While there was still a doubt in every mind whether the Choctaws would remain friendly to the Americans, Pushamataha removed every suspicion by suddenly appearing at St. Stephen’s and offering to enlist several companies of his warriors to take up arms under the banner of the United States. He was conducted to Mobile by George S. Gaines, where he had an interview with General Flournoy. That strangely blind officer declined the chief’s offer, and Gaines and Pushamataha went back to St. Stephen’s filled with mortification and disgust. The assembled citizens had begun to curse the commanding general without stint, when a courier appeared riding in haste. He bore authority from Flournoy for Gaines to recruit in the Choctaw nation. His advisers had caused him to repent of his folly in refusing the generous offer of Pushamataha.

It was while the consternation of the inhabitants on the Alabama and Tombigbee was most intense that Jackson was making his way toward the sanguinary theatre on which, as we have seen, he appeared at the close of October. He now became chief actor in the terrible drama.

Jackson disposed his troops for action so as to inclose the foe in a circle of armed men. The infantry were in three lines, the militia on the left, and the volunteers on the right. The cavalry formed the two extreme wings, and were ordered to advance in a curve, keeping their rear connected with the advance of the infantry lines, so that there should be no break in the circle. In this position were the troops at sunrise, when Colonel William Carroll was sent forward with the advanced guard, composed of the companies of Captains Dederich, Caperton, and Bledsoe, to commence the attack. He delivered a heavy fire, when the savages rushed forth, with horrid yells and screams, in the direction of the militia under General Roberts, from whose brigade Carroll had been detached, and who, pursuant to orders, had fallen back, so as to bring the enemy upon the main body. Their horrid noise and devilish appearance so terrified the militia that some of them gave way. Seeing this, Jackson ordered Colonel Bradley to fill the chasm with his regiment, which was lagging behind the line. Bradley failed to obey, and Lieutenant Colonel Dyer, in command of reserves composed of the companies of Captains Smith, Morton, Axune, Edwards, and Hammond, was ordered to that duty with his men. These were immediately dismounted, and met the yelling savages so resolutely that the fugitive militia took courage, resumed their station, and fought gallantly. The battle now became general, and had lasted about fifteen minutes, when the Indians, who had fought well, suddenly broke, and fled in all directions toward the surrounding mountains.

When Jackson and his troops reached Fort Strother, wearied and half famished, they found the place almost destitute of provisions. None had been brought in during the absence of the little army, and now starvation threatened all. Almost mutinous murmurs were heard among the suffering soldiers, but their general’s words and example kept them within the bounds of obedience. He was ever cheerful, and shared with his soldiers in all their privations, eating, like them, the acorns found in the forest, to sustain life. It was a very critical period in the campaign, but it was passed in safety and honor to all concerned.

The severe chastisement administered upon the Creeks at Tallasehatche and Talladega had an immediate and powerful effect upon the spirit and temper of the savages, and promised a speedy termination of the war. That desired end was postponed by an unfortunate circumstance growing out of the ever-dangerous fact of a divided command in the campaign. There was an existing jealousy between the East and West Tennessee troops; and, notwithstanding Jackson was the senior officer, and properly commander-in-chief of the campaign against the Creeks, General Cocke maintained, up to the time in question, a separate and independent command, and attempted to operate against the hostile Indians at first even without consultation with General Jackson. This produced trouble, as we shall observe presently.

Many of the warriors who fought at Talladega were from the Hillabee towns on the Tallapoosa River, in the present Cherokee County, Alabama. Those who escaped to the mountains on that dreadful morning were so thoroughly convinced of the futility and danger of making farther resistance to the Tennesseeans, that they resolved to sue for peace and reconciliation. For this purpose they sent Robert Grayson, an aged Scotchman and old resident among them, to make peaceful propositions to General Jackson at Fort Strother. Jackson cordially responded to the proposition, but at the same time told the messenger, in firm language, that he had come to chastise those who had committed gross wrongs toward the white people and friendly Indians in the Creek country, and that he must have full evidence of the sincerity of peace professions before he would consent to stay his hand. "The prisoners and property which they have taken from us and the friendly Creeks," he said, "must be returned; the instigators of the war and the murderers of our citizens must be surrendered; the latter must and will be made to feel the force of our resentment. Long shall they remember Fort Mims in bitterness and tears. Upon those who are disposed to remain friendly I neither wish nor intend to make war."

