Stunning Archaeological Discovery made in Chattahoochee, Florida

 

Nicolls' Outpost interpretive panel
at River Landing Park in
Chattahoochee, Florida.

Archaeologists find complete War of 1812 fort in a Chattahoochee Park!

Advanced technology deployed for the first time in North America has produced stunning results in Chattahoochee, Florida. A team of scientists led by Dr. Mary Glowacki, PhD, of Pre-Columbian Archaeological Research Group, Inc., a 501(c)3 nonprofit contracted by the City of Chattahoochee, have revealed the entire outline of Nicolls' Outpost or "Fort Apalachicola". 

As explained in Dale Cox's book Nicolls' Outpost: A War of 1812 Fort at Chattahoochee, Florida, the fort was built by the British in 1814-1815. It was to serve as a "jumping off" point for one wing of a planned invasion of the State of Georgia. Lt. Col. Edward Nicolls of His Majesty's Royal Marines would lead a column from the head of the Apalachicola River up the Flint River against the Georgia frontier and the state capital in Milledgeville, while a second British force advanced up the coast from Cumberland Island to Savannah. 

The War of 1812 ended as Nicolls was assembling a column that included thousands of British Royal and Colonial Marines; the 5th West Indian Regiment from Jamaica; and Seminole, Miccosukee, Yuchi, and Red Stick Creek warriors in late February 1815. The Colonial Marines were composed largely of free Black men who had self-liberated from slavery, while the Native Americans had spent months training in light infantry tactics at Nicolls' Outpost and its sister post, the Fort at Prospect Bluff (later called "Negro Fort" by American officials).

Outline of the fort at
River Landing Park in
Chattahoochee as determined
by the new project.

The end of the war cancelled a looming a battle with an outgunned U.S. force under Col. Benjamin Hawkins that was camped a few miles above the forks of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers (today's Lake Seminole) in what is now Seminole County, Georgia. Each side saluted the other and Hawkins withdrew his fighters with relief. 

The role of Nicolls' Outpost, however, was not yet over. Col. Nicolls assembled a large gathering of American Indian leaders there for an important council on March 10, 1815. Important chiefs and warriors representing most of the towns of today's Seminole Tribe of Florida and Miccosukee Tribe of Indians of Florida marked a treaty that day requesting continued independent relations with Great Britain. More significantly, the document represented the first time that so many representatives of towns that eventually became part of today's federally recognized Seminole and Miccosukee Tribes committed to remain free and independent in Florida, and to mutually defend each other if attacked. 

The exact date on which the fort was evacuated by the British is not known, but Lt. Col. Nicolls reported to a Spanish officer that a handful of soldiers were still there as late as April 1815. The British withdrew from the Apalachicola River in late May, so the evacuation date was probably around the end of April or beginning of May 1815.

The fort was later mentioned in U.S. Army reports as the site where Seminole, Miccosukee, and Maroon (self-liberated Black fighters) forces achieved the first Native American victory of the Seminole Wars during the Scott Battle on November 30, 1817.

To learn more about the archaeological discovery and the remarkable technology that made it possible, enjoy this video from Two Egg TV:

 

Also of interest is this acclaimed Two Egg TV documentary on the Fort at Prospect Bluff, sister post to Nicolls' Outpost: