority to refer you. He was certainly back again upon the upper Wabash late the same year, or at least very early in that of 1812.
"3d. His whereabouts in 1812 and thence on until his death, October 5th of the following year, can be so closely followed as to have given him no time whatever for any other visit to the Creeks or their neighbors. It will be recalled that the battle of Tippecanoe took place Nov. 7, 1811, 'during Tecuraseh's absence.' Now, Little Turtle, the Miami chief, in his address to Gov. Harrison, dated at Fort Wayne,. Indiana, January 25,1812, referring to the results of that affair, says: 'All of the Prophet's followers have left him except two camps of his own tribe. Tecumseh has just joined him with only eight men.' [ Vide 'Little Turtle to Gov. Harrison,' Mem. Gen. Harrison above, page 258.]

82

THE CREEK WAR.

" Again, we find him at a grand council of several Indian nations, 'held at Massassinway (near its mouth) on the Wabash, May 16, 1812,' when he made two speeches. [Vide minutes of those proceedings, same volume, page 266.] On this occasion Tecumseh, alluding to the action of Nov. 7th, said : ' Governor Harrison made war on my people in my absence.' The next month, ' on the 17th of June, he came to Fort Wayne,' saying 'he was on his way to Maiden' (now Amherstburg, Can ada, near the mouth of the Detroit river), to receive from the British government twelve horse loads of ammunition for the use of his people at Tippecanoe.' He went on to Maiden and was there a few days be fore Gen. Hull's army arrived at Detroit, and there upon ' declared he would join the British against the United States.! [ Vide 'Letter of Capt. Wm. Wells to Gov. Harrison, Fort Wayne, July 22,1812, copied into the above volume, page 278.]
"'On the 12th of July, 1812, his brother, the Prophet, reached Fort Wayne with nearly a hun dred Winnebagoes and Kickapoos,' and went into camp near by.
" A week later one of Tecumseh's messengers from the head of Lake Erie arrived at the Prophet's camp telling the latter ' to at once send their women and children towards the Mississippi, while the war riors should strike a heavy blow on Yincennes, and that he, Tecumseh, if he lived, would join him in the country of the Winnebagoes,' then in Wisconsin. After the landing of Gen. Hull at Sandwich to at tack Maiden, Ju\y 12, ' Tecumseh and a hundred of his Indians remained at the latter place with the British.' [ Vide same letter.]
"Wm. S. Hatch, then Quarter Master in the American army, saw him on the streets of Detroit, Aug. 17th of the same year, and graphically de scribes his appearance and dress. He was then an officer in the British service,[ Vide 'Hatche's Chapter

TECUMSEH AMONG THE CHEEKS,

83

on the "War of 1812,' page 114], and on the 9th of the same month he had commanded the Indians in the engagement against the Americans a few miles below Detroit. [ Vide 'History of the Late War' (of 1812)
by Capt. Kobert McAffe, Lexington, Ky., 1816, page T8].
'On the 18th of December, 1812, Col. Campbell, attacked the Indian towns 'on the Mississiniway river' and 'learning from a prisoner that Tecumseh with six hundred warriors was but eighteen miles be low him,' near the Wabash, 'did not think it prudent to remain there any longer.' (Same volume, page 181 to 182.]
"Thus can we trace Tecumseh in 1812 and 1813 from place to place on the northwestern frontier in a way that gives him no time to be absent from that field of military operation.
"Truly yours,
"HiEAM W. BECKWITH."

The critical reader may notice that, as in the text of this chapter, so here in this letter, the presence of Tecumseh in the North has not been shown for the month of October, 1812, when some claim he was among the Creek Indians. But even granting that his presence on the Indiana Territory or in Canada for that month cannot be shown, I think enough has been shown to justify Mr. Beckwith's statement, that there was "no time," in the fall of 1812, when Te cumseh could have been absent sufficiently long, "from that field of military operation," to make that visit described by Parton and by Drake. Mr. Beckwith adds in a postscript:
"The authorities quoted are above all dispute. They are also quite rare. Dawson and Capt. Mc Affe were on the Northern frontier in active service

84

THE CREEK WAR.

from start to finish, and both had access to contem poraneous writings as well as an extended personal intercourse with the leading officers in all military movements of those memorable campaigns."

The writer of the foregoing chapter had access

to Choctaw traditions to enable him to trace Te-

cumseh's movements from place to place, almost

from day to day; but the writer of this chapter has

had no Creek traditions to aid him in making up the

facts as recorded, but has been obliged to sift many

statements to secure a few grains of unquestionable

historic truth. And he is well aware that some

critical readers may say, he has made a needless pa

rade of the work performed; but he hopes many

readers will appreciate it at whatever may be its true

value.

T. H. B.

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

85

CHAPTER V.
THE WAK CLOUD GATHERING.
W AR was declared between the United States and Great Britain June 18, 1812. Into this war Tecumseh entered heartily in favor of the Brit ish and against the Americans, as we have already seen. "We are now to look at the Creek Indians in this year of 1812.
The following are extracts from letters to the War Department, written by Colonel Benjamin Hawkins, and taken from Indian Affairs as pub. lished in American State Papers, commencing on page 304.
CREEK AGENCY, Feb. 3, 1812. Our Indians are, many of them, occupied in spinning, weaving, making new settlements, or im proving those heretofore made. I believe nine-tenths of the Lower Creeks have left their old towns and formed,or are forming settlements on the creeks and rivers where the lands are good and the range for stock good.
CREEK AGENCY, April 6,1812. On the 26th ult., Thomas Meredith, Sr., a res pectable old man, travelling with his family to the Mississippi Territory,was murdered on the post road, at Kittome.a creek 150 miles from this. Sam Macnac, a half breed, of large property, who keeps entertain ment on the road, at whose house Meredith is buried, calls it an accident.

86

THE CREEK WAR.

Colonel Hawkins then details circumstances and gives evidence showing that it was a murder.

GREEK AGENCY, May 11, 1812. I have just returned from the council of the Lower Creeks, and have time only, by this mail, to write you a short letter.