Grayson hastened back with the conciliatory message. It was never delivered, for destruction had fallen upon the Hillabee people while the messenger was away on his errand. That destruction came from the East Tennesseeans under Generals Cocke and White, who had come down in a separate column, and encamped on the bank of the Coosa, seventy miles above Fort Strother, late in October. There Cocke, with the main body, awaited supplies and built a fort, which he named Armstrong, in honor of the then Secretary of War. It was in the present Cherokee County, Alabama, not far westward of the Georgia line. But the supplies came not. The continued low water in the Tennessee would not allow the contractor to fulfill his promises. Famine stared the little army in the face. Cocke was sorely perplexed. He knew that Jackson, who depended upon the same source of supplies, must be as much embarrassed as himself by lack of food. What shall be done? was a very serious question that needed an immediate answer. Jackson had called for a junction of the armies. Shall we go forward and increase the dangers of famine by having a combined army of five thousand men in the wilderness? was another pertinent and important question. A council of officers was held. The question, Shall we follow Jackson? was decided in the negative by unanimous vote. Shall we cross the Coosa and proceed to the Creek settlements on the Tallapoosa? was a second question, and it was unanimously decided in the affirmative. General White was then within a day’s march of Jackson’s camp, and Cocke sent an order for him to return immediately to Fort Armstrong. "It is the unanimous wish of the officers and men also," he said. "If we follow General Jackson’s army," he continued," we must suffer for supplies; nor can we expect to gain a victory. Let us, then, take a direction in which we can share some of the dangers and glories of the field." This message, and the note from General Jackson, already mentioned, urging him to hasten to the protection of Fort Strother, reached White at the same time. He considered his obedience due first to his immediate superior, General Cocke, and he marched his half-starved brigade back to Fort Armstrong.

General Cocke, too remote from General Jackson to act in concert with him, was, consequently and unfortunately, ignorant of the peaceful mood of the Hillabee people. He had been informed that one of the most energetic of the Creek leaders (Bill Scott, who commanded the Indians at Talladega), was among them, filled with the hellish purpose of massacring every white person and friendly Creek in all that region. He accordingly dispatched General White, with some mounted men and a band of Cherokee allies, to attack the Hillabee town. White took only three days’ rations with him, and marched with great rapidity toward the principal village of the Hillabee, on the border between the present Talladega and Randolph Counties, Alabama, full a hundred miles from Fort Armstrong. He spread desolation in his path. Ockfuske and Genalga, two deserted towns, one of thirty and the other of ninety houses, were laid in ashes, and at dawn on the morning of the 18th of November – the very day when Grayson left Jackson’s camp – White appeared before the chief village. The inhabitants were unsuspicious of danger, and made no resistance; and yet White, for the purpose of inspiring terror in the minds of the Creek nation, fell furiously upon the non-resistants, and murdered no less than sixty warriors before his hand was stayed. Then, with two hundred and fifty widows and orphans as prisoners in his train, he returned to Fart Armstrong, without a drop of a Tennesseean’s blood being shed.

The inhabitants of the other Hillabee towns, ignorant of any other commander than General Jackson, regarded this massacre as the most foul perfidy on his part, and were intensely exasperated. They felt that their humble petition for peace had been cruelly responded to only by the sword and bullet, and thenceforth they carried on hostilities with the most malignant feelings and fearful energy.

Jackson’s anger against General Cocke was equally hot. In the absence of correct information, he regarded him as a rival, willfully withholding supplies, and seeking glory on his own account. This was unjust, and the irate commander was convinced of the fact in the course of two or three weeks, when, in a friendly letter, he invited the East Tennesseean to join him with his army at Fort Strother on the 12th of December. Cocke cheerfully complied, and was there on the appointed day, having in the mean time scoured the Cherokee country for provisions, and caused a considerable quantity of supplies to be hauled from the Tennessee to the Coosa for the use of the combined army. He found that of Jackson greatly demoralized. Disappointed, starving, inactive, the troops at Fort Strother were dreadfully homesick, and filled with a mutinous spirit. This the courage and tact of the commander controlled, but with great difficulty. The militia, on one occasion, prepared to go back to the settlements. They started in a body, when the yet faithful volunteers, with Jackson at their head, stood in their path. Then the volunteers attempted to leave the camp and go home – the very men to whose fortunes their leader had so tenaciously adhered at Natchez the year before – when the militia, with Jackson at their head, stood in the path of the new mutineers. At length almost the entire army of West Tennessee, despairing of relief determined to abandon the expedition and go home. Some of the militia actually started, and the volunteers were about to follow. The general had no sufficient force to restrain them, and he was compelled to rely upon himself alone. He mounted his horse, seized a musket with his right hand, while the disabled arm was yet in a sling, and, placing himself in front of the malcontents, with the weapon resting upon his horse’s neck, he declared that he would shoot the first man who should take a step in advance. Amazed at his boldness, they gazed at him in silence. Fortunately, at that moment, Coffee and two companies of faithful mounted men came up, and the mutineers, after consultation, agreed to return to duty. Yet discontent was not allayed, and Jackson finally allowed all volunteers so disposed to return to their homes, and he organized a force out of other materials. Could he have had sufficient supplies after the battle at Talladega, and been met by immediate concert of action by the East Tennessee troops, he might have ended the war within a fortnight. It was protracted for months; and for ten long and weary weeks he was compelled to lie in idleness at Fort Strother, suffering the vexations which grew out of positive demonstrations of discontent.

