Cussetuh and Chickasaw consider themselves as people of one fire (tote-kit-cau humgoce) from the earliest account of their origin. Cussetuh appointed the first Micco for them, directed him to sit down in the big Savanna, where they now are, and govern them. Some of the Chickasaws straggled off and settled near Augusta, from whence they returned and sat down near Cussetuh, and thence back to their nation. Cussetuh and Chickasaw have remained friends ever since their first acquaintance.1 Hawkins adds that on account of this friendship the Kasihta town refused to take part in the war between the Creeks and Chickasaw in 1795. As Hawkins wrote in 1799 it appears that this band of Chickasaw had rejoined their own people by that date. 2 Still another outsettlement was on the lower course of the Tennessee River, where it is mentioned by Coxe and some other very early writers, but it was soon abandoned for the main settlements. In comparatively late times a small body settled temporarily on the Ohio. In 1752 and 1753 the Chickasaw defeated MM. Benoist and Reggio. Under date of August, 1754, the Colonial Documents of Georgia inform us that the Chickasaw had been twice attacked, evidently referring to these expeditions, and reported that they could not stand a third assault without help. Aid was in consequence sent to them. A little later war broke out with the Cherokee and terminated about 1768 with a decisive Chickasaw victory on the Chickasaw old fields.5 6 During this period they were harassed more by the Choctaw and other French Indians than by the French, and their numbers fell off greatly in consequence. Romans, who visited their towns in 1771, compares them with the Choctaw rather to their own disadvantage. He says that the Chickasaw towns, or "town" as he chooses to call it, "they divide into seven by the names of Melattaw (i. e., hat and feather); Chatelaw (i. e., copper town); Chukafalaya (i. e., long town); Hikihaw (i. e., stand still); Chucalissa (i. e., great town); Tuckahaw (i. e., a certain weed); and Ashuck hooma (i. e., red grass); This was formerly inclosed in palisadoes, and thus well fortified against the attacks of small arms, but now it lays open." He says that the traders nicknamed this tribe "the breed," presumably on account of the extent to which it had intermixed with others and with the whites. He himself declares that there were only two genuine Chickasaw of the old stock living-one a man named Northwest. The fidelity which this tribe had displayed with but individual exceptions toward the English was afterwards transferred to the Americans, and few disputes arose between the two peoples. In 1786 official relations with the United States Government began 1 Hawkins, Ga. Hist. Soc. Colls., HI, p. 83. Romans, Concise Nat. Hist. E. and W. Fla., p. 59. Haywood, Hist. of Tenn., pp. 446-462. The translation is wrong. It means "town deserted." 7 Romans, op. cit., p. 63. when, by the Hopewell treaty, their northern boundary was placed at the Ohio. In 1793-1795 war broke out with the Creeks, who invaded the Chickasaw country to the number of 1,000. Here they attacked a small stockade. They were met by a mere handful of Chickasaw, but an unaccountable panic seized the invaders, who fled precipitately. This victory was won by a body of about 200 Chickasaw. Soon afterwards peace was made." Although they were at peace with the white settlers, the latter after this time began to press steadily in upon the Chickasaw, who, by a treaty signed July 23, 1805, made their first cession of territory to the United States Government. Further cessions were made September 14, 1816, October 19, 1818, and October 20, 1832. By the provisions of the treaty signed on the date last mentioned they yielded up their right to all of their lands to the east of the Mississippi 3 and accepted new homes in the territory now included in the State of Oklahoma. The actual migration began in 1822, ten years before the treaty was signed, and extended to 1838. Together with the Choctaw they occupied what is now the southeastern part of this State between the Arkansas and Canadian Rivers on the north and the Red River on the south. The two tribes mingled together rather indiscriminately at first, but were separated in 1855, the Chickasaw being assigned the westernmost part of the above area. Here a national government was established after the pattern of those of the Choctaw and the other "civilized tribes," and this lasted until the nation merged into the State of Oklahoma, of which the Chickasaw are now citizens. THE CHOCTAW The present work has