He then states (given here in an abridged form)

that Charles Hicks,late United States interpreter for

the Cherokees, by order of his chiefs, had sent a

friendly letter to the Creeks, in which he said to

them that if they joined the English in the coming

war they would lose every foot of their land, but

if they joined the Americans they would gain their

friendship forever. To this the Creeks replied that

they would not " interfere in the wars of white peo

ple."

CREEK AGENCY, May 25, 1812. I was this day informed by Mr. Cornells, our in

terpreter for the Upper Creeks, that on the 23rd

inst. a white man, William Lott, was murdered,

eight miles this way from his home, by four Indians,

without the least provocation. *

*

*

The chiefs will meet in one week and we shall see

what can be done. We have a report also that two

families have been killed in Tennessee.

CREEK AGENCY, July 28, 1812. I have just t^.me to inform you that the Indian who murdered Meredith was put to death on the 19th.

CREEK AGENCY Aug. 24, 1812. Those charged with the murder on Duck Eiver are not yet come at.

This massacre of the Tennessee families on Duck River and the treatment of Mrs. Crawley and child ren, aroused strong feelings against the Creeks amon^

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

87

the people of Tennessee. The reader will find, when he comes to the treaty of peace, at the close of the
war, that Duck Eiver was charged up against the Creeks along with Fort Mims.
The Lower and Upper Creeks united their efforts
in having justice dealt out to the murderers of Wil
liam Lott. We come now to 1813, the year of act ual strife.
By an act passed in Congress February 12, 1813, General James Wilkinson was authorized to pro ceed to Mobile, then held by the Spaniards, and to take possession. March 8th, Commander Shaw, with General Wilkinson and his troops on board his fleet,
reached Dauphine Island; and after a few days the following communication was sent to the Spanish
commandant by the American General: BEFORE MOBILE, April 12.
SIR: The troops of the United States do not ap proach you as the enemies of Spain, but by order of the President they come to relieve the brave garrison which you so worthily command, from the occupancy of a post within the legitimate limits of the United States. I hope that you will peacefully retire from Fort Charlotte, and from the Mississippi Territory, to the eastern side of the Perdido river.
This request was in a few days complied with.* General Wilkinson did not long remain at Mo
bile. He was ordered to Canada in June he was passing through the " Creek Nation " on his way to
the North and Major General Thomas Flournoy, of Georgia, succeeded him in the command at Mo bile, and of the Seventh military division.
*I have taken the above fromClaiborneY'Mississippi," which in regard to official documents, I consider perfectly reliable..
T. H. B.

88

THE CREEK WAR,

General Flournoy, June 28,1813, ordered Briga dier General Ferdinand L. Olaiborne, with his brig, ade of six hundred Mississippi volunteers, to march from Baton Rouge to Mount Yernon, in order to be ready there "to repel any attack that may be made on any part of the frontier of the Mississippi Terri tory, either from Indians, Spaniards, or English " Leaving Baton Rouge June 28th, this brigade reached Mount Yernon July 30th, 1813. "You will put yourself," General Flournoy's order continued, "in communication with Lieutenant Colonel Bowyer, who commands at Mobile and Mobile Point, who will give you the earliest information of any movement by the English or Spaniards, The defence of the town of Mobile will be your principal care."
While the open war was between the Americans and the British, it was quite well understood that on the southern frontier both the Spaniards and Indians were likely to aid the British as against the Ameri cans. The Spaniards and British had by turns been the nominal holders of Florida.
Leaving now General Flournoy in command in the summer of 1813, and General Glaiborne at Mount Yernon, we are ready to look at the uprising of a part of the Creek confederacy, or at what was called their civil war.
J. F. H. Claiborne, in his "Mississippi," gives a letter written by General Wilkinson, when on his way northward, to one of the prominent citizens of Washington county, Judge Toulmin, which is dated a misprint or mistake is here corrected "Sam Manacs, Creek Nation, June 25,1813."

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

89

In this letter he says : " Your favor of the 22d reached me near this place, surrounded by dangers; but I am too far advanced to retreat. Indeed, I dare not turn my back on reports, and, therefore, shall proceed this evening [afternoon] to Catoma, and to-morrow to Doyle's, where I expect to see the Big Warrior, who has begged an interview with me. He has been intrenched against the war party a week or ten days and lives in fear of his life, as his antagon ists are daily making converts and increasing in strength, with the avowed intention to destroy him and all who have been concerned in the execution of the murderers; after which, it is believed by all with whom I have conversed, they expect to intimidate the rest of the nation to join them, and then it is their intention to make war on the whites. This seems to be the general impression; but no one can tell or even guess where a blow will be struck." General Wilkinson then speaks of "one Joseph Francis," living on the road, who claimed to have " had a visit from the Lord," and who detailed the things revealed to him " in the manner most impressive on his barbarian auditors." General* Wilkinson also wrote that he was assured that Francis with more than three hundred followers was at a camp on the Alabama about sixteen miles above the Big Swamp, and that it was reported that this party was about " to move down the river to break up the half-breed settlements and those of the citizens in the forks of the river."
He adds:
" I know not what stress to lay on these wild reports, but the whole road is deserted the Indians are all assembled, and their villages ahead of me, many towns on the Alabama and Tallapoosa and Coosa, are deserted, and consternation and terror are in every countenance I meet. I have considered it proper you should receive this information, and, therefore, I send back Weatherford with this infor-

90

THE CREEK WAR.