In the space of seven days Floyd had marched one hundred and twenty miles and committed the massacre. He was now sixty miles from a deposit of provisions, and his rations were nearly exhausted; so, after burying his dead and preparing litters for his wounded, he hastened back to Fort Mitchell, on the Chattahoochee. On his departure, and when a mile eastward of the ruined towns, his rear was attacked by some desperate survivors of Auttose, who were dispersed after receiving a few volleys.

While these events were transpiring in the upper country of the Creeks, stirring scenes were witnessed in the present Clarke County, in the forks of the Tombigbee and Alabama, and vicinity. The Indians, under the direct influence of Weathersford and the British and Spanish officers, were very active and sanguinary in that region, and General Flournoy, who had kept General Claiborne on the defensive, was at last aroused to a sense of the necessity of offensive measures. Accordingly, on the 12th of October, he ordered that officer to advance with his army into the heart of the Creek country for the purpose of defending the citizens while gathering their crops yet in the field; "to drive the enemy from the frontiers; to follow them up to their contiguous towns, and to kill, burn, and destroy all their negroes, horses, cattle, and other property that could not conveniently be brought to the dépôts." This sanguinary order was justified by the Georgia general, by the conduct of Great Britain, and the acts of her Indian allies.

RANDON’S OR CLAIBORNE LANDING.

The troops advanced in three columns, with mounted men under Captains Lester and Wells acting as reserves. The right column was commanded by Colonel Carson, and consisted of twelve-months’ volunteers; the centre was composed of a detachment of the Third Regiment United States Infantry, and some mounted riflemen under Lieutenant Colonel Russell; and the left of militia, and some Choctaws under Major Smoot. Their duty was difficult, for the town was almost surrounded by swamps and deep ravines, and the Indians, regarding the place as holy, and having property there of great value, were prepared to fight desperately. They had, on the approach of the invaders, conveyed their women and children to safe places in the thick forests of what is now known as the Dutch Bend of Autauga County, and they had no hinderances to a vigorous defense.

The term of Carson’s Mississippi Volunteers and cavalry had now expired, and they were mustered out of the service. By this process the little army of volunteers and militia melted away, and on the 23d of January General Claiborne was compelled, in writing to the Secretary of War from Mount Vernon, to say that he had only sixty men left, and their time would soon expire. Colonel Russell and his regulars garrisoned Fort Claiborne, and did what they could in furnishing supplies to the Tennessee troops above; at the same time they made some unimportant raids in the Indian country, but without accomplishing any great results.

Let us now observe the movements of Jackson in the region of the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers. We left him at Fort Strother, comparatively inactive because of a lack of supplies and the discontents of his troops. Nor was this all. The terms of enlistment of most of his men were near expiration, and he saw before him, in the temper of his troops, the inevitable disintegration of his army at the moment when their services were most needed. He was urged by his chief, General Pinckney, to hold all the posts in his possession, for it was of vital importance to deprive the British of these new Indian allies. The skies at that moment appeared lowering. Seven sail of British vessels, with troops and two bomb-ships, were off Pensacola. New Orleans was menaced, and Mobile was in imminent danger. St. Augustine would doubtless be soon occupied by a British force, with the consent of the treacherous Spaniards; and in every direction clouds seemed gathering, portentous of dismal events in the southwest.