been undertaken primarily with the object of furnishing an adequate setting for an understanding of the evolution of the Creek Confederacy and the various elements entering into it. What has been said regarding the South Carolina and Florida tribes and the Chickasaw have marginal importance in the carrying out of this purpose, though they are of less absolute concern. When we come to the Choctaw, however, we are met with a different problem. The Choctaw were always one of the largest southern tribes, and they were more numerous than the Creeks even in the palmiest days of the latter. Although of the same linguistic stock, their customs, social organization, and even their physical characteristics were very different. They never seem to have been on a footing of friendship with the Creeks, and in fact fought them on equal terms during a long period. So far as our acquaintance with them extends they appear to have been a relatively homogeneous 1 Eighteenth Ann. Rept. Bur. Amer. Ethn., part 2, p. 650. See Eighteenth Ann. Rept. Bur. Amer. Ethn., part 2. people, whose history lacks the complication of that of most of the tribes so far considered. While it is capable of extended treatment, for our present purpose a few words will tell all about it that we need to know. It is probable that the Apafalaya chief and river spoken of by Ranjel and the Pafallaya province of Elvas,1 refer to the Choctaw, or to some of them, since Adair informs us that "Long Hairs," (Pa's-falaya) was a name given to the Choctaw by their neighbors. We do not hear of the tribe again until late in the seventeenth century, when they occupied the region in the southeastern part of the present State of Mississippi and the southwestern part of Alabama, which they held until their removal to Oklahoma in the fourth decade of the nineteenth century. A small portion of them have remained in their old country to the present day, while a few are to be found in Louisiana. POPULATION OF THE SOUTHEASTERN TRIBES The population of an Indian tribe at any early period in its history can not be determined with exactness. In the case of the Creeks we have to consider not only the Muskogee or Creeks proper, but a number of tribes afterwards permanently or temporarily incorporated with them, and the problem is proportionately complicated. Fortunately we are helped out by a considerable number of censuses, some of which were taken with more than usual care. The Cusabo tribes were always small, even at the time of their first intercourse with the Spaniards and French, but we have no data regarding their population until the year 1715, just before the outbreak of the Yamasee war, when a careful estimate approaching an actual enumeration as closely as was possible at that time was made under the auspices of Governor Johnson of South Carolina. There were then two bands left belonging to this group. The "Corsaboys" (i. e., the Cusabo proper) are credited with five villages, 95 men, and a total population of 295, while the Itwans of Charleston Entrance had but one village, with 80 men, and a total population of 240.3 The entire population of this group was therefore 535, and they are already described as "mixed with the English settlement." The Yamasee war depleted their numbers considerably. Most of them probably remained in the same place, where they progressively declined and disappeared, though a few retired among the inland Indians. The Coosa are not separately enumerated in this list, and it is uncertain whether they were omitted or are included among the Cusabo. According to Adair some of them later joined the Catawba, but probably not all. 1 Bourne, Narr. of De Soto, 1, p. 99; 11, pp. 129-130. 2 Adair, Hist. Am. Inds., p. 192. S. Car. MS. Docs, at Columbia; also Rivers, Chap. in Early Hist. S. Car., p. 94. The province of Guale, between Savannah River and St. Andrews Sound, was evidently very populous in early Spanish times; but Barcia represents the number of Indians there to have been considerably reduced as a result of the first uprising against the missionaries at the end of the sixteenth century. In 1602 the missionaries claimed that there were "more than 1,200 Christians" in Guale. In 1670 Owen estimated that there were about 300 Indians under the priest at St. Catherines, and that the Indians under all of the priests upon that coast would total 700. Among these may be included a few Timucua, but most were Guale Indians and Yamasee. The figures refer merely to the number of effective men, not to the total population. After these Indians had settled in South Carolina