mation for your government, and will only observe, that I think the volunteers should be called up to your frontier, without a moment's delay." General Wilkinson was now on his way to his command in Canada, and was travelling, the reader will notice, over that " Government road " through the Creek country. One quotation more:
" I have about twenty armed men, and our caval cade consists of about forty persons. Our horses and carriages are in good order. * * * Colonel Hawkins is profoundly silent. Alexander Cornels has fled the country and I cannot hear of any preparation to succor the Big Warrior." The letter is signed "James Wilkinson," and is addressed "Hon. Judge Toulmin, Fort Stoddert."
It appears from this letter that open war among
the Creeks had not then commenced but might
break out any day. Weatherford was at. that time
friendly. (Some suggest that the Weatherford
mentioned in the letter was not the noted William
but Jack Weatherford, but, if so, it will not affect
the statement as a fact, although affecting it as a
conclusion ; for as a fact it rests on other evidence.)
The murderers referred to in this valuable letter
are no doubt those concerned in the murder of
Thomas Meredith and William, or as some call him,
Arthur, Lott. General Woodward says : " I have
often heard Sam Moniac say, that if Lott had not
been killed at the time he was, it was his belief that
the war could have been prevented."*

* The student of history finds King Philip's war originating about as did the Creek war. 1. "It became evident to the Indians that the spreading settlements were fast breaking up their hunting grounds." 2. A converted Indian was found mur dered. "The execution by the whites of three Indians, con victed of the murder, may be considered as the immediate cause of the war." See Andersen's history of King Philip's War.

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

91

The following deposition copied from the Ala bama Historical Reporter of June, 1880, is an inter esting document which will show what plans some of the chiefs had formed as early as July 11, 1813, the time of the interview with Jim Boy or High Head Jim to which Sam Moniac refers.

MISSISSIPPI TERRITORY, WASHINGTON DISTRICT.
The Deposition of Samuel Manac, of lawful age, a Warrior of the Creek Nation.
About the last of October, thirty Northern Indians came down with Tecumseh, who said he had been sent by his brother, the prophet. They at tended our council at the Tuccabache, and had a talk for us. I. was there for the space of two or three days, but every day whilst I was there, Tecum seh refused to ^deliver his talk, and on being re quested to give it, said that the sun had gone too far that day. The day after I came away, he delivered his talk" It was not till about Christmas that any of our people began to dance the war dance. The Muscogees have not been used to dance before war, but after. At that time about forty of our people began this Northern custom, and my brother-in-law, Francis, who also pretends to be a prophet, was at the head of them. Their number has very much in creased since, and there are probably now more than half of the Creek nation who have joined them.
Being afraid of the consequences of a murder hav ing been committed on the mail route, I had left my home on the road, and had gone down to my planta tion on the river. I stayed there some time. I went to Pensacola with some steers, during which time, my sister and brother, who have joined the war party, came and got off a number of my horses and other stock, and thirty-six of my negroes. About

92

THE CREEK WAR.

one or two and twenty days ago, I went up to my house on the road, and found some Indians camped near it whom I tried to avoid, but could not. An Indian came to me, who goes by the name of HighHeaded Jim, and whom I found had been appointed
fco head a party sent from the Auttasee Town, on the Tallapoosa, on a trip to Pensacola. He shook hands with me, and immediately began to tremble and jerk in every part of his frame, and the very calves of his legs would be convulsed, and he would get entirely
out of breath with the agitation. This practice was introduced in May or June last by the Prophet Francis, who says that he was instructed by the Spirit. High-Headed Jim asked what I meant to do. I said that I should sell my property and buy
ammunition, and join them. He then told me that they were going down to Pensacola to get ammunition,and that they had got a letter from a British Gen eral which would enable them to receive ammunition
from the Governor. That it had been given to the Little Warrior, and saved by his Nephew when he was killed, and sent down to Francis. High-Head
told me that when they went back with their supply, another body of men would go down for another supply of ammunition, and that ten men would go out of each Town, and that they calculated on five horse loads for every Town. He said that they were to make a general attack on the American Settlements that the Indians on the waters of the Coosa and Talla poosa, and on the Black Warrior, were to attack the Settlements on the Tombigby and Alabama, particu
larly the Tensaw and Fork Settlements. That the Creek Indians, bordering on the Cherokees, were to
attack the people of Tennessee, and that the Seminoles and lower Creeks were to attack the Georgians. That the Choctaws also had joined them and were
to attack the Mississippi Settlements. That the attack was to be made at the same time in all places where they got furnished with ammunition. I found,

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

93

from my sister, that they were treated very rjgor-

ously by the Chiefs, and that many, particularly the

women among them, (two daughters of the late Gen.

McGillivray, who had been induced to join them to

save their property,) were very desirous to leave

them, but could not.

I found, from the talk of High-Head, that the war

was to be against the whites and not between Indians

themselves, that all they wanted was to kill those

who had taken the talk of the whites, viz.: the Big

Warrior, Alex. Cornells, Capt. Isaac, Wm. Mclntosh,

the Mad Dragon's son, the little Prince Spoko Kange

and Tallasee Thicksico.

They have destroyed a large quantity of my

cattle, and burnt my houses on my river plantation,

as well as those of James Cornells and Leonard

McGee.

(Signed,)

his

SAMUEL S. M. MANAC.

mark.

Sworn and subscribed before me, one of the U. S.

Judges for the Mississippi Territory, this 2d day of

August, 1813.

HAREY TOULMIN.

A true copv.

,

GEO. t. Boss, Lt. Col. Y.

\

This deposition, although sworn to by as friendly and trusty a man as Sam Moniac, must not all be taken as reliable history. The reader must not sup pose the October mentioned to be in the year 1812, as would be natural, but in 1811. In what year the Christmas was can only be conjectured, so far as the deposition is concerned. High Head Jim, whom Dr. A. B. Clanton of Leaf, Mississippi, calls Tuskegee, and of whom he says: " In his person he was the beau ideal of a hero," " beyond all comparison the finest looking man" that he had chanced to see,

94

THE CHEEK WAR.

was evidently mistaken in some of his statements. But the critical reader will find these out for him self. He can see what the River Settlements had reason to expect. How fully any plan for such a widespread extermination of the white settlers was matured, it is impossible now to ascertain ; but they were determined, evidently, to make an effort to prevent their own extermination, and the Spanish authorities at Pensacola had promised that, in the event of their failure, they would transport them all to the island of Cuba.
About this same time, probably in July, 1813, Latecau, an Indian youth eighteen years of age, claiming to be a prophet, and collecting eight others as subordinate prophets, went to the old town of Coosa and invited all the unbelievers or friendly Indians to come and see the display of their magical powers. Many assembled. The prophets com menced " the dance of the lakes," as taught by Tecumseh's warriors, then suddenly gave the warwhoop, rushed upon three friendly chiefs and killed them. The other chiefs immediately retired to their own towns, assembled their warriors, returned to Coosa, killed the nine prophets, and then went to LittleOcfuskee and put to death some more of Tecumseh's deluded followers. Thus, it seems, the civil war, so called, among the Creeks, began. -The hostile bands also commenced killing the cattle of the friendly Indians, as Moniac testified, or driving them off and selling them.
Another valuable letter, in this connection, is the following from General Flournoy to General Claiborne. The date is August 25, 1813.