Inspirited by this success, Jackson immediately detached General Coffee, with four hundred men and the whole body of the Indians, to destroy the encampment of the foe at Emucfau. It was found to be too strongly fortified to be taken without artillery, so Coffee marched back for the purpose of guarding the cannon on its way to a position to bear upon the town. This retrograde movement encouraged the Indians, and a strong party of them fell upon the right of Jackson’s encampment. Coffee at once asked and obtained leave to lead two hundred men to the support of that wing, and to fall upon the left of the foe, while the friendly Indians should fall upon their right flank at the same moment. By some mistake only fifty-four men followed Coffee. The gallant general fell upon the Indians with these, and Jackson ordered two hundred of the friendly Indians to co-operate with him by attacking the right flank of the savages. "This order was promptly obeyed," said Jackson in his report, "and on the moment of its execution what I expected was realized. The enemy had intended the attack on the right as a feint, and, expecting to direct my attention thither, meant to attack me again, and with their main force, on the left flank, which they had hoped to find weakened and in disorder. They were disappointed." The general, with wise discretion, had not only ordered his left to remain firm, but had repaired thither himself, and directed a part of the reserves, under Captain Ferrill, to hasten to its support. In this way the whole main body met the advancing enemy. They gave the foe two or three Volleys, and then charged them vigorously with the bayonet. The Indians broke, and fled in confusion, hotly pursued some distance; and the friendly Indians, unable to withstand the temptation, left their post on the right flank and joined in the chase, all the while pouring a harassing fire upon the fugitives.

General Coffee in the mean time was struggling manfully against the assailants on the right of the encampment. The desertion of his Indian supporters placed him in a critical situation, for the odds were greatly against him. He was soon relieved by the return from the chase of Jim Fife and a hundred of his warriors, who were immediately summoned to his support. The aid was timely. Coffee and his little party charged the savages vigorously, who, dispirited by the flight of their main body, gave way, and ran for their lives in every direction, many of them falling before the destructive weapons of the pursuers. The victory, in the form of a repulse, was complete, but it had been won at the cost of a severe wound in his body by General Coffee, and the loss of his aid-de-camp, Colonel A. Donelson, and two or three others. Several of the privates were also wounded.

Jackson was astonished at the courage and bravery of the Creeks, and thought it prudent to abandon any farther attempts to destroy the encampment at Emucfau. His movement was simply a raid, with the twofold object of striking a quick and destructive blow at the enemy, and to make a diversion in favor of General Floyd, then in the vicinity of the Chattahoochee. He therefore determined to return to Fort Strother.

We will leave Jackson at Fort Strother a few moments while we consider the movements of Floyd below. We left that officer at Fort Mitchell, on the Chattahoochee.

Floyd reposed more than six weeks awaiting supplies, and during that time recovered of his wound received at Auttose. Then he marched toward Toockabatcha, on the Tallapoosa, with over twelve hundred Georgia volunteers, a company of cavalry, and four hundred friendly Indians. He established communicating posts on the way, and at length, on the night of the 26th of January, encamped on the Calebee or Challibee River, on the high land bordering the swamp of that name, in Macon County, Alabama, fifty miles west of Fort Mitchell. The camp was carefully watched, but in the gloom, more than an hour before the dawn of the following morning, a band of Creeks, who had stealthily assembled in the swamp during the night, shot the sentinels, and pounced like fierce tigers on Floyd’s front and flank. The attack was sudden, yet not unprepared for, and the savages were gallantly opposed, in the front, by the artillery under Captain Jett Thomas, riflemen commanded by Captain William E. Adams, and a picket-guard led by Captain John Broadnax.

The foe rushed desperately up within thirty yards of the cannon, and smote the troops severely. Broadnax and his party were cut off from their companions for a while, but with the aid of the half-blood chief Timpoochy Barnard, leader of some Uchees, they cut their way through the encircling savages. Most of the other Indians took shelter in the camp, and were scarcely felt in the battle, which was contested fiercely in the darkness, which was rendered more intense by the umbrageous branches of the heavy pine forest in which they were fighting. When daylight came, and Floyd was enabled to survey the field of action, the contest was soon ended. The general ordered the right wing of his little army, composed of the battalions commanded by Majors Booth, Cleveland, Watson, and Freeman, and a troop of cavalry under Captain Duke Hamilton, to charge on the foe. The Indians were dismayed by the glittering bayonets, and fled in great terror. The infantry pursued, and the cavalry joined in the exciting chase, followed by the friendly Indians and Meriweather’s and Ford’s riflemen. They were chased through the swamp, and many of the fugitives were slain. They left thirty-seven dead in the pathway of their flight. The Georgians lost seventeen killed and one hundred and thirty-two wounded, and the friendly Indians had five men killed and fifteen wounded. Colonel Newman, a gallant officer, was wounded by three bullets and disabled, at the beginning of the action.

Floyd’s wounded were so many, and the hostile Indians in his vicinity were so numerous, and might be speedily re-enforced, that he prudently concluded not to penetrate the country farther, but to fall back to the Chattahoochee. On the day of the battle he retired to Fort Hull, one of his newly-erected stockades, and on the following day the Indians occupied the late battle-field. Leaving a small garrison at Fort Hull, the general continued his retrograde movement to Fort Mitchell, where his men were honorably discharged, their term of service having expired. No other expedition against the Creeks was organized in Georgia.

