seal of South-Carolina, with a party of the Chikkasah Indians, the
small-pox attacked them, not far from the Muskohge country; which
becoming general through the camp, I was under the necessity of setting
off by myself, between Flint river, and that of the Okmulgeh. I came up
with a large camp of Muskohge traders, returning from the English
settlements: the gentlemen told me, they had been lately assured at
Augusta by the Cheerake traders, that above a hundred and twenty of the
French Shawano might be daily expected near that place, to cut off the
English traders, and plunder their camps, and cautioned me, with much
earnestness at parting, to keep a watchful eye during that day’s march.
After having rode fifteen miles, about ten o’clock, I discovered ahead
through the trees, an Indian ascending a steep hill: he perceived me at
the same instant, for they are extremely watchful on such dangerous
attempts—Ambuscade is their favourite method of attack. As the company
followed their leader in a line, each at the distance of a few yards
from the other, all soon appeared in view. As soon as I discovered the
foremost, I put up the shrill whoop of friendship, and continually
seemed to look earnestly behind me, till we approached near to each
other, in order to draw their attention from me, and fix it that way, as
supposing me to be the foremost of a company still behind. Five or six
soon ran at full speed on each side of the path, and blocked up two
vallies, which happened to be at the place of our meeting, to prevent my
escape. They seemed as if their design was to attack me with their
barbed arrows, lest they should alarm my supposed companions by the
report of their guns. I observed that instead of carrying their bow and
quiver over their shoulder, as is the travelling custom, they held the
former in their left hand, bent, and some arrows. I approached and
addressed them, and endeavoured to appear quite indifferent at their
hostile arrangement. While I held my gun ready in my right hand about
five yards distant from them, their leader who stood foremost came and
struck my breast with the but-end of one of my pistols, which I had in
my left hand: I told him with that vehemence of speech, which is always
requisite on such an occasion, that I was an English Chikkasah; and
informed him by expressive gestures that there were two tens of
Chikkasah {276} warriors,[159] and more than half that number of women,
besides children, a little behind, just beyond the first hill. At this
news, they appeared to be much confused, as it was unexpected for such a
number of warlike enemies to be so near at hand. This Shawano party
consisted only of twenty-three middle sized, but strong bodied men, with
large heads and broad flat crowns, and four tall young persons, whom I
conjectured to be of the Cheerake nation. I spoke a little to a
hair-lipped warrior among them, who told me he lived in _Tukkasêhche_, a
northern town of that country. The leader whispered something to his
waiter, which, in like manner, was communicated to the rest, and then
they all passed by me, with sullen looks and glancing eyes. I kept my
guard till they were out of arrow-shot, when I went on at a seemingly
indifferent pace. But, as soon out of their view, I rode about seventy
miles with great speed, to avoid the danger of a pursuit, as I imagined
they would be highly enraged against me for their double disappointment.
About sun-set of the same day, I discovered more Indians a-head; but,
instead of sounding the usual whoop of defiance, I went on slowly, and
silently, a little way, reasoning with myself about the safest method in
so dangerous a situation: I had apprehensions of their being another
party of the Shawano company, separated in that manner to avoid a
pursuit; which otherwise might be very easy, by the plainness of their
tracks, through the long grass and herbage. But, at the critical time,
when I had concluded to use no chivalry, but give them leg-bail instead
of it, by leaving my baggage-horses, and making for a deep swamp, I
discovered them to be a considerable body of the Muskohge head-men,
returning home with presents from Charles Town, which they carried
chiefly on their backs. The wolf-king (as the traders termed him)[160]
our old steady friend of the Amooklasah Town, near the late Alebahma,
came foremost, harnessed like a jack-ass, with a saddle on his back,
well girt over one shoulder, and across under the other. We semed
equally glad to meet each other; they, to hear how affairs stood in
their country, as well as on the trading path; and I to find, that
instead of bitter-hearted foes, they were friends, and would secure my
retreat from any pursuit that might happen. I told them the whole
circumstances attending my meeting the Shawano,[161] with their being
conducted by our deceitful Cheerake friends, who were desirous of
spoiling the old beloved white path, by making it red; and earnestly
persuaded them to be on their guard that night, as I imagined the enemy
had pursued me when they {277} found I had eluded their bloody
intention. After a long conversation together, I advised them to go home
through the woods, to prevent a larger body of the lurking enemy from
spoiling them, and their beloved country, by the loss of so many old
beloved men, and noted warriors. I said this, to rouse them against the
Cheerake; well knowing that one pack of wolves, was the best watch
against another of the same kind. They thanked me for the friendly
notice I gave them, and the care I shewed for their safety, and engaged
me to call the next day at a hunting camp, where was a war-leader, the
son of the dog-king of the Huphale-Town, with a considerable number of
their people, and desire them to remove with all speed to their camp, at
the place they then fixed on. We smoked tobacco, and parted well
pleased. According to promise, I went the next day to the camp, and
delivered their message, which was readily complied with. The Shawano
whom I had eluded, after rambling about, and by viewing the smoke of
fires from the tops of high hills and trees, and carefully listening to
the report of guns, fell in with two Chikkasah hunters, who were adopted
relations of the Muskohge, and killed, and scalped them, and then ran
off to the northern towns of the Cheerake. This was the true and sole
cause of the last war between the Muskohge and Cheerake: and the
following account of the cause of those nations entering into amity with
each other, will, on the strictest enquiry, be found as true. The cause
and direful effects are still feelingly known to great numbers of the
suffering inhabitants, which I insert by way of caution to states-men
hereafter.