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

95

"Sm: Your letters and documents, by express, have been received. As I have already written, you, and likewise Governor Holmes, very fully on Indian affairs, I will not now go into further details. A recent letter from Colonel Hawkins (a copy herein enclosed), will show the situation of the Creek In dians. They must finish their civil war before they go to war with us. And it is by no means certain that the war party will succeed in overpowering the party friendly to us."
Some time between the date of these two letters
it is evident that Weatherford joined the war party,
for before August closed we find him at Fort Mims,
General Woodward places it in 1813, but does not
name the month. And it may be here observed that
Tecumseh seems to have had no influence over
Weatherford. Woodward says that Sam Moniac and
Weatherford^ returning from a trip into the Miss
issippi Territory, where they had been "trading in
beef cattle," found several chiefs assembled it is
said on Tallewassee Creek, a mile and a half from
the Alabama River and taking the "black drink."*
These chiefs told Weatherford and Moniac that
they must join them or be put to death. The fol
lowing are Woodward's own words: " Moniac
boldly refused and mounted his horse.f Josiah
Francis, his brother-in-law, seized his bridle. Moniac

* This drink, a kind of tea, was made from the leaves of the

Ilex Cassine, or holly of the Gulf states, and used on various oc

casions.

See Wood's botany and see Gatschet.

f Whether the trading in beef cattle took place after Moniac made his deposition August 2, 1813, or whether it took place be

fore he took his steers to Pensacola, or whether the two accounts

are different versions of one transaction, I will leave for the con

sideration of those understanding the principles of "higher criti

cism."

T. H. B.

96

THE CREEK WAR.

snatched a war club from his hand, gave him a severe blow and put out, with a shower of rifle bullets fol lowing him. Weatherford consented to remain. He told them that he disapproved their course, and that it would be their ruin, but that they were his people, he was raised with them, and he would share their fate." General Woodward names among these chiefs Hopie Tustanuggee, or Far Off "Warrior, a Tuskegee, their eldest or principal chief, "the one" says Woodward, "looked upon as the General," and who was killed at Fort Mims; Peter McQueen; Jim Boy or High Head Jim; Josiah Francis or Hillis Hadjo, "the new made prophet," probably the same who is called Joseph by General Wilkinson; Seekaboo the Shawnee prophet; and several others. He says that Weatherford offered some advice to these chiefs, but they declined to follow his suggestions. The reasons which Weatherford assigned for joining the war party, as detailed at some length by Woodward, are very creditable to Weatherford's humanity. He thought he would thus be the means of preventing not a little bloodshed. *________________
* Brewer ia his "Alabama," "from 1540 to 1872," published in 1872, a work designed to be "indispensable to the intelligent Alabamian," says of General Woodward that he "had Indian blood in his veins," was reared on the frontier and among the Indiana, coming into the Mississippi Territory from Georgia as early as 1810; that he was an officer in the Florida war of 1817 and 1818, and was a brigadier general of militia. He says that he was an interesting man and a "famous character" in theTallapoosa region. Brewer further says that his volume of Indian Reminiscences"attempts to confute many of the statements made by Pickett, Meek, Coxe, and others," and that he has himself, in his history, ' 'in part adopted" them. I think that in saying "confute" Brewer has used too strong a word here. It seems to me that all Woodward designed to do was, to give what he be lie veil to be facts, and thus to correct any errors into which Pickett and Meek had been led.
Wishing to learn still more in regard to Woodward's Remi-

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

97

There is surely truth in Drake's remark that ''the process of fermenting a civil war was a long and doubtful one," so attached to the whites had the more intelligent chiefs become, although many of the Creeks may have believed, as did some of the Western tribes, that they were on the eve of a great revolution through which they would gain their lost ascendency in America. The pending struggle be tween Great Britain and the United States with Spanish Florida to help the British seemed to be a favorable time for the attempt to be made.
And so there came into what is known as
"THE WAR OF 1812,"
continuing until 1815, the side issue, the Southern conflict, like a stirring episode into some great epic,
"THE GREEK WAR OP 1813 AND 1814."
The main question at issue between the two fac tions of the Creek nation was, whether they should undertake the extermination of the white settlers on

niscences, I wrote to the present Secretary of State of Alabama, Hon. J. D. Barren, in regard to them, and in reply, in a letter dated Montgomery, May 19, 1894, he says that ' 'in Woodward's letters * * * there is a great deal of useful and in teresting information." "I give a great deal of credit to what he says, as I find a great deal of outside evidence to strengthen what he says."
I have given this lengthy note because General Woodward, who died in 1861, is an authority often referred to in parts of this work. His little book of reminiscences is now very rare. The copy used for this work came from the hands of that excellent studentof history, the late Dr. Lyman C. Draper of Wisconsin.
General Thomas S. Woodward must certainly be regarded as a truthful man, and he had undoubted facilities for obtaining some valuable information. When he was not himself an eye witness he may, like others, have been sometimes misled. But certainly by comparing, combining, and sifting statements, all designed to be true, we shall reach the probable facts. T. H. B.