Let us now return to Jackson at Fort Strother.

On his return from his twelve days’ "excursion" or raid to the Tallapoosa, Jackson set his few militia that remained to constructing flat-boats in which to bring supplies down the Coosa, and to transport them to regions below, where materials for his new army were rapidly approaching from Tennessee. He discharged the troops who had been with him on the late expedition, their term of service being about ready to expire. They left for home full of admiration of and enthusiasm for their general, and their return gave a new impetus to volunteering. At the beginning of February two thousand troops from East Tennessee were in the shadows of Lookout Mountain, pressing on toward the Coosa, and at about the same time as many more West Tennesseeans arrived at Huntsville.

Intelligence of these approaching troops filled Jackson’s heart with gladness. His joy was increased by the arrival on the 6th, at Fort Strother, of Colonel Williams and the Thirty-ninth Regiment of the United States Army, six hundred strong, who had been induced to hasten to the relief of Jackson by the late Honorable Hugh L. White, of East Tennessee. Very soon afterward a part of Coffee’s brigade of mounted men came into Fort Strother, and also a troop of East Tennessee dragoons. The Choctaw Indians now openly espoused the cause of the United States; and before the close of February Jackson found himself at the head of an army of five thousand men, lacking nothing to enable them to sweep the whole Creek country with the besom of destruction but adequate supplies of food. Great exertions were put forth successfully to that end, and at the middle of March every thing was in readiness for a forward movement.

The hostile Creeks were aware of the formidable preparations for their subjugation, and were, at the same time, taking measures to avert, if possible, the impending blow. They had suffered severely at the hands of Jackson, Floyd, and Claiborne, and had already begun to have such premonitions of national disaster that they determined to concentrate their forces, and rest their fortunes upon the cast of the die of a single battle with the foe. For this purpose the warriors of the Hillabee, Ockfuske, Eufaulahache, New Youka, Oakchoie, Hickory Ground, and Fish-pond towns had gathered in the bend of the Tallapoosa, in the northeast part of Tallapoosa County, Alabama, called Tohopeka, or the Horseshoe, the river there assuming the shape of that object, forming a peninsula of about one hundred acres. By the aid of white men from Pensacola, and some hostile half-bloods, they built a very strong breastwork of logs across the neck of the peninsula, and pierced it with two rows of port-holes arranged in such manner as to expose the assailants to a cross-fire from within. Back of this breastwork was a mass of logs and brush; and at the bottom of the peninsula, near the river, was a village of log huts, where hundreds of canoes were moored at the banks of the stream, so that the garrison might have the means of escape if hard pushed. A greater portion of the peninsula was covered with forest. The Indians had an ample supply of food for a long siege. Their number was about twelve hundred, one fourth being women and children. There the Indians determined to defend themselves to the last extremity. They regarded their breastwork as impregnable, and were inspirited by recent events at Emuckfau (about four miles distant) and Enotochopco.

Jackson’s spies informed him of the position of the Indians, and he at once comprehended the folly which had permitted them to assemble in a pen, as if offering facilities for him to carry out his threat of extermination. He sent General Coffee, with all the mounted men and friendly Indians, to cross the river about two miles below the Bend, and take position on the bank opposite the village and boats. When, by signal, he was certified of the execution of his order, he went forward with the main body of his army toward the peninsula, and planted two field-pieces upon a little hill within eighty yards of the nearest point of the fortifications on the neck. At a little past ten o’clock these opened fire on the works, under the direction of Captain Bradford, chief engineer, but without seriously affecting the wall. As the small balls were buried in the logs and earth, the Indians set up a shout of derision, and the general was fairly defied.

NOTE. – The above plan of the battle of Cholocco Litabixee, or the Horseshoe, is arranged from one in Pickett’s History of Alabama. A shows the position of the hill from which Jackson’s cannon played upon the breastworks. C C C represent the position of Coffee’s command.

From Fort Williams Jackson pushed on toward the Hickory Ground of the Creeks, at the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa Rivers, over a country flooded by spring rains and swollen streams, and halted at the head of the peninsula, where the rivers approach each other within six hundred yards before uniting four miles below. There, on the sight of Fort Toulouse, erected by Governor Bienville a hundred years before, he built a stockade, cleaned out and deepened the old French entrance, and raised the national standard over a fortification named, in his honor, Fort Jackson. Thither deputation after deputation of humiliated Creek chiefs made their way to sue for pardon and peace in behalf of themselves and their people. They were received with courtesy, yet with sternness. "Give proof of your submission," said the general, "substantially by going and staying above Fort Williams, where you will be treated with, and the final demands of my Government will be made known to you. But you must first bring in Weathersford, the cruel leader of the attack on Fort Mims, who on no account can be forgiven." They cheerfully complied; but little did Jackson know the true character of Weathersford, or the plasticity of his own nature at that time.

