Welcome to the official blog of historian and writer Dale Cox. Articles here explore the history, archaeology, folklore, genealogy, and scenic beauty of the Southeast.
Two Egg TV has a new video on the Civil War in Apalachicola, Florida. It tells the story of events in the beautiful old city from 1861-1865 and takes you on a journey to some of Apalachicola's unique historic sites.
Apalachicola was the third busiest seaport on the Gulf Coast when the war began in 1861. The next four years destroyed its commerce and drove away much of its population, leaving Apalachicola as a "city between the lines."
Now streaming at the Two Egg TV channel on your Roku smart tv or other devices, at https;//youtube.com/twoeggtv or you can watch right here:
If you are interested in learning more about the Civil War from historian and author Dale Cox, please consider these books:
Econchattimico's Town was sketched in 1838 by a visiting French nobleman. It stood north of today's Sneads, Florida.
Yesterday's article focused on the forced removal of Econchattimico's and John Walker's bands from their lands in Jackson County, Floria, by U.S. troops under Brig. Gen. Zachary Taylor. Please see Zachary Taylor and the Red Ground King.
Today we continue the story of this humanitarian tragedy with the departure of the Native Americans from Florida and their arrival in Oklahoma, as well as the failure of the United States government to ever pay them for their lost homes and fields.
The people from Econchattimico’s and John Walker’s reserves were joined near the mouth of the Apalachicola River by 34 refugee Creeks who had been captured following their flight from Jackson County earlier in the year. Brought from a concentration camp on Dog Island in the Gulf of Mexico, they brought the total number of men, women, and children in the group to more than 300 souls.
Dog Island is visible on the horizon in this photo taken from top of the Crooked River Lighthouse at Carrabelle, Florida. Creek Indian refugees were held there in 1838.
Brig. Gen. Taylor had reservations about the safety of moving more than 300 men, women, and children through the Gulf aboard the steamboat Rodney, so Daniel Boyd contracted two additional vessels, the schooners Octavia and Vesper. After a brief stop in St. Joseph (today's Port St. Joe), the entire party moved on to Pensacola:
We left Pensacola on the 29th ult. and arrived at New Orleans on the 2d inst. At New Orleans we took on board the Rodney the Indians shipped per schooner Octavia and Vespar, and next morning proceeded on our voyage and reached Natchez on the 5th. We remained at Natchez one day in order to procure supplies, and to afford the Indians an opportunity to purchase clothing which they stood very much in need of. To those who had not the means to purchase for themselves I supplied such articles as were absolutely necessary for their comfort on the voyage.
They have suffered very much from sickness. Six have died since we left Chattahoochee and more than twenty are now upon the sick list. The weather has been unusually cold for the season, which has no doubt increased the number of invalids.
The water in the Mississippi River is very low; we lay two days upon a sand bar about twenty five miles above Vicksburg. If the Arkansas River continues as low as it is reported to be at present, I will disembark the Indians at the first convenient point where transportation can be procured and proceed by land to Fort Gibson. [1]
Fortunately for the suffering men, women, and children, the Rodney was able to steam up the Arkansas River as far as Little Rock. The Native Americans transferred there to the steamboat North St. Louis to continue the trip upriver, but the second vessel ran aground at nearby Cadron, Arkansas. [2]
The Arkansas River, seen here at Van Buren, Arkansas, was too shallow for the steamboat carrying the Apalachicola survivors and they had to walk through brutal winter weather.
Left with no choice but to continue overland through bitterly cold conditions, the exhausted emigrants finally reached Fort Gibson in present-day Oklahoma on January 10, 1839. A muster roll prepared that same day revealed that 272 of the original 393 survived the trip. Econchattimico and John Walker were among the survivors, but many of their followers were not. Of the African Americans or Black Seminoles who once lived under the protection of the two chiefs, only one made it to Fort Gibson. [3]
The final tally of emigrants included 126 residents of Walker’s Town, 81 from Econchattimico’s village, 34 refugee Creeks, and 32 holdovers from John Blunt’s band. The latter individuals remained behind on the Apalachicola when their chief and most of his followers left for Texas in 1834. Among the residents of Econchattimico’s town was George Perryman, a well-known figure on the early frontier and the son of former principal Seminole chief Thomas Perryman. [4]
Fort Gibson in what is now Oklahoma was the western end of the Trail of Tears for the survivors under Econchattimico and John Walker.
The little group settled in the eastern edge of the Creek Nation, not far from present-day Muskogee, Oklahoma. They built cabins and started clearing lands for themselves, but their winter arrival did not help them acclimate to the new country. Many died from illness and starvation over the coming months.
Three months after they arrived in today's Muscogee (Creek) Nation, the emigrants submitted a list of claims to the government seeking reimbursement for the value of the property they left behind in Florida. Their claims totaled $3,042.80. The amount may not seem significant but is worth $84,403.67 today (excluding interest). The losses included dozens of cabins, corn cribs, sheds, and acres of crops and fruit orchards. The government also still owed $15,000 to them for giving up their lands and moving west. The money was still owed 22 years later when the War Between the States or Civil War broke out in 1861. [5]
The new Confederate government entered separate negotiations with the Apalachicolas, treating them as a sixth "civilized tribe" alongside the Creeks, Seminoles, Cherokees, Choctaws, and Chickasaws. The Confederates secured a separate treaty with them by promising to pay the long overdue claim at the end of the war in exchange for their support and military service. The Apalachicola warriors finally took up arms against the United States, turning out to fight the government that they had tried so long to appease:
The Apalachicola warriors fought on the Confederate side in a number of engagements west of the Mississippi, including the bloody Battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas.