As the Indians have no public faith to secure the lives of friendly
messengers in war-time, their wars are perpetuated from one generation
to another, unless they are ended by the mediation of some neutral
party. A very polished courtier presided in South Carolina,[162] who was
said to have cast a very earnest eye on the supposed profits of the
Cheerake trade, which were much lessened by the Muskohge war; and, in
order to establish it at its former value, so as to be worth some
hazard, he exerted himself to reconcile the Muskohge and Cheerake. If he
succeeded, he was sure to be something in pocket, and could report at
home, the profound peace he had effected between those nations by his
unwearied endeavours. He accordingly applied to some of the most
intelligent and leading traders among those warring savages, and
atempted to persuade them {278} by the ruling motive of mutual interest,
to be reconciled through his brotherly mediation. Though the Cheerake
were great losers in the war, yet the surviving relations of those who
had been killed without equal revenge of blood, were at first
inflexible, and deaf to the mediation: but, by the oratory of some of
their own speakers who had not suffered, connected with our traders
persuasions, each separate family at last consented to meet their
enemies, at the time and place appointed by brotherly request, and there
bury the bloody tomohawk under ground, and smoke together, out of the
friendly white pipe. But, as the Muskohge were conquerors, and
frequently returned home in their favourite and public triumphant
manner, and had then no mischievous views against the English, as at
present, it was a very difficult task to reconcile them to our beloved
man’s pacific measures: their head-men had great sway over the
ambitious, and young rising warriors, and by the former manly conduct of
South-Carolina, in obtaining speedy redress for every material injury,
the more sensible and honest part of the old leading men were as much
averse to peace, as the light-headed warriors. They well knew the fickle
and ungovernable temper of their young men, and ambitious leaders, when
they had no red enemies to war with, to obtain higher war-titles by
scalps—and their wisdom saw at a distance, the dangerous consequences
that must attend a general peace: for a considerable time, therefore,
they highly inveighed, and firmly guarded against it. But when a man’s
private interest coincides with what he intends to accomplish, he is
assiduous and more intent to effect it. This was verified by the
unwearied diligence of the prime magistrate alluded to; he knew the
Indians could not kill so many deer and beaver in the time of war as of
peace, and by his address, he persuaded several of the leading traders,
even contrary to their own outward security and inward choice, to exert
their strongest endeavours with the Muskohge for a reconciliation with
the Cheerake. The chief of those trading gentlemen, who unwillingly
involved himself in this pernicious affair, was the humane and
intelligent L. M’G—l—wr—, Esq.[163] Each had their lessons, to set forth
the reciprocal advantages of the contending parties, by such a
coalition; but it was finished by that gentleman’s earnest and
well-timed application, connected with his great natural sense, and easy
flow of their own bold figurative way of expression—and their favourable
opinion of his steady, honest principles. Since that unlucky period, he
has as often lamented his success in that affair, as the discerning
honest rulers of the Muskohge opposed it. He told me, that {279} when he
was soliciting some of the head-men to comply with the fraternal
proposals of our kindly ruler, he unexpectedly met with a very sharp
repulse;—for, when he had finished his oration, on the disadvantages of
frowning war, and the advantages of smiling peace, an old war-leader
retorted every paragraph he had spoken, and told him, that till then he
always had reckoned the English a very wise people, but now he was sorry
to find them unwise, in the most material point: adding, “You have made
yourself very poor, by sweating, far and near, in our smoky town-houses
and hot-houses, only to make a peace between us and the Cheerake, and
thereby enable our young mad people to give you, in a short time, a far
worse sweat than you have yet had, or may now expect. But, forasmuch as
the great English chieftain in Charles Town, is striving hard to have it
so, by ordering you to shut your eyes, and stop your ears, lest the
power of conviction should reach your heart, we will not any more oppose
you in this mad scheme. We shall be silent concerning it; otherwise, I
should be as mad as you, if I reasoned any more with one who is wilfully
blind and deaf.”
