Removal, The Seminoles

                             Osceola,

               Painting by George Catlin, 1838

It was March 27, 1814. The Tennessee militia, 5000 strong plus several hundred Indian allies, attacked a settlement of 1000 Creek Indians at a point along the Tallapoosa River called Horseshoe Bend. With no mercy the militiamen killed over 800 Creek Indians, the greatest slaughter of Native Americans in history. Among the littered bodies was a mother who lay across her child to protect him.

The name of the commander of the Tennessee Militia responsible for this slaughter was Andrew Jackson, who, as President of the United States would later drive the Seminoles from their homelands. The child's name was Osceola, destined to lead the Seminoles in their struggle against removal.

The nucleus of the Seminole tribe was the Oconee, who lived in the southern Georgia area prior to 1700. The group was first referred to as Seminole, which means 'runaway' in Creek, in the mid 1700's after they had migrating to Spanish Florida to avoid the encroachment of their lands by British settlers. They were joined there by the remnants of the Yamassee tribe which was almost wiped out in 1715 by the British colonists. During the next hundred years the Seminoles were also joined by escaped negro slaves, and by groups of Creek Indians also fleeing the settlers. Among the latter was Osceola's mother, who with her son and about 1000 other Creeks sought refuge among the Seminoles in 1814.

Over the years Georgia plantation owners made repeated raids into Seminole villages in Spanish Florida in search of "runaway slaves," kidnapping anyone of negro descent. The Seminoles in turn made raids on Georgia settlements.

In 1818, after an exchange of attacks across the Florida border by US government forces and Seminoles, Andrew Jackson, now a general, was given permission by President Madison to invade Florida. He went in with 4000 troops, advancing to Pensacola, destroying Seminole villages as he went. This became known as the First Seminole War.

Unhappily, Florida was ceded by Spain to the United States in 1819, and the treaty was ratified in 1821, bringing the Seminoles under US jurisdiction. Almost immediately settlers began pouring into Florida and demanding that the Seminoles be evicted from the choice farm land where they lived. In 1823, the Seminoles were forced to move into a swampy area east of Tampa Bay that was almost uninhabitable. Soon they were starving.

By 1828 when Andrew Jackson was elected president, settlers were clamoring for more land. Many Indians had already moved to the "Indian Territory" west of Arkansas. and in 1830 the Indian Removal Act was passed by Congress, making it official government policy to remove the Indian tribes from their native lands east of the Mississippi River, and giving the President authority to force them to go.

The Seminoles, barely surviving in the swamps of Florida, and still subjected to raids by the greedy Georgians looking for cheap slaves, signed a treaty in 1832, promising to exchange their land in Florida for land in Indian Territory if the land was found to be suitable by the tribe. 

Later in 1832 the Seminoles sent a party west to look at their new home. When the exploring party arrived, they discovered that the land they were being offered was located between the Creeks and the Osages who were at war. The next year another exploring party was sent. The situation in Indian Territory had become more stable and the Seminoles were satisfied with their location, but they were not authorized to make a decision for the tribe. Nevertheless, they were pressured into signing another treaty in which they agreed to accept the land chosen for them.

When the exploring party returned, the tribal leaders were incensed over being tricked. The black members of the tribe, who were very influential, objected to the original treaty which incorporated the Seminoles into the Creek tribe. They feared that the Creeks would demand they be turned over as slaves.  

The treaty allowed three years for the removal to take place. Since the Seminole leaders had never approved the treaty, they made no effort to comply. In 1835 when the time for removal had expired, the government agent, Wiley Thompson, read a letter from President Jackson to Seminole leaders, informing them that if they refused to migrate willingly, they would be removed by force.

During the years since the removal treaty had been signed, a new leader had arisen among the Seminoles, Osceola. Not only had Osceola witnessed the Creek massacre at Horseshoe Bend as a child, he had lost his negro wife in a slave raid as an adult, and he had been thrown into chains by the Seminole agent for speaking out. Osceola continued to speak out, and by 1835 most of the Seminoles supported him.

  

For Osceola, agent Thompson's threat to remove the Seminoles by force was the last straw. Osceola killed Thompson himself, along with several employees of the agency. Charley Emathla, a Seminole chief who had signed the removal treaty was also killed. On the same day another band of Seminoles attacked a company of government troops on their way to enforce the removal. Out of 110 soldiers, there were only 3 survivors. Thus began the second Seminole War.

The war had the overwhelming support of the Seminole people and their chiefs. Osceola sent a letter to General Clinch, in charge of US troops:

 You have guns, and so have we - you have men, and so have we - your men will fight, and so will ours, until the last drop of Seminole blood has moistened the dust of this hunting ground.