98

THE CREEK WAR.

their western borders. The Alibamos especially, says Pickett, those joining these river settlers on the east, upon whose hunting grounds encroachments had already been made, "were furious advocates of American extermination." Colonel Hawkins ac knowledges that all the Alibamo towns, without ex ception, were hostile.
That war of extermination for which some of them had been preparing, was, as we shall soon see, precipitated upon them; and when they finally came into contact with American citizen soldiers they fought with a determination which some one has said, "has hardly a precedent in Indian contests." It is no wonder that they fought then, for the war became for them one for their homes, their hunting grounds, their burial places, their native land.
That Confederacy of Indians known as the Creek or Muscogee, occupied a broad territory extending from the Oconee River in Georgia to the Alabama River, and it included a number of tribes. In 1791 these tribes had fifty-two towns and some ten thou sand members, including the women and children.* Their large division was into UpperCreeks and Lower Creeks. The map inserted here is sufficiently accur ate to show the extent of the Muscogee lands.
It was, and still is, a well watered region. On Colton's map of the states of Georgia and Alabama there are laid down more than fifty water courses of

*Baneroft, as quoted by Lewis H. Morgan in Indian Migra

tions, estimates the Indians east of the Mississippi and south of

the Great Lakes, at the beginning of the seventeenth century, at

about one hundred and eighty thousand; and of those Bancroft

.$

assigns to the Gherokees twelve thousand; to the Chickasaws,

**

Choctaws, and Muscogees fifty thousand.

35 30--

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING,

99

various sizes that one would cross in passing from the Altamaha to Claiborne on the Alabama.
This well known place is named, once "Weatherford's Bluff, two hundred and fifty steps leading up from the landing to the top of the bluff, as it is almost directly south from Tuscaloosa on the Black "Warrior, near which locality a Creek chief, by per mission of the Choctaws, had established himself; and this meridian line continued northward is suffi ciently accurate to mark the boundary in the pres ent North Alabama between the Chickasaws and Cherokees, and eastward of it, south of the Cherokee lands, will be indicated the Creek lands west of the Alabama on the Cahawba and on the upper Black Warrior. This meridian line, which would thus nearly mark the western limits of the Creeks in 1813, is thirty miles east of the St. Stephen's meri dian. The Creeks once claimed, perhaps held, as far west as the Tombigbee.
Of the Upper Creek towns, according to "Weatherford and General Woodward, they were nearly all hostile except the Natchez and Hillabee towns, and were controlled largely by Menawa, or, as the name is now written by his grandchildren, Monahwee (known as Ogillis Incha or Fat Englishman), who commanded the Indian warriors at Tohopeka, called in English, Horse Shoe. Also there should be,excepted the Tookabatchees who adhered to Big War rior and some of the Coshattees with their leader Captain Isaacs.
Gatschet, Migration Legend, Voij II, pages 189, 190, gives the following as the names of the hostile Upper Creek towns, his orthography not being

100

THE CREEK WAR.

adopted: Hoithlewahlee, Fooshatchee, Kolumee, Ekanhatkee, Sawanogee, Muklasa, Ochee-apofa, Oakchoyuchee, Pochus-hatchee, Pakan-talahassee, Wakokayee, Wewaka. These towns " made them selves red." So Gatschet translates itchatidshalgi. The Alibamo towns, which are counted among the Upper Creeks, have already been named as hostile.
The Lower Creeks, under the influence more largely of Colonel Hawkins, were, for the most part, friendly. Noted among these friendly Indians were General William Mclntosh, a Creek chief of the tribe of the Cowetas, Mad Dragon's Son, and Timpony Barnard of the Uchees.
In the narration of events we left Weatherford with the war party on the east of the Alabama, surely, according to the letter of General Wilkinson, in July or August of 1813. And some of that party very soon proceeded to Pensacola, then the great mart of trade, to procure military supplies. On their return occurred the attack and defense known as the Battle of Burnt Corn, which will be detailed in another chapter

APPENDIX.

NOTE. It seems fitting to append here some ex

tracts, if lengthy, yet interesting and valuable, from

the memoranda of Mr. George S. Gaines, origi

nally published in the Alabama Historical Reporter.

With some members of the Gaines family I have

been personally acquainted, and these memoranda

I am sure are reliable.

m1. TT1. lo).

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

101

EXTRACTS FROM MEMORANDA OF GEO. S. GAINES.
"A Creek chief, known as O-ce-o-chee-mot-la, obtained permission of the Choctaws to make a set tlement at the falls of the Black Warrior, so that the hunters of each tribe might have a resting place when visiting^each other. This settlement had in creased to many families before I took charge of the U. S. Choctaw*trading house at St. Stephens (1805), and they traded with us. I was in the habit of extending a credit to the old chief of about a hundred dollars, which he always paid off at his next visit, but expected the same indulgence after he had finished bartering. During the spring and fall of every year he came down the river with a fleet of canoes to visit me. In the fall of 1811 he arrived with a large fleet manned by thirty or forty warriors, and having each canoe freighted with larger cargoes than usual of skins and furs, etc. At that time Tandy Walker, who had lived many years in the Creek nation as a "public blacksmith," sent by the government for the benefit of the Indians, resided in the neighborhood of St. Stephens. He learned their language and was a great favorite, and when O-ce-o-chee-mot-la came down to trade with me he acted as interpreter.
On the present occasion I noticed that the old chief was exceedingly anxious to make me believe that he was very much attached to me. He informed me that he had acted upon my advice in relation to building a good store house, and now brought with him several hundred dollars' worth of peltries, etc., to purchase a supply of goods for his store that I had offered him credit several times before to the amount of several hundred dollars.
Next day, after this conversation, the Chief re marked he would make his debt an "old hun dred" (one thousand) this time. I replied that the times were changed. The British government had a misunderstanding with the President which

102

THE CREEK WAB.