A number of their warriors met at Charles Town, at the time appointed:
their high-stationed English friend then took a great deal of pains to
inform them of the mutual advantages, that would accrue to them, by a
firm peace, and he convinced their senses of it, by a visible proof; for
he borrowed from one of them an arrow, and holding each end of it in his
hands, he readily broke it, which surprized none of the red spectators,
except the owner,—they did not then regard it as a symbolical
performance, but a boyish action. He again requested from the same young
warrior, the loan of his remaining sheaf of arrows, who reluctantly gave
them, as he feared they would all singly fare the fate of the former.
But, when he held the bundle by each end in his hands, and could only
bend it a little, he revived the watchful owner, and pleasingly
surprized the attentive savages, as he thereby had strongly demonstrated
to them, that _vis unita fortior_, upon which he expatiated, in easy
fine language, to the great joy of his red audience. By such evidence,
they were induced to shake hands firmly together; and likewise to
endeavour to preserve a perpetual union with all their neighbouring
nations, lest the wolf should attack them separately. And ever since
that impolitic mediation, they have been so strongly convinced of their
great advantage and security, {280} by a close friendly union with each
other, that all the efforts of the wise and honest Georgia patriot,
Governor Ellis, in concert with the Indian trading merchants, to
dissolve it in the year 1760, proved abortive with the wary and jealous
Muskohge, while we were at war with the Cheerake—and many of the
out-settlers of Georgia and South Carolina were plundered and murdered
by them, without sparing women or children; many instances of which we
were too often well acquainted with on the spot. The Cheerake, however,
stood in such great awe of about sixty Chikkasah warriors, that except
once when they were repulsed by a treble inferior number, they durst not
attempt any sort of attack on Georgia barriers, during the whole
continuance of the war. The wisdom of the ruling members of that weak
colony directed them, in their dangerous circumstances, to chuse the
least of two evils,—to humour, and bear with those mischievous Muskohge,
rather than involve themselves in a complicated war with those two
confederated nations; which must have ruined Georgia, in the weak
condition it then was. And, notwithstanding they have considerably
increased since, both in wealth and number of inhabitants, it is
probable, the colony is now less capable of bearing with any sort of
firmness, a sudden shock from these savages, than they were at that
time. For, though the people were then fewer in numbers; yet their
settlements were more compact. By this means, they could easily join in
social defense, on any alarm: and, as the circumstances of most of them
did not tempt them to enervating luxury, so the needful exercises they
daily pursued, enabled them to make a diversion of ranging the woods,
when occasion required. Plantations are now settled, often at a great
distance from each other, even to the outmost boundaries of the colony,
where commonly the best gunsmen reside, but who probably would be cut
off by surprize, at the first onset: and, lower down, their dispersed
settlements are often separated, either by difficult or unpassable
morasses,—slow running black waters,—or broken salt-water sounds; which
of course would be a great impediment to the people supporting each
other: so that each plantation is exposed to a separate assault, by a
superior body of those cunning savages, who attack, and fly away like a
sudden thunder gust. We have no sure way to fight them, but in carrying
the war into the bowels of their own country, by a superior body of the
provincial troops, mixed with regulars; and as we can expect no mercy in
case of a defeat, we should not despise their power, but prepare
ourselves for a sure conquest. {281}
ACCOUNT
OF THE
CHOKTAH NATION, &c.
The Choktah country lies in about 33 and 34 Deg. N. L. According to the
course of the Indian path, their western lower towns are situated two
hundred computed miles to the northward of New Orleans; the upper ones
an hundred and sixty miles to the southward of the Chikkasah nation; 150
computed miles to the west of the late dangerous French Alebahma
garrison, in the Muskohge country; and 150 to the north of Mobille,
which is the first settlement, and only town, except New Orleans, that
the French had in West-Florida.