…The said Apalachicola band remained loyal to the United States, and maintained their peace and friendship unbroken; but in the year 1837 they were induced, by the urgent solicitation of the emigrating agent of the United States, to remove from the country occupied by them in Florida to the Indian country west of Arkansas, leaving the lands…and a large number of horses, mules, cattle, hogs, wagons, and other articles which they could not collect together and carry with them, and which the said emigrating agent persuaded them to leave in his charge, on his promise that the owners should be paid the value of all such their property in money by the agent of the United States on their arrival in the country provided for them on the west side of the Mississippi. [6]
The Apalachicola chiefs and warriors fought on the side of the Confederacy in numerous battles across the modern states of Arkansas and Oklahoma. They never received the money they were promised. The collapse of the Confederate government ended any remaining hope.
The Apalachicola served in the Creek regiments raised in the Indian Nations during the war and were among the last Confederate soldiers anywhere to give up their arms. Their war finally ended when their commander, Brig. Gen. Stand Watie became the last Confederate general to surrender on June 23, 1865.
-End of Excerpt-
The sites of Econchattamico's and John Walker's reservations in Jackson County are unmarked. Walker's lands were along the Apalachicola River just east of present-day Sneads, Florida. Econchattimico's grounds were north of Sneads along today's River Road. Significant portions of both parcels remain in the hands of the Federal and state governments today.
To learn more about the Trail of Tears in Jackson County, Florida, please consider:
References:
[1]Daniel Boyd to C.A. Harris,
Commissioner of Indian Affairs, November 11, 1838.
[2]Arkansas Gazette, November 28, 1838.
[3]J.R. Stephenson, “Muster Roll of a
Company Seminole who have emigrated West of the Mississippi River,” January 10,
1839.
[4]Ibid.
[5]J.R. Stephenson to T.H. Crawford,
Commissioner of Indian Affairs, March 6, 1839.
[6]Supplementary Article to Treaty
between the Confederate States of America and the Creek Nation, July 10, 1861.
Landmark bridge was the first to span the Apalachicola River.
by Dale Cox
Victory Bridge at Chattahoochee, Florida.
The 100th anniversary of construction for beautiful old Victory Bridge is now underway. The 2,100-foot long structure once spanned Florida's Apalachicola River between Chattahoochee and Sneads.
The bridge gained its name from the Allied victory in World War I, the first "war to end all wars." The cost was paid by Jackson and Gadsden Counties, with assistance from the Federal government.
Sections of the structure still survive, although the central part was removed after the State of Florida built the new U.S. 90 bridge in the 1950s. The longest section stretches out over the river from the high bluffs on the Chattahoochee side. It is easy to see at River Landing Park.
A smaller section survives on the Jackson County side but is more difficult to reach.
The Old Spanish Trail stretched from San Diego on the West Coast to
Jacksonville and St. Augustine on the Atlantic Ocean.
The bridge was part of the original Old Spanish Trail Highway, a coast-to-coast tourist route that carried drivers from San Diego, California, to San Diego, California. The highway commemorated but did not always follow the original trails used by Spanish explorers and missionaries.
The graceful arches and ornate rails were visualized by the bridge's designer, James Austin Mortland of the Florida State Roads Department (today's FDOT). It took crews from Masters & Mullen Construction Company of Cleveland, Ohio, three years to finish the project, which opened to traffic in 1922.
A new interpretive panel will be installed this year at River Landing Park in Chattahoochee to tell the story of Victory Bridge and provide visitors with more information.
Read more about the building of the bridge from the August 24, 1922, issue of Manufacturers Record:
William Augustus Bowles, pirate and
adventurer, as painted by Thomas Hardy.
William Augustus Bowles declares war on Spain!
by Dale Cox
The story of William Augustus Bowles and his "State of Muskogee" is remarkable and violent. The young adventurer waged war on Spain with furious intent in 1800-1804, seizing ships, capturing a fort, and wreaking havoc.
His life was brief but complicated. He was born in Maryland in 1763, the same year that Great Britain gained control of Florida from Spain at the end of the Seven Years (French and Indian) War. He joined the British army as a teenager and came to Pensacola only to be cast from the ranks after a conflict with an officer. Rescued by a Native American trading party as he tried to make his way across the wilderness of Northwest Florida, the charismatic young man lived for a time in the Perryman towns of Tocktoethla and Telmochesses. These important Seminole communities were near today's Parramore Landing north of Sneads, Florida.
Bowles was ambitious and soon married the daughter of Chief Thomas Perryman. He came to envision a trade empire for himself among the Creeks and Seminoles, but Spanish authorities seized and imprisoned him in 1792. He escaped and returned to Florida in 1799, however, only to suffer the loss of his supply ship when it ran aground on St. George Island.
The Apalachicola River as seen from Prospect Bluff, the site
where Bowles started building a port facility in 1799.
That is when things got very interesting. Spanish troops tried to capture Bowles, but he slipped away onto the mainland and started building a port facility at Achackweithle (Prospect Bluff) on the Apalachicola River. Spain destroyed the unfinished settlement and captured some of his followers, but Bowles slipped away and soon reestablished himself at Estiffanulga Bluff in what is now Liberty County, Florida.
The furious adventurer convened a council of his followers at Estiffanulga, producing one of the most remarkable documents in Florida history: a declaration of war against Spain:
Estifanulga, April 5, 1800
Whereas His Catholic Majesty has for many years part
entertained evil intentions against this Nation and pursued measures in every
way injurious and hostile against us, Wantonly violating the Rights that belong
to us as a free & Independent People, Has disregarded all remonstrance made
by us to obtain redress, and induce him to abandon his unfriendly intentions
against us, Has treated our representative with dissimulation and falsehood,
Has suffered all good faith to be violated with impunity by his Governors in
our vicinity. Has formed a treaty with the United States that clearly manifest the
the wickedness of his heart; that his intentions were to usurp the sovereignty of
our Country and totally to distroy our name as a People: To this end he has by
his emisaries endeavoured to disseminate discord amongst our people and by the
force of bribary and corruption to make a party in order to support and effect
his diabolical designs. Ultimately in the month of February 1800 did with an
armed force attack our town of Achackwheethle laid our houses in ashes, made
prisoners of our people, and otherwise distressed us, by blocking up our Ports,
thus terminating all pacific negotiation by an open attack, which reduces us to
the necessity of either taking up our arms to defend our sacred Rights; our
Country; our every thing that is dear to us, or tamely surrender then (and
ourselves) up forever to the dispotic will of his Catholic Majesty.