under the leadership of the Yamasee they occupied 10 towns which in 1708 were estimated to contain 500 men able to bear arms, and in 1715, just before the Yamasee uprising, they were reported to have 413 men and a total population of 1,215. The war which followed sadly depleted them and their losses continued after they had retired to Florida, whither they were pursued by the English and with still more effect by the Creeks. Almost immediately after they had been driven out of Carolina the English settlers learned that one of their chiefs had been made by the Spaniards general in chief over 500 Indians to be sent against Carolina, but of course only a fraction of these were Yamasee." By this time they had probably become completely merged with the Indians of Guale. In 1719 a captive reported only 60 Yamasee near St. Augustine. In 1728 and 1736 we have from Spanish sources detailed statements of the population of all the Indian towns near St. Augustine,' and these agree very closely, although a disastrous British raid had taken place between them. The first mentions seven settlements with an aggregate population. of 115 to 125 men, 105 women, and upward of 55 children, the number of children in two towns not being given. The second list gives eight towns with 123 men capable of bearing arms and 295 women and children, a total of 418. Fifty or more belonged to the Timucua town and there are two or three Apalachee, but upward of 360 must have been Yamasee or Indians of Guale. While this figure is considerably higher than the total indicated in the earlier list the numbers of men reported in both agree quite closely and there is reason to think that in the earlier the numbers of children, and probably those of the women also, were considerably underestimated. In 1761 Yamasee numbering 20 men were reported living near St. Augustine, but we know that several bodies were settled elsewhere. Some 1 Barcia, La Florida, pp. 170-172. 2 S. Car. Hist. Soc. Colls., v, p. 198. 3 Pub. Rec. of S. C., MS., v, pp. 207–209. 4 S. C. MS. Docs. at Columbia. Pub. Rec. of S. C., MS., vп, p. 186. 7 See pp. 105-106, 304. A Descr. of S. C., etc., 1761, p. 63. of them constituted the village of Yamacraw with which Oglethorpe had to deal. In Adair's time a few were with the Catawba. In 1821 the "Emusas" on Chattahoochee River, whom I believe to have been descendants of the Yamasee, numbered 20 souls.2 It is evident that the Apalachee were a large tribe at the very earliest period, but they certainly did not number 15,000, 16,000, 30,000, or 34,000, as estimated by various Spanish missionaries." Much more probable is the statement in a memorial, dated 1676, to the effect that there were then 5,000. In 1702 we find it stated that Spaniards planned to fall upon the English settlements at the head of 900 Apalachee Indians. From Moore's report on his destruction of the Apalachee towns in the winter of 1703-04 it appears that he and his Indian allies killed about 400 Apalachee and brought away 1,400. Two towns and part of another did not come with him. He expected some of them to follow, but they fled for the most part to Mobile to place themselves under the protection of the French.' Bienville states that these originally numbered 500 men but by 1725 or 1726 had become reduced to 100,8 partly from natural causes, partly through removal to Pensacola. In 1708 the Apalachee who had been carried off by the Carolinians and settled on Savannah River numbered about 250 men. The census of 1715 gives their population more accurately as 275 men and 638 souls in four villages. A French manuscript of a little later period estimates 600 men.11 After the Yamasee war all of these seem to have returned to Florida, and in 1718 they started a town near Pensacola, where it is said that more than 100 settled, and they increased every day afterwards, partly from the Apalachee who had been living near Mobile.12 According to Governor De la Vega the Apalachee in their old country had in 1728 become reduced to two villages, one of 140 persons, the other of 20.13 In 1758 De Kerlerec gives the number of their warriors. as 30, probably including both the Spanish and the French bands.1 In 1764, after the cession of Mobile to Great Britain, the Apalachee, along with several other tribes, moved over into Louisiana and settled on Red River. In 1806 we learn from Sibley that they counted but 14 men.15 Whether this band embraced both the Mobile and Florida Apalachee is uncertain, but probably all went together. Morse reported 150 in Louisiana in 1817, a very considerable overestimate.16 10 |