might end in a war, and it would be unwise in me to allow him to contract so large a debt and imprudent in him to do so. He remarked that his friend, Tandy Walker, who was a man of property, would be his security for one or two "old hundreds." While this conversation was progressing I noticed Walker was greatly troubled, and was endeavoring to appear calm. I reiterated I could only let him have the usual amount of credit under the existing circumstances. But the crafty Chief was not to be put off so readily, and entered into an ingenious argument to overcome my objections.
The sun went down and I told the chief that it was time to prepare for sleep, and we would " tell each other our dreams in the morning." Bidding me good night with assurances of affection and respect, he led his party off. In a few minutes Walker returned and leaning over the counter he whispered to me, " I told the chief I left my knife in the store so that I might come back and speak to you privately. Meet me at the Rock at midnight. Let no one know of this, for our lives depend upon secrecy." Before I could answer he was gone. At midnight I went cautiously to the " Hanging Rock," so called because it projected over the bluff of the . river, near the old Spanish Fort. Walker was there, and he whispered, "let us go further in the thicket." He then informed me, still in a whisper, that the Creeks had determined to join the British in the war about to commence. The Chief of the Black War rior settlement proposed to unite with him in obtain ing all the goods they could probably get from me; and that Walker should take his family up to the Falls of the Warrior and enjoy half the profits of the business.. "Before the time to pay for the goods there will be no one to demand it, for the trading house will be the first object to capture when the war begins," the chief had told him many times since proposing the scheme. He consented, fearing that

THE WAR CLOUD GATHERING.

103

if he did not the Indians would immediately attack the place, but took care to impress O-ce-o-chee-mot-la with the danger of offending me, as my brother was a war chief much loved by the President.
Walker remained with me only a few minutes, fearing his absence would be discovered by the Indians and that they might suspect the object of his mission, which would certainly, he assured me, result in the destruction of us all. The balance of that night was passed without sleep because of the uneasiness I felt. There were no troops in St. Stephens and but few men not more than six or seven all told.
Next morning the chief and his warriors came to the store apparently in excellent spirits. He inquired what I had dreamed. I replied, " I dreamed there was a war. The English carne over in their ships and engaged some of the northern tribes to assist them to fight, but the President's warriors soon drove the English back over the great waters, leaving the Indians who helped them to suffer alone." O-ceo-chee-mot-la said, " I dreamed that my good friend sold me all I wanted, and ^hen I reached home my people said, Mr. Gaines is a great man he is a man of his word and our Chief, who has always told us this and how Mr. Gaines trusted him, is a man of but one talk!" I said to him, I was obliged to believe my dream, and it was useless to waste words in idle talk- After bartering his cargoes and obtain ing his usual credit he departed with his fleet, and I never saw him again.
Rumors of the rapidly increasing bad feeling of the Creek Indians rendered the settlers on the Alabama and.Tombigbee rivers very uneasy during the year of 1812, checking emigration to a great extent. In the fall of this year Tandy Walker called on me to inform me that he had just learned from a Creek Indian that a white woman had been brought from Tennessee as a prisoner to Tuscaloosa

104

THE CREEK WAR.

by a party of Indians returning from a visit to the
Shawnees on the northern lakes. Mrs. Gaines, who was present, said to Walker that he ought by all
means to endeavor to rescue the woman and bring her down to the white settlement. Walker replied he would try to effect her release, but it would be at
the risk of his life. He proposed to walk up to the falls on pretense of paying a visit to his old friend O-ce-o chee-mot-la and lull suspicion by declaring
his adherance to the cause of the hostile Indians. He would then obtain a canoe, buy or steal the woman and bring her down the river. He departed immediately, returning in about two weeks with the
woman in a canoe. She was in a very feeble con dition, her mind a good deal impaired by suffering, and her limbs and feet were still wounded, caused by
the hardships she was forced to undergo after she had been captured. Mrs. Gaines took charge of her and after a week's tender nursing her mind appeared
to be restored. Her name was Crawley. Her home was in a
new settlement near the mouth of the Tennessee river. During the absence of her husband, a party
of Creek Indians rushed to her house and while they stopped to murder two of her children who were playing in the yard she concealed her two youngest in a potato cellar under the floor. The Indians
broke open the door and dragged her out with the intention of killing her, but concluded to take her to their town. They compelled her to cook f6r them on the march, but offered no other violence.
After her recovery, we sent Mrs. Crawley home
with a party of my friends who were going through the wilderness to Tennessee * * * The Legis
lature of Tennessee voted thanks and an amount of
money to Tandy Walker for his agency in this affair. I promptly communicated to the War Depart
ment the conduct of the chief O-ce-o-chee-mot-la on
his last visit to the Trading House ; also Mrs. Craw-
ley's capture and rescue.

THE KIOCKADES.

105

CHAPTER VI.
THE STOCKADES.
THE writers who have treated of the "Creek War" briefly are many. Those who have gone much into the details are few. And these few seem to have had influences bearing upon them which led them to take different views of the same facts,or sometimes to disagree in regard to the facts. Claiborne, to whose large work reference has already been made, doubtless meant to be, as he says in his Introduction that he has striven to be " truthful and impartial;" but it is difficult to read several things in his "Mis sissippi," without thinking that his strong feelings and sympathies and his love for that brilliant rhe toric, which he knew how to command, have un duly colored some of his statements. He objects strongly to the view which Colonel Hawkins, the Government Agent among the Creeks, took of Tecumseh, as Claiborne himself gives that view, and of Colonel Hawkins' claim that there would not be much war if the Creeks were let alone. He says that General Flournoy was misled by Colonel Hawkins' representations concerning the degree of civil ization attained by the Creeks and their peaceful disposition towards the whites. He makes this state ment : " Even after the massacre at Fort Minis,

106

THE CREEK WAR.

Colonel Hawkins reiterated these assurances, laid the blame of that affair on the Tombigbee people, and declared that the war would be ' a civil war among the Creeks and not on the whites,' if let alone."
Claiborne adds: " Unfortunately General Flournoy adopted these views and forbade any aggressive movement on the savages."
Pickett also speaks of Colonel Hawkins as hav ing been "strangely benighted," not properly realiz ing the danger that existed. It is not designed to suggest, here, who had the most accurate knowledge of the real state of affairs among the Creeks, some of Brewer's statements will appear in other chap ters, and the readers will have other facts before them on which to form their own ooinions but it is certain that the inhabitants of these river settle ments, these pioneers along the Mobile and Tensaw and the Alabama and Tombigbee, saw a dark look ing war cloud rising to the eastward, and that they felt it needful, and that it was needful, for them to do the best which they could do in preparing for self-defense. They therefore erected as speedily as possible stockades, which they called, in the language of war, forts, in which they spent quite a little time in the summer and fall of 1813. No dates have been found giving the exact time of the erection of the stockades in Clarke county, but it is evident that s6me were erected in July.
An enumeration and some description of these forts is the object of this chapter, including also some erected long before 1813.
1. Fort St. Stephens, established by the French? probably about 1714, held afterwards by the Span-

TH& STOCKADES.