Estiffanulga Bluff, the headquarters of William Augustus
Bowles in 1800, overlooks the Apalachicola River just
south of Bristol, Florida.
We being now in special council met in order to consider of
the present state of our Country, do declare that we have not given his Catholic
Majesty any cause whatever to commence hostilities against us; That we view
with abhorrence and detestation the wicked designs of his Catholic Majesty;
That we will defend our Country and our Rights while Blood remains in our
veins. That we now consider all pacific remonstrance as ineffectual.
Therefore we do determine, and are determined to take such
measures as may be effectually necessary to defend our Country, to defend our
most sacred Rights; to defend the Honor of this Nation, and procure reparation
and satisfaction for our injured Citizens.
Historical Marker noting the presence of Bowles on
St. George Island near Apalachicola, Florida.
Therefore be known to all Men, that WE THE DIRECTOR GENERAL
OF MUSKOGEE In special Council met, for the reasons aforesaid do, by virtue of
our authority and High office, as in duty bound declare war against his
Catholic Majesty and his subjects and order that general reprisal be made both
by Land and sea of the goods ships and subjects of his Catholic Majesty.
We order that this proclamation be duly proclaimed that all
our beloved people may have due notice hereof, And we pray God the great
disposer of all things who knows the wickedness of our enemies who knows the justice
of our Cause to favor our exertions.
Given under our hand in council
at Estifanulga this 5th day of april
1800
WM. A. BOWLES
GOD SAVE MUSKOGEE
The declaration was no mere threat. Bowles soon laid siege to the Spanish fort of San Marcos de Apalache at St. Marks and unleashed "privateers" (pirates) on Spain's shipping in the Gulf of Mexico. His piratical war continued for three years. Legends it produced of battles and treasures continue to reverberate today.
Editor's Note: This is the first in a series of articles from historian Dale Cox on the pirate career of William Augustus Bowles. The adventurer and his crews will be commemorated at Pirate and Heritage Days at Three Rivers State Park on May 1-2, 2020. The park is located on River Road (FL-271) just north of Sneads, Florida. Please click here to learn more.
The ground trembles beneath the feet of peace emissaries.
by Dale Cox
USGS map showing that Intensity IV and V earthquakes were felt well into Florida during the New Madrid events of 1811-1817.
The New Madrid Earthquakes traditionally played a role in the coming of the Creek War of 1813-1814. It is a little known fact that an earthquake also shook the borderlands of Southwest Georgia, Southeast Alabama, and North Florida during the early stages of the Seminole Wars. It happened on the night of December 10, 1817:
Earthquake! – The shock of an Earthquake was distinctly felt in Milledgeville (Geo.) on Wednesday night, the 10th inst. about 11 o’clock. A gentleman recently from Columbia, in this State, informs that a slight shock was also experienced there, at exactly the same time. – Charleston City Gazette, December 25, 1817.
Experts believe that the quake was a strong aftershock of the massive New Madrid Earthquakes of 1811-1812. It was felt from its center point in the Mississippi River valley somewhere between Memphis, Tennessee, and the forks of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers all the way to the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean. A strange noise also accompanied the tremor:
Massive Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee was created by the New Madrid Earthquakes of 1811-1812. The 1817 quake was an aftershock.
Between 11 and 12 o’clock on the night of Wednesday, an earthquake was felt in this town [i.e., Knoxville, TN] – the shock continued about half a minute, and violently shook the houses and furniture, arousing many that were asleep. It was accompanied by a rumbling noise, which many think was of longer duration than the noise accompanying the quakes at this season five years ago, though the shock was not so violent. The undulation was from west to east. – American Beacon, January 2, 1818 (republishing a letter from Knoxville dated December 1817).
The shock was felt at Fort Scott on the Flint River in Southwest Georgia and along the Apalachicola River in Florida. The Prophet Josiah Francis, who was assembling an army of more than 1,000 warriors for an attack on two United States supply ships, may have seen it as an omen. It definitely served notice that the Seminole War was about to spread.
The earthquake also signaled the entry of a new state to the Union. Mississippi became one of the United States on December 10, 1817.
The earthquake tossed boats on the Apalachicola River when it struck on December 10, 1817.
There was an important conference at Fort Scott on the same day. Several of the Lower Creek chiefs in alliance with the U.S. Army appeared at the fort with an offer of peace from one of the most influential Red Stick chiefs. The U.S. raids on Fowltown and the Native American retaliation at the Scott Battle of 1817 threatened to engulf the borderlands with blood and fire. The Atasi Mico (Autossee Mico) made one last attempt to stop the war from spreading:
A proposition has been made by the Hostile Chiefs through the friendly chiefs Perriman and Johnston for peace. As evidence of their desire for peace, they say they will not permit their warriors to fire on our vessels ascending the river, that they will send on board the vessels the woman they took from Lieut. Scott’s command. - Lt. Col. Matthew Arbuckle to Commanding Officer of the Supply Boats on the Apalachicola River, December 10, 1817)
The Apalachicola River as seen from Spanish Bluff, where William Hambly lived in 1817.
The circumstances of the proposition received from the chiefs are difficult to fully ascertain. It followed a discussion held between the Atasi Mico and Edmund Doyle, an employee of John Forbes & Company. Atasi Mico was a Red Stick Creek who had evacuated into Florida with his surviving followers after the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. Doyle was the storekeeper in charge of the trading post at Prospect Bluff on the lower Apalachicola River.
