SOUTHERN INDIANS. The Creek Confederacy extended from the Atlantic westward to the high lands which separate the waters of the Alabama and Tombigbee Rivers, including a great portion of the States of Alabama and Georgia, and the whole of Florida. Oglethorpe's first interviews' with the natives at Savannah, were with people of this confederacy. The Yamassees, or Savannahs of Georgia and South Carolina, and the Seminoles of Florida, were of the Creek confederacy. The latter were strong and warlike. They were at the head of the Indian confederacy, to destroy the white people, in 1715. When the general dispersion followed that abortive attempt, the Yamassees took refuge with the Spaniards of Florida. Small bands often annoyed the white frontier settlements of Georgia, but they were not engaged in general hostilities until the Revolution, when the whole Creek confederacy3 took part with the British. 5 4 2 The most inveterate and treacherous enemy of the white people, have ever been the Seminoles. Bands of them often went out upon the war-path, with the Yamassees, to slay the pale-faces. They joined the British in 1812-14; and in 1817 they renewed hostilities. They were subdued by General Jackson, and afterward remained comparatively quiet until 1835, when they again attacked the white settlements. They were subjugated in 1842, after many lives and much treasure had been sacrificed. A few of them yet [1856] remain in the everglades of Florida, but a greater portion of the tribe have gone west of the Mississippi, with the other members of the Creek confederacy. The Creeks proper now [1856] number about twenty-four thousand souls. The number of the whole confederacy is about thirty thousand. They occupy lands upon the Arkansas and its tributaries, and are among the most peaceable and order-loving of the banished tribes. In the beautiful country bordering upon the Gulf of Mexico, and extending west of the Creeks to the Mississippi, lived the Choctaws. They were an agricultural people when the Europeans discovered them; and, attached to home and quiet pursuits, they have ever been a peaceful people. Their wars have always been on the defensive, and they never had public feuds with either their Spanish, French, or English neighbors. They, too, have been compelled to abandon their native country for the uncultivated wilderness west of Arkansas, between the Arkansas and Red Rivers. They now [1856] number about twentythree thousand souls. They retain their peaceable character in their new homes. The Chickasaw tribe inhabited the country along the Mississippi, from the borders of the Choctaw domain to the Ohio River, and eastward beyond the Tennessee to the lands of the Cherokees" and Shawnees. This warlike people were the early friends of the English, and the most inveterate foes of the French, 1 Page 102. 8 2 Page 170. 3 Page 19. 3 This confederacy now [1856] consists of the Creeks proper, Seminoles, Natchez, Hichitties, and Alabamas. The Creeks, like many other tribes, claim to be the Original People. 7 Page 27. 4 Page 448. 5 Page 466. 6 Page 468. who had twice [1736-1740] invaded their country. They adhered to the British during the Revolution, but since that time they have held friendly relations with the Government of the United States. The remnant, about six thousand in number, are upon lands almost a hundred leagues westward of the Mississippi. Thus, with almost chronological brevity, we have given an outline sketch of the history of the Aboriginal nations with whom the first European settlers in the United States became acquainted. They have now no legal habitation eastward of the Mississippi; and the fragments of those powerful tribes who once claimed sovereignty over twenty-four degrees of longitude and twenty degrees of latitude, are now [1856] compressed within a quadrangle of about nine degrees, between the Red and Missouri Rivers.' Whether the grave of the last of those great tribes shall be within their present domain, or in some valley among the crags of the Rocky Mountains, expediency will hereafter determine. CIIAPTER IX. THE DAHCOTAH OR SIOUX TRIBES. THE French were the earliest explorers of the regions of the Middle and Upper Mississippi, and they found a great number of tribes west of that river who spoke dialects of the same language. They occupied the vast domain from the Arkansas on the south, to the western tributary of Lake Winnipeg on the north, and westward to the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains. These have been classed into four grand divisions, namely, the WINNEBAGOES, who inhabited the country between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi, among the Algonquins; the ASSINNIBOINS and SIOUX proper, the most northerly nation; the MINETAREE GROUP in the Minnesota Territory, and the SOUTHERN SIOUX, who dwelt in the country between the Arkansas and Platte Rivers, and whose hunting-ground extended to the Rocky Mountains. The most uneasy of these tribes were the Winnebagoes, who often attacked the Sioux west of the Mississippi. They generally lived on friendly terms with the Algonquins, after their martial spirit was somewhat subdued by the Illinois, who, in 1640, almost exterminated them. They were enemies to the 1 Mr. Bancroft [II., 253] after consulting the most reliable authorities on the subject, makes the following estimate of the entire Aboriginal population in 1650 Algonquins, 90,000; Eastern Sioux, less than 3,000; Iroquois, including their southern kindred, about 17,000; Catawbas, 3,000, Cherokees (now more numerous than ever), 12,000; Mobilian tribes, 50,000; Uchees, 1,000; With the Natchez, 4,000-in all, 180,000. These were the only nations and tribes then known. expansion of our territory westward and southward, we have embraced numerous Indian nations, some of them quite populous, until the number of the estimate above given has been more than doubled, according to the late census. Page 17. 