Pensacola, and there was tendered him a colonelcy in their army, without
interference with his chiefship in the Indian tribe. He was placed on the
payroll of the English army and exchanged his toggery of the Indian chief
for the crimson uniform of the British colonel. This was an occasion of
fascination to the Indians, who exulted in the promotion of their young
chief. McGillivray now had everything his way. He plied his seductive
arts, and there was nothing that he desired that was withheld. The Indians
doted on him, and the pride of the young man knew no limit. He proved a
skillful leader in battle, courageous and strategic, but his sphere was in
the field of diplomacy. He left others to lead in fight, while he
solicited the aid of Indians in the service of the king of England. In the
ranks of the Tories, none was so efficient as was McGillivray, yet when
the war closed disastrously to the crown, and when the British had no
further use for him, they abandoned him to his fate, took his commission
from him, and cared no more for him.
While the result was disastrous to the British arms, it was exceedingly so
to the McGillivrays. The father had been a devoted loyalist throughout,
and when peace was declared his property was confiscated, he was left
without a penny, and, worse still, the Whigs thirsted for his blood. They
sought to find him, and, without a dime in his pocket, he fled the country
and returned to Europe, after making many narrow escapes, for had he been
captured, he would have paid the penalty of his loyalty to the British
crown by dangling from the end of a rope. All that saved Alexander's neck
was that he was recognized the chief of the Indian tribes whom the
Americans were eager to conciliate. The conditions created by the close of
the war afforded to Colonel McGillivray a fresh opportunity for new
alliances on a new field.
Impoverished by the calamitous result of the Revolution, Colonel
McGillivray was more enraged than dispirited, and in seeking new
connections, he turned to the Spanish, who recognized the services of so
valuable an ally, and were not slow to use him. In order to facilitate
their schemes they gave to McGillivray the commission of colonel in the
Spanish army on full pay, and besides, made him commissary commissioner to
the Creek Indians, whom to win to the loyalty of Spain there was offered
to them open ports on the Gulf coast for the shipment of their peltry.
This latter position gave to McGillivray vast advantage, as his palms
itched for Spanish gold, much of which he handled in this new relation.
Having the confidential ear of both parties, McGillivray was not slow to
replenish his impoverished purse. He was equally the trusted counselor of
both, and was not hindered in cross-purposes by any scruple, to make the
most of the advantage afforded. He was the prince of plotters, and the
impersonation of selfishness. A treaty was entered into at Augusta,
Georgia, between the white settlers and the Creeks, respecting the lands,
which treaty was repudiated by the Indian tribes, and led to outbreaks of
violence on the part of the savages. This action was inspired by
McGillivray, the promotion of whose interest lay in agitation and
disturbance. Outbreaks became general, as the result of the instigation of
McGillivray, who did nothing openly, but inspired the Spanish to stimulate
the animosity of the savages against the white settlers.
Conditions rapidly assumed an aspect of gravity, and outbreaks became so
general, that it was necessary for the American government to take the
matter seriously in hand, and to seek to placate the Indians. A commission
of able men was appointed by congress, under the leadership of General
Andrew Pickens, to negotiate with the Indians, with the end in view of
adjusting all differences. General Pickens addressed a letter to
McGillivray, which communication was a masterpiece of astute diplomacy.
While it bristles with threat, it is at the same time pervaded by
conditional conciliation; while stout in the assertion of independence, it
is yet concessive in tone, and while it promises direful consequences in
case the general government declines to recognize the rights of the
Indians, it adroitly injects, in a patronizing way, the suggestion that
the Americans who had wrested independence from the British crown would be
glad to be in position to accord great consideration to the unfortunate
Indian.
Able as General Pickens was in the field of statescraft, it was impossible
for him so to depress the standard of his character to such a plane as to
be able to cope with the villainy of McGillivray. The difficulty lay in
the fact that the two men were working from two opposite points. Pickens
was seeking reconciliation, while this was precisely what McGillivray did
not wish. Pickens was seeking to heal a serious breach, while it was to
the interest of McGillivray to keep it as wide open as possible. However,
negotiations were arranged for and the congressional commission was to
meet, in council, Colonel McGillivray, at Golphinton.