The meeting between the two likely took place at or near Spanish Bluff in what is now Calhoun County, Florida. Doyle had sought shelter there at the home of his friend and sometimes coworker William Hambly after hearing of the Battle of Fowltown. Atasi Mico was among the chiefs and warriors gathering at nearby Ocheesee Bluff under the leadership of the Prophet Josiah Francis for a planned attack on two U.S. ships making their way up the Apalachicola River with supplies for Fort Scott.
The Jim Woodruff Dam stands where the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers joined to form the Apalachicola in 1817.
The details of the discussions are not known. Still, Atasi Mico did authorize Doyle to go with the neutral chiefs William Perryman, George Perryman, and Johnston to see Lt. Col. Matthew Arbuckle. He had assumed command at Fort Scott on the departure of Maj. Gen. Edmund P. Gaines after the latter was ordered to the St. Marys River.
The meeting took place at Fort Scott on December 10, 1817, and the lieutenant colonel was quick to tell Johnston and the Perryman brothers that he had not authorized Doyle to make an overture to the Native American force:
I have understood that Mr. Doyle has had a talk with Ottossee Micko about making peace. I did not ask Mr. Doyle to make this, or any other Talks with the hostile Indians, but I shall be glad if the talk has enduced them to wish for peace, as their Great Father the President of the United States, has always wished for peace with them. - Lt. Col. Matthew Arbuckle, Talk delivered on the 10th of Decr. 1817 to three Indian Chiefs, December 10, 1817.
Arbuckle outlined the U.S. Army’s position on what had happened at Fowltown. He touched on the real truth of the war by telling the chiefs that “the army did not come here to make war on the Indians, but expected their assistance in getting the negroes belonging to the white people who are in their country.” He also asked that “some offenders should be given up.”
The peace initiative failed.
For the Prophet Josiah Francis, who commanded the American Indian army that was gathering on the Apalachicola for an attack on the army's supply boats, the earthquake likely was an omen. The war expanded dramatically over the days that followed.
Editor's Note: You can learn more about the First Seminole War in these books by Dale Cox:
- Excerpt -
THE BLOODIEST DAY OF THE FIRST SEMINOLE WAR dawned not much different than other recent days on Florida’s Apalachicola River. Mount Tambora still exerted its influence on the weather of the world, and temperatures along the border of Spanish Florida were falling to levels lower than normal.
Aboard the open vessel commanded by Lieutenant Richard W. Scott of the 7th U.S. Infantry, men, women, and children shivered in the early morning mist. Some of the soldiers shivered from the cold, but nearly half of them shook with the fever that had overcome them on their long journey from the Alabama River to the Apalachicola. Onshore and hidden in the trees where they could not benefit even from the meager sunlight of the morning, Creek, Seminole, Yuchi (Euchee), and African warriors shivered as well. It takes time for the sun to rise high enough over the bluffs that tower above the east bank of the river for the woods and swamps below to benefit from its warming rays.
The Apalachicola River at Chattahoochee, Florida, as seen
from the air on a beautiful fall day.
Roughly one mile below the original confluence of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers, the course of the Apalachicola makes a full bend. The site of the junction is now beneath the waters of Lake Seminole just above the Jim Woodruff Dam. One mile below the dam, however, the river still swings around the same bend as it begins its southward flow to the Gulf of Mexico. A panoramic view of the curve of the river can be seen from the dock at Chattahoochee Landing, and in 1817, as a boat rounded the bend from the South, it would have been possible for its passengers to see straight up the channel to the point of land formed by the confluence...
...As the boat entered the widest part of the arc of the bend, it was pushed hard by the full force of the water pouring from the river’s two main tributaries. The Apalachicola was beginning its winter rise, a fact that made its current even stronger. The vessel was pushed from the center of the river towards the east bank as the men pulled hard on their oars to maneuver it against the current and around the bend. Their forward progress stalled as the current ran hard against the side of the boat and drove it ever closer to the bank. All that could be seen there were the trees and bushes of the swamp, and the focus of the lieutenant and his men was devoted almost entirely to the navigation of the large bend so that they did not run aground in the shallows.
The boat used by Lt. Scott's command was similar to the Aux Arc ("Ozark"), a 38-foot keelboat that is coming from
Arkansas to take part in the reenactment on Dec. 6-8.
The chill of the morning replaced by the heat of the adrenalin running through their veins, hundreds of warriors waited in the thick trees and brush that lined the east bank at the point where the boat would be forced closest to shore. Stripped for battle and painted in their traditional colors and designs, they took careful aim with their rifles and muskets and waited for the signal to open fire.
Lieutenant Scott and his men were focused almost entirely on getting their boat around the bend and into the straight channel that would take them up to the confluence when the east bank of the Apalachicola River suddenly erupted with a solid wall of flame:
[The survivors] report that the strength of the current, at the point of the attack, had obliged the lieutenant to keep his boat near the shore; that the Indians had formed along the bank of the river, and were not discovered until their fire commenced; in the first volley of which Lieutenant Scott and his most valuable men fell.
The site of the Scott Battle of 1817 at Chattahoochee, Florida.
The explosion of gunfire from the trees and bushes along the bank all but annihilated the able-bodied portion of Scott’s command. The lieutenant and most of his armed men went down without ever firing a shot. The boat now floated on the current and in minutes was pushed aground in the shallows. The various war cries of the Red Stick Creek, Seminole, Yuchi, and African warriors rose above the scene, drowning out the terrified screams of the women and children of Lieutenant Scott’s party.