Their country is pretty much in the form of an oblong square. The
barrier towns, which are next to the Muskohge and Chikkasah countries,
are compactly settled for social defense, according to the general
method of other savage nations; but the rest, both in the center, and
toward the Missisippi, are only scattered plantations, as best suits a
separate easy way of living. A stranger might be in the middle of one of
their populous extensive towns, without seeing half a dozen of their
houses, in the direct course of his path. The French, to intimidate the
English traders by the prodigious number of their red legions in
West-Florida, boasted that the Choktah consisted of nine thousand men
fit to bear arms: but we find the true amount of their numbers, since
West-Florida was ceded to us, to be not above half as many as the French
report ascertained.[164] And, indeed, if the French and Spanish writers
of the American Aborigines, had kept so near the truth, as to mix one
half of realities, with their flourishing {282} wild hyperboles, the
literati would have owed them more thanks than is now their due.
Those who know the Choktah, will firmly agree in opinion with the
French, concerning them, that they are in the highest degree, of
a base, ungrateful, and thievish disposition—fickle, and
treacherous—ready-witted, and endued with a surprizing flow of smooth
artful language on every subject, within the reach of their ideas; in
each of these qualities, they far exceed any society of people I ever
saw. They are such great proficients in the art of stealing, that in our
store-houses, they often thieve while they are speaking to, and looking
the owner in the face. It is reckoned a shame to be detected in the act
of theft; but, it is the reward they receive, which makes it shameful:
for, in such a case, the trader bastinadoes the covetous sinner, almost
as long as he seems sensible of pain. A few years ago, one of the
Chikkasah warriors told me, he heard a middle-aged Choktah warrior,
boast in his own country, at a public ball-play, of having artfully
stolen several things from one and another trader, to a considerable
amount, while he was cheapening goods of us, and we were blind in our
own houses.
As their country is pleasantly interspersed with hills, and generally
abounds with springs and creeks, or small brooks; and is in a happy
climate, it is extremely healthful. Having no rivers in their country,
few of them can swim, like other Indians; which often proves hurtful to
them, when high freshes come on while they are out at war. Their towns
are settled on small streams that purl into Mobille river, and another a
little to the southward of it. Koosah, the largest town in their nation,
lies within 180 miles of Mobille, at a small distance from the river
which glides by that low, and unhealthy old capital. The summer-breezes
pass by Mobille, in two opposite directions, along the channel of the
river; and very unhealthy vapors keep floating over the small
semicircular opening of the town, which is on the south-side of the
river, opposite to a very low marsh, that was formed by great torrents
of water, sweeping down rafts of fallen trees, till they settled there,
and were mixt with the black soil of the low lands, carried, and
subsiding there in the like manner. From thence, to the opposite shore,
the river hath a sandy bottom, and at low water is so very shallow, that
a person could almost walk across, though {283} it is two leagues broad.
The southern side of the river is so full of great trees, that sloops
and schooners have considerable difficulty in getting up abreast: and
for a considerable distance from the sea-coast, the land is low, and
generally unfit for planting, even on the banks of the river. About
forty miles up, the French had a small settlement of one plantation
deep, from the bank of Mobille river. The rest of the land is sandy pine
barrens, till within forty miles of the Choktah country, where the oak
and the hiccory-trees first appear; from whence, it is generally very
fertile, for the extensive space of about six hundred miles toward the
north, and in some places, two hundred and fifty, in others, two hundred
and sixty in breadth, from the Missisippi: This tract far exceeds the
best land I ever saw besides in the extensive American world. It is not
only capable of yielding the various produce of all our North-American
colonies on the main continent, as it runs from the south, towards the
north; but, likewise, many other valuable commodities, which their
situation will never allow them to raise. From the small rivers, which
run through this valuable large tract, the far-extending ramifications
are innumerable; each abounding with ever-green canes and reeds, which
are as good to raise cattle in winter, as the best hay in the northern
colonies. I need not mention the goodness of the summer-ranges; for,
where the land is good, it always produces various sorts of good timber,
such as oak of different kinds; hiccory, wall-nut, and poplar-trees. The
grass is commonly as long and tender, as what the best English meadows
yield; and, if those vacant fertile lands of the Missisippi were settled
by the remote inhabitants of Virginia, the Ohio, and North-Carolina,
they, from a small stock, could in a few years raise a prodigious number
of horses, horned cattle, sheep, and swine, without any more trouble
than branding, marking, and keeping them tame, and destroying the beasts
of prey, by hunting them with dogs, and shooting them from the trees.
Soon they might raise abundance of valuable productions, as would both
enrich themselves and their off-spring, and, at the same time, add in a
very high degree to the naval trade and manufactures of Great-Britain.