McGILLIVRAY'S CHICANERY
At great sacrifice, and by laborious travel, the commissioners of the
government, under General Pickens, made their way to Golphinton, when, lo!
McGillivray was not there. Instead, he had sent to represent the Indians,
the chiefs of two towns, accompanied by about sixty warriors. As
negotiations had been conducted by McGillivray, and as his presence was
necessary to consummate the proposed treaty, there was not only
disappointment on the part of the commissioners, but great indignation.
Even though every chief had been present, the absence of their
representative and commissioner would invalidate any agreement, and this
McGillivray well knew.
Nonplused by his absence, the commissioners of the government merely
stated to those present that which congress desired to accomplish, and
withdrew. This gave rise to fresh complications, which now assumed a
three-cornered aspect, as the federal commissioners' plans were objected
to by the commissioners of Georgia, on the one hand, and by the Indians,
on the other. Conditions were growing worse instead of better, much to the
delight of Alexander McGillivray, who would produce such a juncture as
would eventuate in his final enrichment. Without the knowledge of either
of the other parties, he was pulling the wires with the hand of an adept
schemer. After all the negotiation, therefore, the whole affair proved a
fiasco.
Still, something must be done. Conditions could not remain as they were,
and border warfare was continually imminent. The government was prostrated
by the Revolution, and a general war with the Indians might invite an
interference on the part of both England and Spain. President Washington
was much worried and perplexed, and summoned to his aid the ablest
counselors. The situation was exceedingly grave, and a single misstep
might plunge the country into the most disastrous of wars.
The next step led to the appointment of Dr. James White as the
superintendent of the Creek Indians. Dr. White was cool and cautious, a
skilled diplomat, and was familiar with Indian treachery, while he had the
advantage of enjoying, to a degree, their confidence. He was not without a
sense of self-reliance in the undertaking, and if he could not succeed in
the ratification of a treaty, he would so probe into the situation as to
glean facts which would enable the government the better to adopt proper
policies. He knew McGillivray well, and was not averse to a tilt in
diplomacy with this arch plotter and schemer. He at once wrote to
McGillivray from Cusseta, setting forth his mission and that which he
proposed to accomplish. The reply was one of equivocal phraseology,
lengthy, shrewd, evasive. It might mean anything or nothing, and was
susceptible to a variety of interpretations. The upshot of the
correspondence was a meeting at Cusseta. This time McGillivray was present
with a proposal to the national commissioner, which proposal was
astounding and startling. Surrounded by a large number of chiefs,
McGillivray submitted his unreasonable proposal. This occurred in April,
1787.
The proposal, in brief, was that the general government make large and
unreasonable grants, with the alternative of a prompt acceptance, or that
of a declaration of war on the first of the following August, just four
months hence. McGillivray knew that the proposed conditions would not be
acceptable, and he also knew the consequences of a war to the young
nation. Matters were not growing better fast. Here was a juncture that
called for the skill of the ripest statesmanship. The general government
and the state of Georgia were as much out of accord, as were both, with
the Indians. It was an opportunity which the keen McGillivray could not
suffer to remain unused. It was a matter of bargain and trade with him,
and the question uppermost with him was how much he could derive from it.
So astounding was the proposal, that Dr. White found himself a pigmy
dealing with a colossus, and he could do nothing more than to report to
the President the result of the meeting. All the while, McGillivray was
shuffling with the Spanish authorities in such a way as to extort large
sums of gold from them, while he was dissembling with the American
government for a similar reason, using meanwhile the deluded Indian as an
instrument to promote his designs. He would hold the Indian in his grip by
an affected solicitude in his behalf, while he would promise certain
results to Spain for given sums, and meanwhile agitate Washington with a
threat of war. Men and interests, however sacred, were to him as puppets
to be employed for the profoundest selfishness. He would create
demonstrations of hostility on the part of the Indians, in order to extort
from interested merchants tribute to quell the disturbance. He would
threaten Spain with America, and America with Spain, thereby producing
alarming conditions in the commercial world, and from nations and
merchants alike, he reaped booty.
Exasperated to a pitch almost uncontrollable, Washington at one time
thought of a war of extermination, but this would involve the lives and
property of the people of the whole South, involve the country seriously
with England and Spain, and leave a stain on the American government, and
the idea was abandoned. Resourceful as he was, Washington had practically
reached the limit of suggestiveness when it occurred to him to appoint a
secret agent charged with the mission of inviting a big council of the
Indian chiefs to repair on horseback all the way from Alabama and Georgia
to New York, then the seat of national government, in order to confer with
him in person in the adjustment of all grievances. Colonel Marinus Willett
was chosen by the President for this delicate and difficult function.
Taking a ship at New York, Colonel Willett was just fourteen weeks
reaching Charleston, from which point he immediately set out along the
Indian trails on horseback for the region of the Chattahoochee. He was
served by faithful Indian guides, and through many days of hard riding, he
proceeded to his destination where he had arranged a meeting with
McGillivray and all the great chiefs. Conditions were now favoring
McGillivray, for he well knew that he had produced grave concern at the
national capital, and was abundantly prepared for the result which he was
now nursing. According to prearrangement, Colonel Willett and Colonel
McGillivray met at the town of Ocfuske, on the Tallapoosa River.
McGillivray found his match in Colonel Willett, who was as skilled in the
art of diplomacy as was McGillivray, but without his unscrupulousness.
A NOVEL DEPUTATION
The diplomats met--Willett and McGillivray. Willett was polite, courtly of
address, skillful of speech, resourceful, but wary. McGillivray was suave,
excessive in politeness, equivocal of speech, deceitful, ostensibly
generous, though as treacherous as a serpent. Both were able. Each had had
much to do with men and affairs, but the motives of the two were as wide
as the poles. In the assembled council, Willett showed that he was at
home. Under the guise of excessive politeness, the two played against each
other for advantage with the skill of trained fencers. There was a mastery
of self-confidence that equally possessed both. Each spoke in a measured,
cautious way. With mutual distrustfulness, each vied with the other in
courtesy of tone. Objections were met and verbal blows were parried with a
degree of politeness that approached the obsequious. It was Greek meeting
Greek. The widest discretion was Willett's in arranging for the proposed
council in New York, where the Indian chiefs were invited by the "great
President" to meet him.
With the mastery of a skilled disputant, Colonel Willett addressed the
assembled chiefs, including, of course, Colonel McGillivray. The pith of
his speech was that "our great chief, George Washington," had sent him to
convey to them a message of cordial affection, and to invite them to his
great council house in New York, where he wished to sign with his own
hand, along with Colonel McGillivray, a treaty of peace and of alliance.
He assured them of the high regard entertained for them by "our great
chief," who did not want their lands, but wished to see them happy,
contented, and protected. He further assured them that Washington would
make a treaty "as strong as the hills and as lasting as the rivers." His
tone of address and assurance of sincerity greatly pleased the assembly.
The result of the meeting, which lasted for hours, was that a deputation
of chiefs, together with Colonel McGillivray, would accompany Willett on
horseback to New York. Arrangements for transporting the baggage on horses
were made, and the day appointed for the departure. Accordingly, Colonels
Willett and McGillivray, a nephew of Colonel McGillivray, and a body of
Indian chiefs filed out of Little Tallassee, near Wetumpka, on the morning
of June 1, 1790, for the distant capital. Along the way the party was
reinforced by other chiefs on horseback, who were in wait for the arrival
of Willett and McGillivray. At Stone Mountain, Georgia, the two great
chiefs of the Cowetas and Cussetas joined the party. Onward the procession
moved, exciting much interest, and in certain quarters, not a little
sensation. On reaching the home of General Andrew Pickens, on the Seneca
River, in South Carolina, they were received with the utmost cordiality by
this distinguished gentleman, who arranged for more comfortable means of
travel. Here the party fell in with the Tallassee king, Chinnobe, the
"great Natchez warrior," and others. Henceforth the Indians rode in
wagons, excepting the four who were the bodyguard of Colonel McGillivray,
who accompanied him on horseback, while Colonel Willett rode alone in a
sulky. At Richmond and at Fredericksburg the party halted to rest, at
which places much consideration was shown to Colonel McGillivray.