Here we will leave the consideration of the fearfully-smitten Creeks for the present, with the remark that they showed themselves to be a brave people, and, on many accounts, deserving of the respect of mankind.

------------------------------

ENDNOTES.

1 The country in that region is exceedingly rough and mountainous, and the troops were compelled to endure the most appalling labors. "We have cut our way," wrote Major Reid, Jackson’s aid-de-camp, "over mountains more tremendous than Alps."

2 Letter of Major John Reid to Quarter-master W. B. Lewis, October 24, 1813, quoted by Parton, i., 432.

5 Life and Times of General Sam Dale, pages 116 and 117. Dale says Flournoy was opposed to the stockade system, and was determined to concentrate his troops at Mobile, Mount Vernon, and St. Stephen’s. Claiborne’s order for the evacuation of Fort Madison, inspired by Flournoy, was cursed by the settlers in the forks of the Alabama and Tombigbee, who considered themselves cruelly abandoned.

6 "During the day," says Dale, "sentinels were posted around the fort. At night I illuminated the approaches for a circuit of one hundred yards by a device of my own. Two poles, fifty feet long, were firmly planted on each side of the fort; a long lever, upon the plan of a well-sweep, worked upon each of these poles; to each lever was attached a bar of iron about ten feet long, and to these bars were fastened with trace-chains huge fagots of light wood. The illumination from such an elevation was brilliant, and no covert attack could be made upon my position. As a precaution against the Indian torch, I had my block-houses and their roofs well plastered with clay. We displayed ourselves in arms frequently, the women wearing hats and the garments of their husbands, to impress upon the spies that we knew were lurking around an exaggerated notion of our strength. For provisions we shot such cattle and hogs as grazed within the range of our guns, but I carefully noted the marks and brands, and afterward indemnified the owners." – Life of Dale, page 117.

7 The Choctaw nation was then composed of three distinct governments. The Eastern district was ruled over by Pushamataha, the Western by Puckshenubbee, and the Northwestern by Mushelatubba.

8 "You know Tecumtha," said Pushamataha. "He is a bad man. He came through our nation, but did not turn our heads. He went among the Muscogees [Creeks], and got many of them to join him. You know the Tensaw people. They were our friends. They played ball with us. They sheltered and fed us whenever we went to Pensacola. Where are they now? Their bones rot at Sam Mims’s place. The people at St. Stephen’s are also our friends. The Muscogees intend to kill them too. They want soldiers to defend them. [Here he drew his sword and flourished it.] You can all do as you please. You are all freemen. I dictate to none of you. But I shall join the St. Stephen’s people. If you have a mind to follow me, I will lead you to glory and victory." – Pickett’s Alabama, ii., 291.

9 Pickett’s Alabama, ii., 292.

10 Not far from the present village of Jacksonville, the capital of Benton County, Alabama, on the southeast side of Tallasehatche Creek.

11 General Coffee said in his report (November 4, 1813): "They fought as long as one existed; and when the last of the devoted band, still struggling for the mastery, had fallen beneath the hatchets and hunting-knives of his enemies, one hundred and eighty-six warriors were stretched lifeless on the fine open woodland in which their village was situated."

12 A touching tale of truth is told in connection with the battle of Tallasehatche. Among the slain was found an Indian mother, and upon her bosom lay her infant boy, vainly endeavoring to draw sustenance from the cold breast. The orphan was carried into camp, and Jackson tried to induce some of the mothers among the captives to give it nourishment. "No," they replied; "all his relatives are dead, kill him too." The little boy was taken to the general’s own tent, fed on brown sugar and water until a nurse could be procured at Huntsville, when it was sent to Mrs. Jackson. The general was a childless man, and he adopted the forest foundling as his son. Mrs. Jackson watched over him with a mother’s care, and he grew to be a beautiful youth, full of promise. But consumption laid him in the grave among the shades of the "Hermitage" before he reached manhood, and his foster-parents mourned over him with a grief as sincere as that of consanguinity.

This boy was no exception to the rule of Indian instinct for wild and forest life. He delighted to roam in the woods, decorate his head with feathers, and start out from ambush and frighten children with loud yells and horrid grimaces. He was apprenticed to a harness-maker in Nashville.