Among the soldiers on the boat that day was a man identified only by his last name, Gray. Severely wounded in the first volley, he was still at Fort Scott when Major General Andrew Jackson arrived there in March 1818 at the head of a brigade of Georgia militiamen. In the campfires of the army camps, Gray described the speed and ferocity with which the attack took place:
…As those on board were hooking and jamming (as the boatmen called it) near the bank, and opposite a thick canebrake, the Indians fired on them, killing and wounding most of those on board at the first fire. Those not disabled from the first fire of the Indians made the best fight they could, but all on board were killed except Mrs. Stuart and two soldiers Gray, and another man whose name I have forgot, if I ever knew it; they were both shot, but made their escape by swimming to the opposite shore.
- End of Excerpt -
By the time the battle ended, Lt. Scott, 34 men, 6 women, and 4 children were dead. There were Native American casualties as well, but the total number is known. Six soldiers, five of them badly wounded, escaped by leaping from the boat and swimming to today's Jackson County shore.
Editor's Note: The only other survivor of Scott's command was Mrs. Elizabeth Stewart, the wife of a soldier. She was rescued by a warrior named Yellow Hair. Her complete story is a fascinating part of Cox's book, the newest edition of which was released this week! It is available in both book and Kindle formats. You can order now by clicking the ad below.
The keelboat Aux Arc (pronounced "Ozark") is similar to the
one used by Scott's command. It will take part in the annual
reenactment set for Dec. 7-8 in Chattahoochee, Florida.
Editor's Note: The annual Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment begins one week from today on Friday, December 6, in Chattahoochee, Florida. It commemorates the first U.S. defeat of the Seminole Wars, a decisive battle that took place on the Apalachicola River 202 years ago tomorrow.
Lt. Richard W. Scott navigated his shallow-draft keelboat up the Apalachicola River 202 years ago today. He knew that hundreds of warriors waited somewhere near the forks of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers, which form the Apalachicola on the border between Florida and Georgia. He kept going anyway, despite the warning of a longtime trader:
Mr. Hambly informs me that the Indians are assembling at the junction of the river, where they intend to make a stand against those vessels coming up the river; should this be the case, I am not able to make a stand against them. My command does not exceed forty men and one-half sick, and without arms. I leave this immediately. [1]
The Apalachicola River as seen from Spanish Bluff, today's
Neal Landing in Blountstown, Florida. This was the site of
William Hambly's trading post.
William Hambly and his friend and sometimes business associate Edmund Doyle had farms on the east side of the Apalachicola at present-day Bristol, Florida. Hambly also ran a trading post on the west bank at Spanish Bluff near the town of the Upper Creek chief John Blunt, where the city of Blountstown stands today. Doyle was the storekeeper of the John Forbes and Company trading post at Prospect Bluff lower down the river.
Hambly undoubtedly knew of the U.S. Army's attacks on Fowltown, and this news likely formed the basis of his warnings to Scott. The lieutenant had gone down the river from Fort Scott to assist Maj. Peter Muhlenberg in bringing the supply ships Phoebe Ann and Little Sally upstream. The sailing vessels were slowing coming up the river, but Maj. Gen. Edmund Gaines worried about the speed of their progress.
Instead of keeping Scott and his 40-men as the general suggested, however, Muhlenberg replaced 20 of the lieutenant's able-bodied men with 20 sick soldiers from his own detachment and ordered him to take them, 7 women, and 4 children to Fort Scott. A supply of regimental clothing for soldiers of the 4th Infantry was also placed on the keelboat.
The Jim Woodruff Dam stands at the original point where
the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers merged to create the
Apalachicola. The blue water beyond it is Lake Seminole.
Scott stopped at Hambly's trading post, which overlooked the river from Spanish Bluff, where Neal Landing park is located today in Blountstown. There Hambly warned him of danger ahead and found a Native American warrior willing to run a message through the woods to Fort Scott. He encouraged Scott to wait, but the lieutenant underestimated the danger and decided to continue moving upstream. [Note: Neal Landing in modern Calhoun County should not be confused with Neals Landing in neighboring Jackson County.]
Lt. Scott's vessel is often described as a "flatboat" or "barge" by modern writers but really was a keelboat. Flatboats and barges were generally rectangular vessels designed for downstream travel. Quite often, they were broken up after reaching their destinations and the lumber used in other construction projects. A keelboat, however, was a shallow-draft vessel that could move both up and downstream,
Scott's keelboat was similar to the 38-foot Aux Arc
(pronounced "Ozark"), which is coming from its homeport in
Arkansas to take part in this year's Scott 1817 Seminole War
Battle Reenactment on December 6-8 at Chattahoochee, FL.
Common on American rivers in the late 18th and early 19th-centuries, keelboats were the workhorses of the expanding republic. They could carry tons of cargo while still drawing less than 2-feet of water. In fact, they remained in use on rivers like the nearby Chipola long after the introduction of paddlewheel steamboats because they could go places that the larger vessels couldn't reach.
Steamboats were not yet in use on the Apalachicola, so the army depended on keelboats to move men and supplies. All were propelled by oars, and some even had masts and sails. They also usually had a cabin or shelter, and accounts from the time of Scott's voyage indicate that this was the case with his vessel.
By nightfall on November 30, 1817, 202 years ago today, Lt. Scott's boat was nearing the confluence of the Chattahoochee and Flint River. He and his command had made it as far as the vicinity of today's Interstate 10 near Aspalaga Bluff but thus far had not seen so much as a single warrior. That would change the next day.
Fighters from the Suwannee prepare to battle the U.S. Army.
by Dale Cox
Abraham was a prominent Black Seminole or Maroon freedom fighter and "sense bearer" or advisor. He is portrayed here by Antonio Wright.
The United States Army's attacks on the Creek Indian village of Fowltown ignited outrage across the Florida borderlands. (Please see First Blood at Fowltown and Neamathla battles Arbucklefor details on the two days of fighting at Fowltown).