When the first group of 1100 US troops was sent to Florida to quell the rebellion, Osceola's warriors pinned them down for 10 days, forcing them to kill their horses for food. The Indians then asked for a truce, saying they were tired of fighting. General Gaines, commander of the army troops, thinking that the Indians had given up, sent the volunteer portion of his forces home.

Two chiefs, with about 400 of their followers, asked to be transported west. The rest of the Seminoles moved their families into the swamps and prepared to fight.

The Seminoles held out against the US Army for the next seven years. Their villages were burned; their crops were destroyed and their livestock was sold. Small groups of warriors would emerge to attack army units, only to melt back into the forest. When the soldiers waded into the swamps to follow the Indians, they were rarely able to make contact.

Over the years the Seminoles learned to survive in the marshes. They killed small game and fished. They crushed the native coontie root to make flour for bread, and they boiled the palmetto palms for cabbage, and ate the palmetto fruit. But the Indians suffered from constantly hiding and being on the run. 

One army officer described the conditioin of a group of Seminoles who came in to meet with General Macomb in the spring of 1839: 

"The men were destitute of clothing other than a buckskin shirt; and the women and children were almost in a state of nudity. Those who had covering were wropped up in old forage bags, picked up in the vicinity of abandoned posts; they were truly objects of commisseration."

One by one the Seminole chiefs surrendered with their people and were shipped out to join their brethren in Indian Territory, some in chains. The Indians, most of whom were already ill, were given inadequate care and supplies. They arrived in Indian Territory without clothing to shield them from the cold climate. About 20% of the migrating Indians died in route.   

General Jesup who was being criticized in the popular press for his failure to round up the Seminoles, became totally unscrupulous in his dealings with them. He allowed slave traders to select slaves from among the Seminole negroes who had surrendered, which was expressly prohibited by a treaty he had personally negotiated. He also hired Creek warriors to go on slave raids, promising freedom to negroes who would help him search for the Seminoles hiding in the swamps, and selling the rest into slavery. 

Jesup captured Seminoles who came in to parley under a flag of truce. He captured the principal Seminole Chief Mikanopi in this way and finally Osceola. This failure to abide by the time honored rules of war was even criticized in the white press.

In the fall of 1837, John Ross, chief of the Cherokees, who were having troubles of their own over the government's removal policy, offered to go to Florida to help pursuade the Seminole leaders to end their futile struggle. He and a group of Cherokee leaders followed Seminole representatives deep into the swamp for a meeting. As a result a large band of Seminoles who were assembled in hopes of a settlement were captured and made prisoners by General Jesup.

Incensed over being used as a tool for Jesup's treachery, John Ross appealed unsuccessfully to the Secretary of War for the Indians to be released.

A group of Army Generals, disgusted by the prolonged struggle, met with General Jesup to pursuade him to give up his struggle for this Florida swampland, and as a result, Jesup wrote a letter to the Secretary of War, asking for an end to the fighting: 

In regard to the Seminoles, we have committed the error of attempting to remove them when their land is not required for agricultural purposes; when they were not in the way of white inhabitants...As a soldier, it is my duty, I am aware, not to comment upon the policy of the Government, but to carry it out in accordance with my instructions... My decided opinion is, that unless immediate emigration be abandoned, the war will continue for years to come. 

The Secretary replied that he was powerless to suspend operations. 

Meanwhile, Osceola, who had inspired and led the Seminoles in their struggle, lay dying in prison. George Catlin, the famous artist, came to Ft. Moultrie to make a portrait of this valiant warrior. Osceola's wives brought him his ceremonial garb and he carefully painted his face with war paint and sat for the artist. He posed for four days, and then on the fifth day, January 30, 1838, unable to lift himself from the floor, Osceola died.    

After the death of Osceola, the US Army carried on the Seminole war for another three years. More chiefs gave up their struggle to continue their miserable existence in the Florida swamps. Those who surrendered were forced to leave without possessions. Their livestock, and their ponies had been sold. Their fields and homes had been burned. Many died as they were being transported as captives and deposited at Ft. Gibson in Indian Territory. The survivors stayed near the fort, dependant on the meager rations provided by the Army, and unable to move to their assigned lands because those areas had already been settled by Creeks. Several hundred Seminoles never surrendered, and the descendants of these proud people still live in the Florida Everglades.

The Seminoles lost about 40% of their population in the war and in the removal, but the survivors persisted in their struggle for sovereignty. Finally in 1856 the Seminoles were assigned their own domain in Indian Territory and were allowed to form their own government, independant from the Creek Nation.