13 This fort was a little eastward of the Coosa River, in Talladega County, Alabama; and a portion of its site is now covered by the pleasant village of Talladega, the capital of the county, which had a population of about two thousand when the late Civil War broke out in 1861. It is in a delightful valley, with very attractive scenery in view.

* William Hall had been a colonel in the Tennessee militia who followed Jackson from Nashville to Natchez and back, and was made brigadier general of three-months’ volunteers on the 26th of September, 1813.

† Isaac Roberts. He was commissioned brigadier general of three-months’ Tennessee Volunteers on the 4th of October, 1813.

15 General Jackson’s Dispatch to Governor Blount, November 11, 1813. Report of Adjutant General Sitler, November 15.

16 These consisted of one hundred and sixty friendly Creek warriors, with their wives and children. The crushing blow was to have fallen upon them on that very day. They were almost ready to die of thirst. Their gratitude and joy were commensurate with the distress from which they had been relieved.

"General Andrew Jackson, with compliments to Governor Blount, requests him to inform the ladies of East Tennessee, who presented the colors to the Tennessee volunteers, that Captain Deaderich, who, with Captain Bledsoe’s and Captain Caperton’s companies, under the direction of Major Carroll, were sent to bring on the attack, and lead the enemy, by a regular retreat, on the strongest point of my infantry, went into action with their colors tied round him, and that they were well supported. And, in return, I send you a stand of colors (although not of such elegant stuff or magnificent needle-work) taken by one of the volunteers, which I beg you to present to them as the only mark of gratitude the volunteers have it in their power to make. With his own hand he slayed the bearer. They will be handed by Mr. Fletcher, who I send for that purpose." A letter dated Nashville, November 17, 1813, said, "Mr. Thomas H. Fletcher, of this town, has just arrived from General Jackson’s army. He was the bearer of a stand of colors taken from the enemy, and bearing the Spanish cross."

19 General Floyd’s dispatch to Major General Pinckney, the commander-in-chief of the Southern Department, December 4, 1813; Pickett’s History of Alabama, ii., 300.

21 It was dug out of a huge cypress-tree. It was between thirty and forty feet long, four feet deep, and three feet abeam. It had been used for the special purpose of transporting corn.

23 Samuel Dale was a remarkable man. He was of Irish extraction, and was born in Rockbridge County, Virginia, in 1772. His father removed with his family to Glade Hollow, on the Clinch River, in 1775, and in 1784 emigrated to the vicinity of Greensburg, Georgia. Not long afterward Dale and his wife died, leaving eight children, Samuel being the eldest. He took part in movements for keeping in check the hostilities of the Creek Indians in the time of Washington’s administration. He became a famous borderer and Indian fighter, and afterward a trader among the Creeks and Cherokees. He was also a guide to parties emigrating to the Mississippi Territory from Georgia. During the war with the Creeks now under consideration, he was very active and efficient. He received the commission of brevet brigadier general. After the war he settled at Dale’s Ferry, on the Alabama, and engaged in merchandising. In 1816 he was a member of the Convention called to divide the Mississippi Territory, and the following year he was a delegate to the first General Assembly of the Territory of Alabama – the eastern portion of Mississippi. He served several terms in the Legislature of Alabama, and in 1824 he was on a committee of the body appointed to escort Lafayette to the capital of the state. He was engaged much in public life until his death, which occurred at his residence in Daleville, Lauderdale County, Mississippi, on the 24th of May, 1841, when he was in the seventieth year of his age.

25 Pickett’s Alabama, ii., page 320.

26 This enterprise was deemed so hazardous that a memorial against it was signed by nine captains, eight lieutenants, and five ensigns of the Mississippi Volunteers in behalf of themselves and their men. They urged the feeble condition of the men, lack of provisions, clothing, blankets, and shoes, the inclemency of the weather, and the want of transportation through a country where there was not even a hunter’s trail. Yet they expressed their willingness to follow the general if he should resolve to proceed. He did so resolve, and they cheerfully followed. "Not a murmur was heard; not a complaint was made," said General Claiborne afterward. "Subordination to their officers marked their every act, and no suffering could seduce them from their duty. Their patience was equal to their courage." Most of them were young men accustomed to the comforts and luxuries of life. Among them were Gerard W. Brandon and Abraham N. Scott, both afterward governors of the state. – Claiborne’s Life of Dale, page 138.