107

ish, who made there a settlement about 1Y86, given up by the Spaniards to the Americans in 1799, has been already mentioned. So far as the Greek Indians were concerned, this was con sidered an impregnable fortress. As this locality, the old St. Stephens, will be again more fully men tioned, it needs no further notice here, only the statement that it was on the west bank of the Tombigbee, on a high bluff, at the head of sloop naviga tion.
2. Fort Stoddart, as established by United States troops in July, 1T99, has also been named, with its stockade and bastion. As this was for some years a government post, held by United States troops, and became a port of entry where the Court of Admi ralty was held, it was of course a strong point. In 1804 Captain Schuyler of New York was com mander here, with eighty men, Edmund P. Gaines was Lieutenant, and Lieutenant Reuben Chamberlain was paymaster. At Fort Stoddart duties were ex acted on imports and exports.* Four miles west of Fort Stoddart was Mount Yernon.
3. Passing down the river, a strong fort was lo cated at Mobile called Fort Charlotte. Another was also constructed here, Fort Bowyer.
4. Going now northward, on the east side of the Alabama, two miles below the " cut off," a quarter

*A beautiful, or at least an instructive and strong example of the effect of duties on articles reaching the consumer was shown here in 1807. In that year the Natchez planters in the western part of the Mississippi territory paid for Kentucky flour four dollars per barrel, and the same flour brought round by Mobile and there subjected to Spanish duties, and coming up the river past the Fort Stoddart port of entry, cost the Tombigbee planters sixteen dollars a barrel.

108

THE CREEK WAR.

of a mile from the Tensaw Boat Yard, was the illfated Fort Mims. This was built in the summer of 1813 and will be again noticed. When the erection of this stockade was commenced is uncertain, per haps in July, and, according to Pickett, its last block house was never finished.
This might be called No. 1 of the stockades erected especially for protection against the Creeks, but the former notation will be continued.
5. Fort Pierce was a small stockade some two miles south-east of Fort Mims. It took its name from two brothers, "William Pierce and John Pierce, who came from New England and made there their home in Spanish times. "William Pierce was a wea ver and John Pierce a teacher.
6. Crossing the Alabama and coming into the new Clarke county, we reach Fort Glass, built some time in July at the home of Zachariah Glass by himself and his neighbors, Nah-hee, called a Tory Creek, an intelligent Indian, employed in the Creek war as a scout, assisting, it is said, in the building.
7. Fort Madison was in the north-east corner of section one, township six, range three east of the St. Stephen's meridian, on the water-shed line, which was then the eastern boundary of Clarke County. As will be seen from the accompanying cut, it was north of Fort Glass only two hundred and twentyfive yards, and the two stockades constituted one locality, being the center of the quite large Fort Madison neighborhood. The first store in this region was about due east from Fort Madison, on the Alabama River, distant six miles, opened, probably, in 1812; and one of the first grist mills was built

6O Yard
FORT MADISON
Well

1| Q Church

VTS
<M

Glass
i40Yds.

Springs Yds.

110

THE CREEK WAR.

about the same time, perhaps about four miles north; and in 1813 the first cotton gin in the vicinity was erected some two miles north. This was one of the seven principal settlements in the then new Clarke county and the region west of the Alabama. As is evident from the mention of the store and the mill and the gin, and the plantations that were opened around these, it was an important locality for these settlers to hold.
Fort Madison contained not quite an acre of ground, having been, as will be seen from the cut, sixty yards square. A trench three feet in depth was dug around the outside and bodies of pine trees cut about fifteen feet in length were placed perpendicularily in the trench side by side, making thus a wall of pine wood twelve feet in height. Port holes were cut at convenient distances so as to en able the inmates to look out, and in case of an attack to fire upon the beseigers. In about the same way all these stockades of 1813 were constructed. They were lighted at night by means of the abundant pitch pine placed upon scaffolds, covered with earth, erected for the purpose. Additional securities were added at Fort Madison and an improved method of lighting introduced, which will be by and by men tioned. Within this enclosure, bearing the name of the President of the United States, were the tents and cabins of the settlers of that neighborhood, and, after its erection, the date not certain, Fort Glass was occupied by the soldiers.*
* From information gathered in Clarke county, in the region occupied by several of these forts, it seems that when General Claiborne reached Mount Vernon, July 30th, he immediately ascertained what could then be learned about the Burnt Corn

THE STOCKADES.

Ill

8. Fort Sinquefield was about ten miles north of Fort Madison, on the western side of Bassett's Creek, a large stream of water for a creek, on section thirteen, township eight, range three east, a smaller stockade buiilt ver"y much in the same manner. As the map in this book will show, it was about five miles south-east from the present town of Grove Hill, formerly called Macon, the county seat of Clarke county. This fort stood on a table-land or height of ground extending for a mile north and south. East ward is a gentle slope which terminates finally in the Bassett's Creek valley. "Westward are deep valleys and narrow, between large, high ridges of land. No actual hill is within miles of this locality, yet the ascent from the valleys to the top of the ridges or table, might be called going up hill. The spring which supplied this stockake with water is south of west, in one of the deep valleys, distant two hundred and seventy-five yards.
Ninety feet distant from the once stockaded ground, in a north-west direction, are some graves. A few. rods eastward of the fort ground is supposed to be an old burial place, although here the traces of the graves were not distinct in 1879. One of the principal highways of Clarke county runs directly by this locality, but, as it has been for many years a family home, no traces of the stockade outlines can

action, and iu regard to the stockades around the residences of Glass, Lavier, Sinquefield, White, Easley, and Carney, which of course were then already erected; and that he sent Colonel Carson with two hundred mounted men to Fort Glas; and that after their arrival Fort Madison was immediately constructed. This fixes the date some time in August. It may be added here that General Claiborne also sent Captain Scott with a company of men to St. Stephens, to occupy the old Spanish block-house,