Distinguished honor was shown the entire party at Philadelphia, where they
were entertained for three days. Boarding a sloop at Elizabethtown, New
Jersey, they were finally landed in New York.
Now began a series of demonstrations that lasted through a number of days.
The sachems of Tammany Hall turned out in full regalia, met the deputation
at the water's edge in lower New York, which was at that time about all
there was of the city, marched up Wall Street, then the principal
thoroughfare of the city, past the federal building, where congress was in
session, then to the home of the President, with that pomp and ceremony of
which Washington was very fond. Each member of the deputation was
presented to the President, while the eyes of the enchanted chiefs fairly
glittered with delight as they unceremoniously gazed on the scenes about
them in the mansion of the President. Washington could not outdo Colonel
McGillivray in conventionality in the exchange of greeting. Both were men
of splendid physique, McGillivray being just six feet high, with broad
shoulders, well proportioned, and as straight as a flagstaff. From the
home of the President the procession filed to the office of the secretary
of war, thence to the mansion of Governor Clinton, all of which being
over, they were marched for entertainment to the principal hostelry of
the city, the City Tavern, where a banquet was spread for the unique
deputation, when the functions of the first day were closed.
Other notable attentions charmed the visiting chiefs, whose elation over
the novel scenes in which they were the principal sharers was equaled
alone by the concern of Colonel McGillivray regarding what all this might
mean for him. The chiefs of the wilds were easily beguiled by these
profuse attentions, but not so the wily McGillivray. With sedulous care he
kept the chiefs well under his thumb, lest they might fall into other
hands, by means of which they might be alienated from himself.
After some days, negotiations were entered on between McGillivray and the
Indian chiefs, on the one hand, and Henry Knox, the chosen representative
of the government, on the other. With cautious vigilance on the part of
both Knox and McGillivray, each step in the proceeding was taken. Knox
knew his man, and McGillivray knew what he wished, and all else was made
subservient to that purpose. McGillivray was as free in the ply of his art
in the metropolis, as he was beneath the native oaks of his tribe on the
distant Coosa. Nothing daunted him, and with dexterity he employed his art
as the situation was gone into. A sensational episode occurred in
connection with the proceedings. Washington learned that the Spanish of
Florida and of Louisiana, having heard of the departure on this mission of
McGillivray and his chiefs, had dispatched a secret agent with a bag of
Spanish gold, by ship to New York, to bribe the chiefs and prevent a
treaty. McGillivray wore their uniform, bore a commission as colonel in
their army, and was their agent, but their confidence in him was naught,
hence the mission of the agent. This agent was detected on his arrival,
and was shadowed by an officer from the moment he touched the soil of the
city. The agent was never able to reach the Indians. With consummate skill
the contest continued from day to day, McGillivray determined to force the
initiative in the offer to be made, before he would agree to commit
himself. He was a plausible enigma to the statesmen at New York, whom he
forced to show their hands before he would agree to disclose his purposes
and wishes.
THE TENSION RELIEVED
While several previous articles have been devoted to the notorious career
of Alexander McGillivray, there was a phase of the situation which
logically belongs to the interesting proceedings in New York which should
not be omitted, and when read in connection with facts already presented,
adds increased interest to the narrative.
Keeping his plans well to himself, McGillivray was quietly breeding
schemes with which to baffle the able men at the national capital. For
days together, the negotiations were kept up, and they were days of
serious concern and of lingering suspense to President Washington. The
parleying and dallying led to the apprehension that McGillivray would
propose terms so startling, as to end the whole affair with a fiasco, and
in view of the recent demonstration, reduce the situation to governmental
mortification. On the other hand. McGillivray was apprehensive that his
intended proposals would be rejected, hence his tactical delay and parley.