News that U.S. troops attacked the town in the dark, killing women as well as men, brought warriors across the region to their feet. Any hope that Cappachimico, the principal chief of Miccosukee, and others had of avoiding war with the United States, was now gone. Even leaders friendly to the whites were upset over the unprovoked raids and warned that they might not be able to control their young men.
One group of men who responded to Neamathla's calls for help knew well what it meant to oppose the United States military. They were Maroons or escaped slaves - commonly called Black Seminoles - from Nero's town on the Suwannee River. They were black men for whom every battle was a fight for freedom, and every night brought fears of raids by slave catchers from Georgia or the Carolinas.
The real Abraham as he appeared two decades later. This engraving by N. Orr appeared in the 1848 book The Origin, Progress, and Conclusion of the Florida War, by John T. Sprague.
Among these fighters were survivors of the deadly 1816 U.S. attack on the Fort at Prospect Bluff or "Negro Fort." Abraham, Polydore, and others were in the log and earth fort on the lower Apalachicola River when a heated cannonball from an American gunboat ricocheted off a pine tree and struck one of their three gunpowder magazines. The result was a horrible explosion that killed 270 men, women, and children in an instant.
Now, just one year later, they grabbed their British-made Brown Bess muskets and started for the Apalachicola, where the Prophet Josiah Francis, an influential Red Stick Creek leader, was raising an army to fight the Americans. The Maroons or Black Seminoles marched with confidence because they still possessed a magazine of arms and ammunition that was removed from the Negro Fort before its destruction.
The number of men under Nero's command is difficult to determine, as estimates by white writers of the time vary wildly. The consensus seems to be that he commanded around 300 well-armed men, many of whom were trained during their time with the British Colonial Marines in 1814-1815. In fact, quite a few probably still wore their British uniforms in 1817, although they were definitely starting to assimilate to the culture of the Alachua Seminoles alongside whom they lived.
The Maroons or Black Seminoles were among hundreds of warriors who gathered here on the Apalachicola River to attack any U.S. boats trying to bring supplies upstream.
A large contingent of the black fighters was sent by the Prophet to join a force assembling just below the forks of the Chattahoochee and Flint Rivers. The Red Stick chief "Homathlemico" (probably Hoboeithle Mico) commanded the group of 300-400 warriors. In addition to the men from Nero's town, they included angry warriors from Fowltown, a group of Yuchi from the lower Chattahoochee River, and many Red Stick Creeks. Others joined as well.
The plan developed by Francis and the other vital leaders was to blockade all approaches to Fort Scott and prevent supplies from reaching the soldiers there. The Prophet learned well from the Creek War of 1813-1814 that the only way to defeat the U.S. Army was to cut off its provisions. Any boats coming upriver would be attacked and stopped.
Lt. Scott's command was aboard a keelboat similar to the Aux Arc (pronounced "Ozark"), seen here. The beautiful vessel will participate in this year's Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactments on December 6-8.
The strike force just below the confluence camped around the abandoned War of 1812 British fort that is commonly called Nicolls' Outpost today. Several U.S. reports refer to it as "Fort Apalachicola." It stood atop a large prehistoric Native American mound at today's River Landing Park.
They waited there for an American vessel to appear and offer them a chance to strike back not just for Fowltown but for the destruction of the Negro Fort one year before. The next boat to come into view on this section of the big river would be the keelboat commanded by Lt. Richard W. Scott of the 7th Regiment, U.S. Infantry.
Editor's Note: The Maroons or Black Seminoles played a critical role in the Seminole victory at the Scott Battle of 1817. Antonio Wright will portray the famed leader Abraham this year. More than 1,000 area school students will have a remarkable educational opportunity to learn the real Abraham's story during Education Day activities on Friday, December 6. Wright will be joined this year by Matthew Shack, a descendent of Maroons and noted educator from Gulf Coast State College, who will tell the students more about Black Seminoles and their struggle for freedom.
The annual Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment takes place at River Landing Park in Chattahoochee on December 6-8, 2019. Entry is free to all. Click to visit Scott1817.com for more information.
Click play below to enjoy a brief 30-second preview of this year's reenactment:
Scott 1817 event to feature amphibious battle on the Apalachicola.
by Dale Cox
Red Stick Creek warriors like these will join two days of
battle reenactments at Chattahoochee, Florida, on
December 7-8, 2019.
Soldiers and warriors are set to battle it out as the 19th-century comes to life at River Landing Park in Chattahoochee, Florida on December 6-8, 2019.
The beautiful park on the Apalachicola River will host this year's Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment, three days of living history events, demonstrations, battle reenactments, and more. Friday, December 6, is Education Day with more than 1,000 students coming from schools and home school groups throughout the region to learn about early 19th-century life.
The authentic 38-foot keelboat Aux Arc ("Ozark") will be
part of the fighting as warriors attack her from the banks of
the Apalachicola River on December 7 & 8, 2019.
Saturday, December 7, and Sunday, December 8, will be the main public days. The grounds will be open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Eastern/8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Central each day. Visitors can explore the living history camps to meet Creek, Seminole, Miccosukee, Yuchi, and Maroon (Black Seminole) warriors and their families. Then they will meet early frontier settlers, the soldiers of Jacksonian Guard, early boatmen aboard the authentic 38-foot keelboat Aux Arc (pronounced "Ozark"), and more!
At 12:30 p.m. Eastern/11:30 a.m. Central on Saturday and 2 p.m. Eastern/1 p.m. Central on Sunday, the public is invited to witness full-scale amphibious battle reenactments along the banks of the Apalachicola River!
Ed Williams, the captain of the Aux Arc, demonstrates the
firing of the boat's swivel gun. Original accounts indicate that
such a cannon was fired in the Scott Battle of 1817. Photograph by Tim Richardson
The Scott 1817 event commemorates the first battles of the Seminole Wars, which took place along the Florida-Georgia border in November 1817. These began on November 21, 1817, with the first U.S. attack on the Creek village of Fowltown (please see First Blood at Fowltown), followed by more fighting in the town near Bainbridge on November 23 (please see Fighting continues at Fowltown).