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be found here which are still so distinct at forts Glass and Madison.
9. Fort White was a small stockade a short dis tance north-east of the present Grove Hill.
10. Landrum's Fort was eleven miles west from Fort Sinquefield; on section eighteen, township eight, range two east.
11. Mott's Fort was in the same neighborhood. These both were small.
12. Going now to the Tombigbee Biver and north ward, Fort Easley was on section ten or eleven, town ship eleven, range one west, at what is now called Wood's Bluff. This fort was named, as were nearly all others, from a prominent settler in the neighborhood, and the bluff took its name from Major Wood, an offi cer in the Burnt Corn expedition. This stockade was on a small plateau containing about three acres. On the side next to the river the bluff is almost a perpen dicular wall, there is " a bold spring of water flowing from its side," and the descent is quite abrupt from this plateau above and below the stockade ground, making this fort a naturally strong position.
General Claiborne visited this stockade about the last of August, having received a report that it would be attacked by the Indians. It is possible that some of the Creeks started this report to call attention away from the real fort which they de signed to attack, that Fort Mims, which was fifty miles south and twelve miles east from Fort Easley.
13. Turner's Fort was some eight miles south and five west, in the west bend of the Tombigbee River, near the residence of Abner Turner. This fort was built of split pine logs doubled and con-

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tained two or three block-houses. It was held by the citizens of the neighborhood, thirteen men and some boys forming the garrison that expected to protect the women and children. Two or three miles distant, on the river, was a' Choctaw reservation known as Turkey Town, called by the Choctaws " Fakit Chipunta," Little Turkeys. In this stockade were members of the Turner, Thornton, Pace, and other families, early settlers in what became the delightful West Bend neighborhood. Here for a time resided Tandy Walker, who is mentioned in the Gaines records, who was " a most experi enced and daring backwoodsman;" but in the sum mer of 1813 he was connected with the affairs at Fort Madison.
The inmates of the two forts, Turner's and Easleys', held religious services in their fort life. At Fort Easley a camp-meeting was held, probably in August, which some from the other stockade at tended. The "love feast " on Sunday morning was held outside the fort, but guards were stationed to give warning if any attacking party of Indians ap peared.*
14. Passing, now, down the river, on the west side, five miles below Coffeeville, about a mile from the river, was Cato's Fort.

* Among those attending this meeting from West Bend was Mrs. Martha Pace, known in her later life as Aunt Patsy, born about 1800, then a girl of thirteen, with whom I became ac quainted in 1859, and who mentioned the incident of the " love feast," when she was about eighty years of age, a very active, even then, and noble hearted woman. In this West Bend neigh borhood, at the home of Hon. Eli S. Thornton, among those who were in the Turner fort and their descendants, I spent nearly two
years. T. H. B.

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15. Still further west, in Washington county, was Rankin's Fort, quite a large stockade, and the most western one of the Eiver Group.
16. McGrew's Fori was in the corner of sec tion one, township seven, range one west, about three miles north of Fort St. Stephens, in Olarke county, five miles north and eighteen west from Fort Madison. It is claimed that the area here enclosed with palisades was about two acres. Some of the posts were remaining in 1879, and around the fort locality was an old field. Here two brothers, Will iam McGrew and John McGrew, British royalists then, refugees, probably, from the Atlantic coast, made an early settlement near the Tombigbee River. McGrew's Reserve, an old Spanish grant, is still a landmark in Clarke county. These brothers left the reputation of having been exemplary men, and of having become good Americans. How many families were in this fort is not known.
17. Six miles south from Jackson, at Gullet's Bluff, was Fort Carney, on the line of travel to Mount Yernon. This fort was built by Josiah Car ney, who settled on the river in 1809.*
18. Three miles south of Fort Carney, near Oven Bluff, was Po well's Fort, where were about six families, including those of John McCaskey, James Powell, and John Powell.

* At this stockade an incident occurred illustrating the siatement that skill, acquired through disobedience, may be useful, la one of the families was a girl about fourteen years of age who found the large water course attractive, but whose father, know ing nothing about the management of a boat, fearing no doubt for her safety, had forbidden her to go to the river. One day an alarm was given that the Indians were near, and the families hurriedly sought safety on the west side of the river. But how

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19. Lavier's Fort, written sometimes by mistake or misprint Rivier's, was built, so far as has been ascertained, (the only authority is an aged colored man, Dick Embree), near the residence of Captain Lawson Lavier, who traded with the Choctaw Indians. It was built by himself and a few neigh bors, but its locality is not known. Pickett names it, but no resident of Clarke County was found in 1877" who knew anything of it.
20. At Mount Yernon, to which as General Claiborne's headquarters we now come, and where was a United States arsenal, were two forts. An arsenal was maintained here until 1861, and since 1865 this has been held as a United States post, where a few officers and soldiers may always be found. Near the parade ground are some of those beautiful trees known as live oak, and the long leaf pine growth extends a long distance northward. The landing place on the river, known as Arsenal Wharf or Fort Stoddart, four miles distant, the early United States "port of entry," is distant from Mobile by the river channel forty-five miles, and five miles further north by the river brings one to the head of the Mobile River, the union of the Alabama and
should this family cross, when the father could neither paddle nor row? The daughter procured a boat, and, to the astonish ment of her father, took them all rapidly over the river. And then the fact came out that she had slipped off secretly to the river when opportunities offered and by practice had learned to take a boat across that current. What her father said or did tradition has not preserved, but that girl, surely not generally disobedient nor wayward, grew up to womanhood, became Mrs. Blackwell, one of the highly respected women of Clarke cou