27 Pickett’s History of Alabama, ii., 324.

28 The gallantry of two young men in this engagement deserves a record. These were Constantine Perkins and Craven Jackson. The former was a graduate of Cumberland (Tennessee) College, was with Jackson at the battle of Talladega, and was one of the few who refused to desert him at Fort Strother. In the hurry and confusion in separating the cannon from the limber, the rammer and picker of the piece were left behind. In the midst of the shower of bullets from the Indians, Jackson coolly pulled out his iron ramrod from his musket and used it as a picker, primed with a cartridge from his side, and fired the cannon. Perkins then slipped off his bayonet, used his musket for a rammer, and drove down the cartridge for another discharge. These two brave young men kept the field-piece working, and drove the savages to the deep forest. Armstrong lay wounded near by, and called out to those around the piece, "My brave fellows, some of you may fall, but you must save the cannon!"

29 General Jackson’s official Letter to General Pinckney, January 29, 1814.

30 This was the afterward soldier and statesman, General Sam Houston, one of the bravest of the leaders in the Texas Revolution, first President of the independent Republic of Texas, and for many years a member of the National Legislature of the United States. He was a remarkable man. He was born in Rockbridge County, Virginia, on the 2d of March, 1793, and, while yet a child, he went with his widowed mother to Tennessee. He spent several years with the Cherokee Indians, and became enamored with their roving, restless life. He enlisted in the army in 1813, and at the close of the war had reached the position of lieutenant. Then he studied law at Nashville, and there commenced his long political life. In 1823 he was elected to Congress, and continued in that body until 1827, when he became Governor of Tennessee. Before the expiration of his term he resigned, and took up his abode among the Cherokees in Arkansas, where he befriended them much in their intercourse with dishonest agents of the Government. He became commander-in-chief of the little army of revolutionists in Texas, which achieved its independence in 1830. He was twice elected president of that republic, and when Texas was annexed to the United States he was sent as her representative to the Senate, where he remained until just before the breaking out of the great Civil War, when he was Governor of Texas. He died in November, 1863, aged seventy years.

31 Pickett relates (History of Alabama, ii., 343) that many suffered long from grievous wounds. "Manowa," he says, "one of the bravest chiefs that ever lived, was literally shot to pieces. He fought as long as he could. He saved himself by jumping into the river where the water was four feet deep. He held to a root, and thus kept himself beneath the waves, breathing through the long joint of a cane, one end of which he held in his mouth, while the other end came above the surface of the water. When night set in, the brave Manowa rose from his watery bed, and made his way to the forest, bleeding from many wounds. Many years after the war we conversed with the chief, and learned from him the particulars of his remarkable escape. His face, limbs, and body, at the time we conversed with him, were marked with scars of many horrible wounds."

32 Lemuel Purnell Montgomery was born in Wythe County, Virginia, in 1786, and was distantly related to the hero of the same name who fell at Quebec at the close of 1775. His family settled originally in North Carolina, and were Scotch-Irish. In early life the major became a resident of East Tennessee, near Knoxville. He studied law, and became a rival of the eminent Felix Grundy. He was a daring horseman, and full of soldierly qualities. President Madison appointed him major of the Thirty-ninth Regiment, and he fell at their head when storming the breastworks at the Horseshoe, as we have observed in the text. Jackson wept over his body like a child, and exclaimed, "I have lost the flower of my army!" He was buried near where he fell, and in long after years the citizens of Tallapoosa County honored his memory by exhuming his remains, and burying them with military ceremonies at the capital of the county. The County of Montgomery and the political capital of the State of Alabama were named in honor of this brave soldier. – Pickett.

35 Weathersford’s appeal for the women and children was kindly responded to, and not only to the women and children, but to the remnant of the nation succor was given. For a considerable part of the ensuing summer, five thousand Creek Indians drew rations from the public stores. But for this aid a large number of them must have perished by starvation.

36 Drake’s Book of the Indians, eleventh edition, page 390.

37 Weathersford settled upon a farm in Monroe County, Alabama, well supplied with negro slaves, where he maintained the character of an honest man. Soon after his return he married, and General Sam Dale, frequently mentioned in this chapter, was his groomsman. His birth-place was the Hickory Ground, but he could not live there. He said that his old comrades, the hostile Creeks, ate his cattle from starvation, the peace-party ate them from revenge; and the squatters because he was "a damned Red-skin;" so, he said, "I have come to live among gentlemen." – See Life of General Sam Dale, page 129. Weathersford died from the effects of fatigue produced by a desperate bear-hunt in 1826.

----------------------------------------

Transcription and html prepared by Bill Carr, last updated 12/06/2001.

Copyright Notice: Copyright 2001. All files on this site are copyrighted by their creator. They may be linked to but may not be reproduced on another site without the specific permission of their creator. Although public information is not in and of itself copyrightable, the format in which it is presented, the notes and comments, etc., are. It is, however, quite permissible to print or save the files to a personal computer for personal use ONLY.