Читать книгу The Seminoles of Florida - Minnie Moore-Willson - Страница 6

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The history of the Seminoles of Florida begins with their separation from the Creeks of Georgia as early as 1750, the name Seminole, in Indian dialect meaning wild wanderers or runaways. Sea-coffee, their leader, conducted them to the territory of Florida, then under Spanish colonial policy. Here, they sought the protection of Spanish laws, refused in all after times to be represented in Creek councils, elected their own chiefs, and became, in all respects, a separate tribe.

To-day the Seminoles of Florida are only a frail remnant of that powerful tribe of Osceola’s day. Their history presents a character, a power, and a romance that impels respect and an acknowledgment of their superiority. Of the private life of the Seminole less is known, perhaps, than of any other band in the United States. His life has been one long struggle for a resting-place; he has fought for home, happy hunting grounds and the burial place of his fathers. At present we can only see a race whose destiny says extinction.

From a drawing by the French artist, Le Moyne, 1563.

FLORIDA INDIANS CARRYING THEIR CROPS TO THE STOREHOUSES

The wilds of Florida became a home for these Indians as well as for the fugitive negro slaves of the Southern States. The Indian and the negro refugee, settling in the same sections, became friendly, and in time some of their people intermarried. The same American spirit that refused to submit to “Taxation without Representation,” was strong in the breast of the Seminole, and Florida, belonging to Spain, afforded him a retreat for his independent pursuits. Subject only to the Spanish crown, the exiles found a home safe from the inexorable slave catchers. The Seminoles were now enjoying liberty, and a social solitude, and refused to make a treaty with the colonial government, or with the Creeks from whom they had separated. One demand after another was made upon the Spanish government at St. Augustine for the return of the fugitives, which was always rejected. African slaves continued to flee from their masters to find refuge with the exiles and the Indians. They were eagerly received, and kindly treated, and soon admitted to a footing of equality. The growing demand for slaves in the southern colonies now made the outlook serious, and from the attempts to compel the return of the negroes grew the first hostilities.

One of the first communications ever sent to Congress after it met was by the Georgia colony, stating that “a large number of continental troops would be required to prevent the slaves from deserting their masters.” But, in that momentous year of 1776, Congress had more important duties on hand, and it was not until 1790 that a treaty was entered into between the Creeks and the United States. In this treaty, the Creeks, now at enmity with the Seminoles, agreed to restore the slaves of the Georgia planters who had taken refuge among them. The Seminoles refused to recognize the treaty; they were no longer a part of the Creeks, they resided in Florida and considered themselves subject only to the crown of Spain. One can readily believe that the Spanish authorities encouraged their independence. Legally the exiles had become a free people.

The Creeks now found themselves utterly unable to comply with their treaty. The planters of Georgia began to press the Government for the return of their fugitive slaves. Secretary Knox, foreseeing the difficulty of recovering runaway slaves, wrote to the President advising that the Georgia people be paid by the Government for the loss of their bondmen. The message was tabled, and until 1810 the Seminoles and negroes lived in comparative peace.

The people of Georgia, now seeing the only apparent way to obtain possession of their slaves would be by the annexation of Florida, began to petition for this, but the United States, feeling less interest in slave catching than did the State of Georgia, manipulated affairs so slowly that Georgia determined to redress her own grievances, entered Florida and began hostilities. The United States was too much occupied with the war with Great Britain to take cognizance of Indian troubles in a Spanish province, hence the Georgia intruders met with defeat. For a short time after these hostilities ceased the Seminoles and their allies enjoyed prosperity, cultivated their fields, told their traditions and sang their rude lays around their peaceful camp fires. Seventy-five years had passed since their ancestors had found a home in Florida, and it was hard for them to understand the claims of the southern planters.

The year 1816 found the Seminoles at peace with the white race. In a district inhabited by many of the Indians on the Apalachicola river was Blount’s Fort.

The fort, although Spanish property, was reported as an “asylum for runaway negroes.” General Jackson, now in military command, ordered the “blowing up of the fort, and the return of the negroes to their rightful owners.” The exiles knowing little of scientific warfare believed themselves safe in this retreat; and when in 1816 an expedition under Colonel Duncan L. Clinch was planned, the hapless Indians and negroes unknowingly rushed into the very jaws of death. A shot from a gunboat exploded the magazines and destroyed the garrison. History records that of 334 souls in the fort, 270 were instantly killed! The groans of the wounded and dying, the savage war whoops of the Indians inspired the most fiendish revenge in the hearts of those who escaped, and marks the beginning of the First Seminole War.

Savage vengeance was now on fire, and “Blount’s Fort” became the magnetic war cry of the Seminole chiefs as they urged their warriors to retaliation. This barbarous sacrifice of innocent women and children conducted by a Christian nation against a helpless race, and for no other cause than that their ancestors, one hundred years before, had been born in slavery, marks a period of cruelty, one of the most wanton in the history of our nation.

The inhuman way in which the massacre was conducted was never published at large, nor does the War Department have any record of the taking of Blount’s Fort, as is shown by the following:

An examination of the records of this Department has been made, but no information bearing upon the subject of the taking of Blount’s Fort, Florida, in the year 1816, has been found of record.

By authority of the Secretary of War,

F. C. Ainsworth,

Colonel, U. S. Army, Chief of Office.

Washington, July 25, 1895.

History does not dwell on the cruel treatment the Indians received from the United States authorities during the Seminole Wars, yet pages of our National Library are devoted to the barbarity of the Seminoles. There are two sides to every question, and it is only what the Indian does to the white man that is published, and not what the white man does to the Indian.

The facts show that instead of seeking to injure the people of the United States, the Seminoles were, and have been, only anxious to be free from all contact with our government. In no official correspondence is there any reference made to acts of hostility by the Indians, prior to the massacre at Blount’s Fort.

But Floridians, who had urged the war with the hope of seizing and enslaving the maroons of the interior, now saw their own plantations laid waste, villages abandoned to the enemy, and families suffering for bread. The war had been commenced for an ignoble purpose, to re-enslave fellow-men, and taught that every violation of justice is followed by appropriate penalties.

Few of the people of the United States knew the true cause of the war, nor the real inwardness of the purposes of those in command, as history and official documents show that affairs were in the hands of the Executive rather than in those of Congress. The first war was in itself an act of hostility to the King of Spain; yet nothing was gained by our government except possession of part of the fugitives. Military forces could not pursue the Indians into the fastnesses of the Everglades, and after two years of bloodshed and expenditure of thousands of dollars, peace was in a manner restored, and the army was withdrawn without any treaty being signed.