The first two battles were launched by the United States. The third and most deadly fight, however, came when Native American and Maroon (Black Seminole) forces retaliated at today's River Landing Park on November 30, 1817. Several hundred warriors overwhelmed Lt. Richard W. Scott's command, which was making its way upriver to Fort Scott on present-day Lake Seminole. Lt. Scott, 34 soldiers, 6 women, and 4 children were killed in action, 5 other soldiers were wounded. Seminole/Red Stick Creek casualties are unknown.
Soldiers of Pensacola's Jacksonian Guard will take part in
the battle reenactments as musket, rifle, and cannon fire
flash across the Apalachicola River at Chattahoochee, Florida,
on December 7-8, 2019.
The dead of both sides will be remembered in a unique luminary service on Saturday night, December 7, at 6:30 p.m. Eastern/5:30 p.m. Central. Participants will light 400 luminaries along the Apalachicola River to honor the men, women, and children, who died in the fighting not only at the Scott Battle of 1817 but in other actions across the area in 1816-1819. Included will be 270 luminaries for the victims of the 1816 explosion that destroyed the Fort at Prospect Bluff or "Negro Fort" on the Apalachicola River.
In addition to the battle reenactments, visitors can visit a mobile museum, see exhibits, explore vendors, buy lunch, and much more. The soldiers of the Jacksonian Guard will provide military drill demonstrations and perhaps even teach a little old-fashioned dancing as well!
The Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment is FREE to visit and open to visitors of all ages on Saturday and Sunday from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Eastern/8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Central, and during the luminary service on Saturday night. Please visit Scott1817.com or www.facebook.com/scott1817 for more information.
River Landing Park is at 500 River Landing Road, Chattahoochee, Florida. See the map at the bottom of this page for directions. Also, be sure to enjoy this quick 30-second video preview! Just click play:
Lt. Richard W. Scott's last command leaves Fort Scott.
by Dale Cox
The 38-foot keelboat Aux Arc ("Ozark") underway on the
Flint River arm of Lake Seminole in 2017.
As U.S. troops attacked Fowltown on November 21, 1817 (please see First Blood at Fowltown), igniting a war that would continue more than 40-years, a major disaster was building on Florida's Apalachicola River.
The march of the 4th and 7th Regiments from Camp or Fort Montgomery north of Mobile to Fort Scott had necessitated the transport of supplies, ordnance, ammunition, uniforms, and other necessities by ship on the Gulf of Mexico. Maj. Gen. Edmund P. Gaines contracted sailing vessels for this purpose, sending them out from Mobile in two flotillas.
The first of these, escorted by 1st Lt. Richard W. Scott and a detachment of the 7th Infantry, reached Fort Scott without significant incident. The second was guarded by a larger force under Brevet Maj. Peter Muhlenberg of the 4th U.S. Infantry. It reached the mouth of the Apalachicola River as the main bodies of the two regiments were marching across present-day Alabama.
The Aux Arc recreates the keelboats that carried tons of
cargoes on America's rivers in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Anticipating the arrival of Muhlenberg's three ships, Gen. Gaines ordered Lt. Scott to take a detachment of 40 men and go back down the Apalachicola to meet them. The lieutenant had already navigated the river, and his experience, Gaines assumed, would prove helpful to the major.
Scott, a Virginia-born officer with experience in the War of 1812, did not know that the general planned to attack Fowltown and provoke a war. In truth, Gaines himself probably did not expect his raid to ignite the fiery response that it did. Either way, he gave the lieutenant no indication of his plans, simply ending advise that Muhlenberg use the junior officer's detachment to help bring up the supply ships.
Many keelboats, as the Aux Arc demonstrates, were propelled
by either oars or sail. The vessel will be on the Apalachicola
River at Chattahoochee, Florida, for the Scott 1817 Seminole
War Battle Reenactment on December 6-8, 2019.
Lt. Scott's command left Fort Scott aboard a keelboat. These shallow-draft vessels were the workhorses of America's rivers long before inventor Robert Fulton took the steamboat New Orleans down the Mississippi River in the winter of 1811-1812. They continued to operate on rivers throughout the country for decades to come.
A good example of a keelboat is the Aux Arc (pronounced "Ozark"), the Arkansas-based vessel that will take part in this year's Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment on December 6-8. Fitted with a mast and sail and a small cabin, the Aux Arc is 38-feet long but draws only about 12-inches of water. Even when loaded with a full crew and a cargo weighing several tons, she still draws only 13-inches or so.
At least one account indicates that Lt. Scott's keelboat carried
a swivel cannon like this one on the Aux Arc. You can see it
fire at the Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment.
Like the Aux Arc, Scott's keelboat was also equipped with oars and could be rowed up or downriver by her crew when the wind failed. They could cover remarkable distances in short periods when going downstream. One keelboat leaving Fort Gaines, for example, traveled some 60-miles down the Chattahoochee River in a single night. Going upriver, of course, was much slower.
Scott's boat was somewhere on the Apalachicola when the Maj. Gen. Gaines sat down on November 22, 1817, to order a second attack on Fowltown. Maj. David E. Twiggs and his men had returned to Fort Scott the night before with news of their failure to capture Neamathla. The general decided to try again, this time from a different direction with a more significant force.
The task this time was assigned to Lt. Col. Matthew Arbuckle, who was given more than 300 men and a detachment of artillery. He was also ordered to carry wagons and bring away as much corn as possible from the log cribs in the Native American town. Food supplies were running short at Fort Scott, and Gaines hoped to supplement his own stocks by raiding those of the Creeks.
Fighting at Fowltown resumed the next morning.
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Editor's Note: This article is part of a series that helps explain the background of the annual Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment. This year's event is coming up in two weeks on December 6-8, 2019. Please visit Scott1817.com for more information.