Knox was patient, McGillivray impatient. At last Knox was able to force
from the wily trickster and supple diplomat the condition on which he
would be willing to sign the treaty. It proved to be an occasion of as
much elation to the one as to the other. McGillivray chuckled over his
success, while the government congratulated itself on the settlement of
terms so easy.
When, at last, McGillivray stated his terms, they were that fifteen
hundred dollars in gold should be paid him outright by the government
annually, together with other easy emoluments, yet to be named, and a
certain quantity of merchandise, with certain limited sums of money to the
Indians each year, for which consideration the vast domains of the Oconees
were to be surrendered, while they were to remain under the peaceable
protection of the United States, and form no treaties with any others.
Yet, on account of that which occasioned this treaty so cheaply, much
suspense and terror had been created and much blood spilled, and not a few
whites were even then in bondage to the Indians. These slaves were to be
liberated, and the two powerful tribes, the Creeks and the Seminoles, were
to become subject to the general government. Paltry as the consideration
was, McGillivray got the utmost of his wishes, and crowed over the result.
The infamy of this malicious character grows in depth with the probing.
Back of his tampering with different embassies in the past, his Judas-like
dealing with different nations at the same time, his instigation of the
tribes to outbreak, his dragging these Indian chiefs across the country
all the way to New York, lay the sinister and sordid selfishness of this
perfidious man, already named, McGillivray provided for himself by being
made a brigadier general in the regular American army on full pay, which
was at that time twelve hundred dollars, while he was to derive additional
remuneration as the government agent to the Indian tribes.
Intoxicated with delight at his success, McGillivray headed the procession
homeward bound, after an exchange of congratulations with President
Washington, where each vied with the other in stilted conventionality.
McGillivray flattered the artless Indians into the belief that he had won
for them a victory, and they shared with him in the gusto of his elation.
His maneuvers were just such as to produce fresh plans of conspiracy and
of intrigue for the future. On his return home, he doffed the uniform of
the Spanish colonel, and donned that of the American brigadier, all of
which heightened the admiration of the Indians, while it afforded newer
opportunity to the general to lay deeper schemes and reap richer rewards.
This course was occasioned by the reasons now to be given.
One of our modern investigations would have disclosed the fact that while
the treaty was based on the conditions named, there lay beneath it, out of
the sight of the general public, a secret treaty between President
Washington and General McGillivray, on condition that he would manage the
Indians as the President might desire. As a sort of secret agent, and in
order to enhance his position in the estimation of the Indians,
McGillivray was made a channel for the transmission of certain gifts and
privileges, which he was to use to the advantage of the government, for
which he cared not a thread, and he would never have become the secret
purveyor, without the prospect of personal enrichment. He was to give to
the Indians, in his own way, the assurance that their commerce was to find
exit through the Gulf and ocean ports, while he was to present to each
chief, as from himself, but really from the government, a handsome gold
medal, besides a yearly gift of one hundred dollars in gold. Besides
still, the government was in the same secret way to educate annually four
of the Indian youth, free of all charge. All this was to be done in such
manner, as to have it appear how strong was the hold and influence of
McGillivray on the general government, and thus maintain his grip on the
Indians. This looks a little nebulous, from the government side, but it is
a matter of history, and at the time, was known only to the favored few.
History, like the sea, has hidden depths. That which Washington wished,
was to keep in subjection the troublesome Indian; that which McGillivray
wished was the enhancement of his importance, in order to the
gratification of his personal vanity, and in order, too, to a plethoric
purse. At any rate, such are the facts. What our modern muckrakers might
make of a proceeding like this now, deponent knoweth not. While in the
state councils of New York, there was silent and suppressed glee over the
result, in the heart of Alexander McGillivray, at the same time, there
were fresh schemes being incubated, as in daily meditation he southward
rode. Washington thought he had McGillivray bagged, while McGillivray knew
he had Washington hoodwinked. Later developments afford fresher
revelations of the diabolical character of Alexander McGillivray.