Read Part 1 and
Part 2 of our
3-part Historical Overview of the Southeastern Creek Tribes and Creek Nation.
In the fall
of 1811 the Upper Creeks held their annual meeting Tuckabatchee near
Montgomery, Alabama area. Anger and resentment against the Americans was at a
peak among the 5,000 Creeks present. The Great Shawnee war Chief Tecumseh traveled
from his homeland above the Ohio River in the hope of enlisting the southeastern
tribes in a great pan-Indian confederacy. The Shawnee gained a following among
a group of young Creek medicine men. They claimed to possess a special
understanding of the good and evil spirits occupying the traditional Creek
three-tiered universe of the earth, sky, and underworld. They were called
“prophets” by the whites and were strong advocates for a return to traditional
Creek ways. When Tecumseh departed for the North, some of the prophets
accompanied him and spent the winter absorbing his doctrine. On their way home
in the spring of 1812, they encountered a group of white settlers in western
Tennessee and murdered them. These killings and others in the Ohio country and
within Creek lands to the south triggered a chain of events that led to war,
and, ultimately devastation for the Creek.
First, under
orders from the U.S. government, Hawkins demanded the arrest of the warriors
responsible for the settlers’ death. Creek leaders were permitted to send in
their own lawmen to bring in the culprits, but, instead of taking the culprits
into custody, the Creek officers
executed them. Militant factions within the Tribe swore vengeance and
set out to eliminate from the confederacy every last shred of white
civilization. By the end of 1813 one observer noted, “The whole of towns has
taken up the war club.” Since these war clubs were painted red, those who
wielded them became known as the Red Sticks.
The Red
Stick crusade spread rapidly. By July the Red Sticks had slain nine Creeks who
backed accommodation with white Americans, burned several villages, and
destroyed livestock, fences, plows, and most everything non-traditional they
came across. Most of the opposition came from the Lower Creek towns, led by
William McIntosh of Coweta.
In the summer
of 1813, a band of Red Sticks traveled to Pensacola where they purchased
gunpowder from the Spaniards. On their way home, they were attacked by a combined
force of whites and Creeks. Some Red Sticks died in the skirmish and they vowed
to retaliate in kind. They attacked Fort Mims, a well-protected plantation in
southern Alabama where the warriors who had attacked them had taken refuge. About
750 warriors led by Red Eagle, also known as William Weatherford, slaughtered some
250 men, women and children.
The Fort
Mims massacre was the incentive the Americans needed to launch an all-out campaign
against the Creek Indians. General Andrew Jackson of Tennessee was at the head
of the largest force – which included a band of Creeks under McIntosh and Big
Warrior as well as 600 Cherokees. Twice Jackson had led his troops into the
heart of Creek territory and twice his advance was checked, first by problems
with his troops, next by fierce Creek resistance. Then, in March 1814, Jackson
encountered the Creeks at a neck of land on the Tallapoosa River known a
Horseshoe Bend. Some 1,000 Red Sticks had barricaded themselves there but
Jackson’s force was well armed and perhaps two to three times greater in
number. While Jackson’s hidden allies swam the river to steal the canoes and
block any escape, Jackson launched a frontal assault. The fighting lasted all
day. When it ended, approximately 800 Red Sticks lay dead. Many of Jackson’s
men stripped the skin from the bodies as gruesome souvenirs of the battle. Most
of the 800 Red Stick bodies were thrown or dragged into the river. Weatherford,
who had miraculously escaped a few months earlier by jumping his horse off a
bluff into a river, was not among the dead. He had purportedly been off
inspecting other fortifications on the day of the attack.
The wars
shattered the Creek nation claiming over 3,000 lives – nearly 15 percent of the
total Creek population. Jackson’s campaign had swept most of Upper Creek
country clean and driven as many as 2,500 Creeks into Florida where many had
sought refuge among the Seminoles.
Others escaped to establish new homes in the Florida Panhandle area. Jackson
continued his advance down the Tallopoosa River and built Fort Jackson on the
ruins of the old French redoubt, Fort Toulouse. In April 1814, the Creek
leaders assembled there to have a treaty dictated to them. They were shocked by
the terms, spelled out by Jackson himself. The Creek Confederacy would be
forced to give to the U.S. government more than 23 million acres, representing
half their domain. In an ironic note, it was the pro-government William
McIntosh and his lieutenants who had to do the signing. Most of the Red Stick
leaders were either dead or in Florida, waiting for the next round of fighting.
Sources: Tribes of the Southern Woodlands, Time-Life
books; Creek Country, The Creek Indians and their World by Robbie Ethridge;
Native Americans of the Southeast by Christina M. Girod; The Southeastern
Indians by Charles Hudson; and numerous web sites including Wikipedia.
No comments:
Post a Comment