2 United States during the second war with Great Britain,' and they confederated with the Sacs and Foxes in hostilities against the white people, under Black Hawk, in 1832. The tribe, now [1856] less than four thousand strong, are seated upon the Mississippi, about eighty miles above St. Paul, the capital of Minnesota. Fear of the white people keeps them quiet. In the cold, wet country of the North, the Assiniboins yet inhabit their native land. Having separated from the nation, they are called "rebels." Their neighbors, the Sioux proper, were first visited by the French in 1660, and have ever been regarded as the most fierce and warlike people on the continent. They also occupy their ancient domain, and are now [1856] about eighteen thousand strong. Further westward are the Minetarees, Mandans, and Crows, who form the MINETAREE GROUP. They are classed with the Dahcotahs or Sioux, although the languages have only a slight affinity. The Minetarees and Mandans number about three thousand souls each. They cultivate the soil, and live in villages. The Crows number about fifteen hundred, and are wanderers and hunters. The Mandans are very light-colored. Some suppose them to be descendants of a colony from Wales, who, it is believed, came to America. under Madoc, the son of a Welsh prince, in the twelfth century.3 There are eight in number of the SOUTHERN SIOUX tribes, namely, the Arkansas, Osages, Kansas, Iowas, Missouries, Otoes, Omahas, and Puncahs. They are cultivators and hunters. They live in villages a part of the year, and are abroad upon their hunting-grounds during the remainder. Of these tribes, the Osages are the most warlike and powerful. All of the Southern Sioux tribes are upon lands watered by the Missouri and the Platte, and their tributaries. CHAPTER X. THE EXTREME WESTERN TRIBES. WITHIN a few years, our domain has been widely expanded, and in our newly-acquired possessions on the borders of Mexico and the Pacific coast, and the recently organized Territories in the interior of the continent, are numerous powerful and warlike tribes,1 of whom little is known, and whose history Page 260. 2 Page 287. It is said that Madoc, son of Prince Owen Gwignedd, sailed from Wales, with ten ships and three hundred men, at about the year 1170, on an exploring voyage, and never returned. Many learned conjectures have been expressed, and among them the belief that the expedition reached the American continent, and became the progenitors of the Mandans, or White Indians, of our western plains. 4 The whole number of Indians within the present limits of the United States, in 1853, is reported in the census to be a little more than 400,000. There are about 17,000 in the States eastward of the Mississippi, principally in New York, Michigan, and Wisconsin; the remainder, consisting of Cherokees, Choctaws, and Seminoles, being in North Carolina, Mississippi, and Florida. The has no connection with that of the people of the United States, except the fact that they were original occupants of the soil, and that some of them, especially the California and Oregon Indians, yet [1856] dispute our right to sovereignty. Of these, the Comanches and Apaches of California are the most warlike. The Pawnees upon the Great Plains toward the Rocky Mountains are very numerous, but not so warlike; and the Utahs, among the Wasatch and neighboring ranges, are strong in numbers. Further northward and westward are the Blackfeet, Crow, Snake, Nezperces, and Flathead Indians, and smaller clans, with petty chiefs, whose domains stretch away toward the Knisteneaux and Esquimaux on the extreme north. These tribes are rapidly fading in the light of modern civilization, and are destined to total annihilation. The scythe of human progress is steadily cutting its swathes over all their lands; and the time is not far distant when the foot-prints of the Indians will be no more known within the domain of our Republic. In future years, the dusky son of an exile, coming from the far-off borders of the Slave Lake, will be gazed at in the streets of a city at the mouth of the Yellow Stone, with as much wonder as the Oneida woman, with her blue cloth blanket and bead-work merchandize is now [1856] in the city of New York. So the Aboriginals of our land are passing away, and even now they may chant in sorrow : "We, the rightful lords of yore, Are the rightful lords no more; Like the red leaves on the gale- J. MCLELLAN, JR. "I will weep for a season, in bitterness fed, For my kindred are gone to the hills of the dead; number in Minnesota and along the frontiers of the Western States and Texas (most of them emigrants from the country eastward of the Mississippi), is estimated at 110,000. Those on the Plains and among the Rocky Mountains, not within any organized Territory, at 63,000; in Texas, at 29,000; in New Mexico, at 45,000; in California, at 100,000; in Utah, at 12,000; in Oregon and Washington Territories, at 23,000. For more minute accounts of the Indians, see Heckewelder's "History of the Indian Nations;" Schoolcraft's "Algic Researches;" M'Kinney's "History of the Indian Tribes;" Drake's "Book of the Indians;" Catlin's "Letters and Notes." 3 AMERIGO VESPUCCI. ONE of the most interesting of the unsolved problems of history, is that which relates to the alleged discovery of America by mariners of northern Europe, almost five hundred years before Columbus left Palos, in Spain, to accomplish that great event. The tales and poetry of Iceland abound with intimations of such discoveries; and records of early voyages from Iceland to a continent southwestward of Greenland, have been found. These, and the results of recent investigations, appear to prove, by the strongest circumstantial evidence, that the New England' coast was visited, and that settlements thereon were attempted by Scandinavian navigators, 2 almost five centuries before the great Genoese undertook his first voyage in quest of a western passage to India. NORTHMAN. 1 The States of our Union eastward of New York are collectively called New England. P. 74. 2 The ancients called the territory which contains modern Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Lapland, Iceland, Finland, etc., by the general name of Scandinavia. |