As early as the latter half of the sixteenth century, a tribe speaking
a Maskoki language was settled on the shores of the Atlantic ocean, on
lands included at present in the State of South Carolina, and from
these shores they extended to some distance inland. In that country
René de Laudonnière in 1564 established a fortification in Port Royal
Bay, called Charlefort, and the terms transmitted by him, being all of
Creek origin, leave no doubt about the affinity of the natives,
yatiqui _interpreter_, tola _laurel_, Olataraca, viz.: holá'hta `láko,
nom. pr. "_the great leader_." Shortly after, the Spanish captain Juan
Pardo led an expedition (1566-67) through the countries along Savannah
river, and the local names found in the report made of it by Juan de
la Vandera (1569) also point to the presence of a people speaking
Creek established on both sides of that river:[41] Ahoya "_two
going_"; Issa Cr. ídshu "_deer_"; Solameco, Cr. súli miko "_buzzard
chief_"; Canosi, Cr. ikanō′dshi "_graves are there_"--the name of
Cannouchee river, Georgia.
[Footnote 41: Cf. Buck. Smith, Coleccion de Documentos ineditos,
I, p. 15-19 (Madrid, 1857).]
After the lapse of a century, when British colonists began to settle
in larger numbers in these parts, a tribe called Yámassi (Yemasee,
Yamasee, Yemmassaws, etc.) appears in the colonial documents as
settled there, and in the maritime tracts of Georgia and Eastern
Florida. Thus G. R. Fairbanks, History of St. Augustine (1858), p.
125, mentions the following dates from Spanish annals: "The Yemasees,
always peaceful and manageable, had a principal town, Macarisqui, near
St. Augustine. In 1680 they revolted, because the Spaniards had
executed one of their principal chiefs at St. Augustine; and in 1686
they made a general attack on the Spaniards, and became their mortal
enemies."
The inroads of the Yámassi, in Cr. Yamassálgi, made in 1687 and 1706
upon the christianized Timucua have been alluded to under "Timucua"
(p. 12).
The English surveyor Lawson, who traveled through these parts in 1701,
calls them Savannah Indians, stating that they are "a famous, warlike,
friendly nation of Indians, living at the south end of Ashley river."
(Reprint of 1860, p. 75.) Governor Archdale also calls them
_Savannahs_[42] in 1695; hence they were named like the Yuchi, either
from the Savannah river, or from the savanas or prairies of the
southern parts of South Carolina. The Yuchi probably lived northwest
of them. A few miles north of Savannah city there is a town and
railroad crossing, Yemassee, which perpetuates their tribal name.
Another ancient authority locates some between the Combahee and the
Savannah river, and there stood their largest town, Pocotaligo.[43]
Hewat (1779) states that they possessed a large territory lying
backward from Port Royal Island, in his time called Indian Land (Hist.
Acc., I, 213). Cf. Westo and Stono Indians, p. 48.
[Footnote 42: Description of Carolina, London, 1707. The Yámassi
then lived about eighty miles from Charleston, and extended
their hunting excursions almost to St. Augustine.]
[Footnote 43: Gallatin, Synopsis, p. 84, recalls the
circumstance that Poketalico is also the name of a tributary of
the Great Kanawha river. This seems to point to a foreign origin
of that name.]
They had been the staunchest Indian supporters of the new British
colony, and had sent 28 men of auxiliary troops to Colonel Barnwell,
to defeat the Tuscarora insurrection on the coast of North Carolina
(1712-13), when they suddenly revolted on April 15th, 1715, committed
the most atrocious deeds against helpless colonists, and showed
themselves to be quite the reverse of what their name indicates
(yámasi, yámassi, the Creek term for _mild, gentle, peaceable_[44]).
Among their confederates in the unprovoked insurrection were Kataba,
Cheroki and Congari Indians. Wholesale massacres of colonists occurred
around Pocotaligo, on Port Royal Island and at Stono, and the number
of victims was estimated at four hundred. A force of volunteers,
commanded by Governor Craven, defeated them at Saltketchers, on Upper
Combahee river, southern branch, and drove them over Savannah river,
but for a while they continued their depredations from their places of
refuge (Hewat, Histor. Acc., I, 213-222).
[Footnote 44: Verbified in tchayámassïs: I am friendly, liberal,
generous, hospitable.]
Names of Yámassi Indians mentioned at that period also testify to
their Creek provenience. The name of a man called Sanute is explained
by Cr. sanódshäs _I encamp near_, or _with somebody_; that of
Ishiagaska (Tchiagaska?) by íka akáska _his scraped_ or _shaved head_;
or issi akáska _his hair (on body) removed_. At a public council held
at Savannah, in May 1733, a Lower Creek chief from Kawíta expressed
the hope that the Yámassi may be in time _reunited to his people_; a
fact which fully proves the ethnic affinity of the two national
bodies.[45]
[Footnote 45: Cf. Jones, Tomochichi, p. 31.]
In Thomas Jeffery's Map of Florida, which stands opposite the
title-page of John Bartram, Descr. of East Florida, London, 1769, 4to,
a tract on the northeast shore of Pensacola bay is marked "Yamase
Land."
A tradition is current among the Creeks, that the Yámassi were reduced
and exterminated by them, but it is difficult to trace the date of
that event. W. Bartram, Travels, p. 137, speaks of the "sepulchres or
tumuli of the Yamasees who were here slain in the last decisive
battle, the Creeks having driven them to this point, between the
doubling of the river (St. Juan, Florida), where few of them escaped
the fury of the conquerors.... There were nearly thirty of these
cemeteries of the dead," etc.; cf. _ibid._, p. 183. 516. Forty or
fifty of them fled to St. Augustine and other coast fortresses, and
were protected by the Spanish authorities; p. 55. 485. 390.
After the middle of the eighteenth century the name Yámassi disappears
from the annals as that of a distinct tribe. They were now merged into
the Seminoles; they continued long to exist as one of their _bands_
west of the Savannah river, and it is reported "that the Yemasi band
of Creeks refused to fight in the British-American war of 1813."
All the above dates permit us to conclude that, ethnographically, the
Yámassi were for the main part of Creek origin, but that some foreign
admixture, either Kataba or Yuchi, had taken place, which will account
for the presence of their local names of foreign origin. The
Apalachian or Hitchiti branch of the Maskoki family must have also
furnished elements to those Yámassi who were settled southwest of
Savannah city, for that was the country in which the Apalachian branch
was established.