For a quick 30-second look at what to expect at the annual reenactment, please click play:
Neamathla (Eneah Emathla)
Primary Chief of Fowltown
Note: As we approach the Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment, which will take place on Dec. 6-8 in Chattahoochee, Florida, I will post articles that give you information about the significance of that encounter. DC
The effective strengths of the Fourth and Seventh Infantry Regiments of the U.S. Army began arriving at Fort Scott on today's Lake Seminole in Southwest Georgia 202 years ago today. The soldiers did not know it, but they were coming to start a war.
Maj. Gen. Edmund P. Gaines, a hero of the War of 1812, commanded the march, which started at Camp or Fort Montgomery in the Tensaw settlement of what is now Alabama. He was under orders from the administration of President James Monroe to kidnap the Red Stick Creek chief Neamathla (Eneah Emathla) and some of his leading men.
Neamathla was the principal chief of Fowltown, a Lower Creek village that had recently resettled on the swamps of Four Mile Creek about 3-4 miles south of present-day Bainbridge, Georgia. He and his followers sided with the Prophet Josiah Francis during the Creek War of 1813-1814 but were defeated at the Battle of Uchee Creek and forced to evacuate to the Florida borderlands.
Rearmed by the British during the closing months of the War of 1812, they refused to evacuate their lands as required by the Treaty of Fort Jackson, which seized more than 22 million acres from the Creeks. Neamathla had not signed that document. "The land is mine," he told Maj. David E. Twiggs of the U.S. Army that summer, "I am directed by the Powers Above to defend it."
Maj. Gen. Edmund P. Gaines, USA
Photographed later in life. National Archives.
Angered by the chief's "defiance," the powers in Washington, DC, instructed Gen. Gaines to hold the chief as a hostage until his followers left the Fort Jackson Treaty lands. The general started his troops for Fort Scott.
Hindsight shows that everyone involved in the U.S. side of the dispute - from subordinate officers at the fort on the Flint to the highest officials in the Monroe Administration - underestimated Neamathla. The fighting that would take place at Fowltown and on the Apalachicola River over the next eleven days would show by how much.
Perhaps the best account of the chief was written by the famed author Washington Irving. Remembered today for The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and other works, Irving interviewed Florida Gov. William P. Duval about his later interactions with the chief. Duval met Neamathla as lands were being selected for Florida’s capital city of Tallahassee:
…He was a remarkable man; upward of sixty years of age, about six feet high, with a fine eye, and a strongly-marked countenance, over which he possessed great command. His hatred of white men appeared to be mixed with contempt: on the common people, he looked down with infinite scorn. He seemed unwilling to acknowledge any superiority of rank or dignity in Governor Duval, claiming to associate with him on terms of equality as two great chieftains.[i]
Washington Irving, the noted American
writer who penned a fascinating account
of Neamathla. Library of Congress.
Irving’s statement that the chief was unwilling to acknowledge the superiority of the white governor is powerful. It shows that Neamathla regarded himself as the equal of any white leader. He also left no doubt about his feelings concerning the U.S. occupation of his lands:
…This country belongs to the red man; and if I had the number of warriors at my command that this nation once had, I would not leave a white man on my lands. I would exterminate the whole. I can say this to you, for you can understand me: you are a man; but I would not say it to your people. They’d cry out I was a savage, and would take my life. They cannot appreciate the feelings of a man that loves his country.[ii]
Duval was attempting to arrange the movement of Neamathla and his followers from a village site at Tallahassee to a new reservation established for them near the Ochlockonee River in Gadsden County, Florida. The chief’s voice grew louder and louder until it could be heard over the entire village as he made clear that he was willing to fight to the death to defend the lands of his people:
…He held in his hand a long knife, with which he had been rasping tobacco; this he kept flourishing backward and forward, as he talked, by way of giving effect to his words, brandishing it at times within an inch of the governor’s throat. He concluded his tirade by repeating, that the country belonged to the red men, and that sooner than give it up, his bones and the bones of his people should bleach upon its soil.[iii]
Pensacola's Jacksonian Guard demonstrates the uniforms,
weapons and musical instruments of the 4th and 7th
Regiments. The unit will participate in the Scott 1817
Reenactment at Chattahoochee, FL on Dec. 6-8, 2019.
Neamathla eventually did put his words into action. He never occupied the tiny reservation established for him in Florida but instead moved up the Chattahoochee River to the surviving part of the Creek Nation. There he became the principal chief of Hitchiti and emerged as one of the principal leaders in the Creek War of 1836.
Captured by U.S. and Alabama militia troops, he was placed in chains and marched west on the Trail of Tears. An officer who saw him wrote that the chief was over 80 years old but never uttered a complaint despite the weight of his chains. He reached what is now Oklahoma during the brutal winter of 1836-1837. One of the final mentions of him to appear in U.S. Army records is a plea for his people to receive the blankets that they had been promised. They were suffering in the snow and ice and had nothing with which to cover themselves.
Editor's Note: The events of November 1817 are commemorated by the annual Scott 1817 Seminole War Battle Reenactment at Chattahoochee, Florida. This year's event is scheduled for December 6-8 and will feature an Education Day for school and home school students on Friday, December 6, followed by public days on Saturday and Sunday, December 7 and 8. Activities take place at River Landing Park and feature living history encampments, demonstrations, exhibits, a mobile museum, the authentic 19th-century replica keelboat Aux Arc ("Ozark"), and battle reenactments on both Saturday and Sunday. All activities are free to the public.
For more information, please visit https://scott1817.com. This video will give you a quick 30-second preview:
[i] Washington Irving, “Conspiracy of Neamathla” in The Works of Washington Irving, Author’s Revised Edition, Volume XVI, Wolfert's Roost, New York, G.P. Putnam, 1863, page 297.
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