INDIAN CREEK TRIBE CHICKAMAUGA CREEK & CHEROKEE NATION INC.

                                        A PART OF HISTORY

BEFORE THE CREEK TRAIL OF TEARS THERE WERE TWO LODGES IN THE CREEK NATION.  ONE WAS CALLED THE LODGE OF MICCO.  IF YOUR MOTHER WAS THE FEMALE CHILD OF A CHIEF THEN YOU WOULD BELONG TO THE LODGE OF MICCO, OR THE HOUSE OF KINGS.  AND WHEN IT CAME TIME  TO PICK A NEW CLAN CHIEF OR PRINCIPAL CHIEF THEY WERE CHOOSEN FROM THE LODGES OF MICCO BY THE MOTHERS OF THE ROUNDHOUSE.

THE OTHER LODGES WERE CALLED THE LODGES OF THE WARRIORS. IF YOUR MOTHER WAS THE FEMALE CHILD OF A WARRIOR, THEN YOU BELONG TO THE LODGES OF THE WARRIORS AND COULD NOT BE A CHIEF UNDER THE LAWS.

IT WAS ONLY AFTER THE TRAIL OF TEARS WHEN THEY GOT TO OKLAHOMA THAT THAY STARTED TO TRY TO FIT IN TO THE WHITE MANS WAYS.  THEY MADE NEW LAWS TO FIT IN WITH THE WHITE MAN’S WAY OF DOING THINGS. WE HAVE ALWAYS LIVED BY THE OLD LAWS.

IT’S THE WAY OUR FOREFATHERS LIVED FOR MANY HUNDREDS OF YEARS. WE NEVER SAW ANY REASON TO CHANGE WHAT WAS RIGHT FOR THEM THEN, IS STILL RIGHT FOR US NOW. IT’S WHAT MAKES US WHO WE ARE, WE ARE CHEROKEE & CREEK INDIANS, WE ARE NOT WHITE, BLACK, OR YELLOW SKIN, BUT IN OUR BLOOD WE ARE            INDIANS.  BUT WE ARE NOT JUST ANY INDIANS WE ARE CHICKAMAUGA            CHEROKEE & CREEK INDIANS.  HAVE GREAT PRIDE IN WHO YOU ARE AND WERE YOU CAME FROM.  WE NEVER LAID DOWN BEFORE ANY ONE.  WE HAVE ALWAYS STOOD OUR GROUND.

PRINCIPAL CHIEF JAMES BILLY CHANCE

INDIAN CREEK TRIBE CHICKAMAUGA CREEK & CHEROKEE NATION INC.

Forced Removal of the Creeks

The Creeks had occupied lands in the modern states of Alabama and Georgia for  hundreds of years, the people of the Creek Nation were driven west at bayonet point in 1836 and 1837.

The road that would lead to the Trail of Tears for the Creeks began 23 years earlier when a civil war erupted in the nation. Remembered today as the Creek War of 1813-1814, the conflict spilled over to the whites and ended when three American armies invaded the Creek lands. The destruction of the last major Creek fighting force at the Battle of  Horseshoe Bend in 1814 led to the Treaty of Fort Jackson, a settlement that stripped tens of thousands of acres of land from the Creek people.

Other treaties followed and by 1836 there was dramatic pressure on the Creek people to abandon the last of their Alabama homes and move to new lands in the Indian Territory of present-day Oklahoma. The Hitchiti and Yuchi branches of the nation resisted, sparking the Creek War of 1836.

After crushing this last major outbreak, U.S. soldiers and state militia troops rounded up thousands of Creek men, women and children.  These unfortunate individuals were herded into what would today be considered concentratin camps.  From these camps, they were driven west in large groups.

The Creek Trail of Tears was a route that included travel by both land and water. Its easternmost point was Fort Mitchell in
Alabama and it ended at Fort Gibson in Oklahoma, where the unfortunate people stopped briefly before crossing over to the
lands reserved for them in the West.

Thousands of men, women and children died on the trial and contemporary accounts describe how their bleached bones could be seen along the route for years to come. The wholesale removal of the Creeks was one of the greatest tragedies in American history. ( http://www.exploresouthernhistory.com/creektrail.html) 

The Trail of Tears, was painted by Robert Lindneux in 1942. It commemorates the suffering of the Cherokee people under forced removal. The painting erroneously portrays the Cherokees as possessing warm blankets, wagons, and horses. In reality, Native Americans were often allowed to carry little more than the clothes on their backs.

Chief Billy Bowleggs

Now for more of our History…..

Chief Doublehead went to a treaty meeting and was told that the lands of the Cherokee would be protected from the whites, but later the trading company from the Carolina moved into the Cherokee Land. People jumped to thinking he had sold them out, which he really did not, but once your dead it no longer matters, and over the past hundred years or so, there have been all kinds of stories told about him.  He was a true Chickamauga Cherokee and loved the land and his people.

     Many people misunderstand about what took place after Dragging Canoe died in 1792.  John Watt tried to make a treaty with the United States, but it did not work, and it ran against what Dragging Canoe wanted his people to do.  So the war and the fighting moved to the Chickamauga Towns in Northren Alabama, these Chickamauga Towns were where present day, Stevenson, Alabama is today and Bridgeport Ala., Trenton Ga. and made Raids on Shelby County, Ala., Muscle Shoals, Ala., Broken Arrow Town in Tallapoosa County,  The Indian Creek Village in Bullock County, and Eufaula Town in Tallapoosa County Alabama.

     We sent Warriors to aid Chief Red Eagle at Fort Mims where 498 whites were killed, they only had to walk in the front gate, because you could not close the gate, parts of the Chickamauga hitting other places in Alabama and Georgia, the ones from Ft. Mims went to Horseshoe Bend, not really uderstanding the force that General Andrew Jackson was to bring against them.  The biggest part there were woman and Children, to take on a force of over 6000 soldiers. It took 6000 soldiers to kill women and children. Davey told Andrew Jackson he did not come to Alabama to kill women and children after watching Jackson’s soldiers eating potatoes cooked in the oils from the bodies of the Indian women and children. He and Andrew Jackson never got along very well after that.

     But with a very large force of Soldiers moving into Alabama against the Chickamauga many moved into Florida.  Some went underground and some, under Ben F. Green, took the women, Children, the old and sick into Arkansas and Missouri were many are still today.

     The war in Florida went on until 1845 but by that time they started calling it the Seminole war, but it really was still just the Chickamauga war which was made up of the Chickamauga Cherokee, Creek, Shawnee, Choctow, Chickasaw, Blacks and some whites that supported the Chickamaugas.

We must always be on guard to show we did not die at Horseshoe Bend, our people live on, and still carry on the fight for our right to be who we are, we may have lost our lands, but we are still here, and will never lay down before anyone. 

 Principal Chief James Billy Chance

Chickamauga Timeline Massacre of Fort Mims
The Uneasy Dead - http://www.prophecykeepers.com/chickamaugacherokee/fortmims.html

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