Tohome Tribe

Tohome Indains. A former Muskhogean tribe of the Gulf coast, speaking a dialect of Choctaw. Their cabins stood 8 leagues north of the French settlement at Mobile, on the west side of Mobile river.

The Meeting in 1811 of Tecumseh and Apushamatahah

Peter Perkins Pitchlynn was the Choctaw Principal Chief from 1864-1866

The meeting in 1811, of Tecumseh, the mighty Shawnee, with Apushamatahah, the intrepid Choctaw. I will here give a true narrative of an incident in the life of the great and noble Choctaw chief, Apushamatahah, as related by Colonel John Pitchlynn, a white man of sterling integrity, and who acted for many years as interpreter to the Choctaws for the United States Government, and who was an eye-witness to the thrilling scene, a similar one, never before nor afterwards befell the lot of a white man to witness, except that of Sam Dale, the great scout of General Andrew Jackson, … Read more

Biography of Joseph Raymond Hampson

JOSEPH RAYMOND HAMPSON – The work in which Joseph Raymond Hampson is engaged is eminently vital and important to the welfare of the people and the progress of the civic body. Mr. Hampson has had wide experience in this general field and has executed many large and important contracts, both for private individuals and for the United States Government. His outstanding success in these various achievements has given his name unusual recognition for a man still looking forward to many years of useful and progressive activity. He is a son of Louis and Viola (Lasher) Hampson, former residents of New … Read more

Gov. Perier and Bienville

Bienville

While the English east of the Alleghany mountains were adopting active, but secret measures, to stop the progress of French colonization on the banks of the Mississippi river, their traders were meeting the French traders every where among the southern Indians, and their mutual animosity and competition causing frequent quarrels, oft terminating in collisions, in which the unfortunate Indians always became involved on the one or the other side. But the French, at an; early day had excited the animosity of the Chickasaws by failing to protect a band of their warriors who had solicited an escort from Mobile to … Read more

Journey of Bartram Through Alabama

History of Alabama and incidentally of Georgia and Mississippi, from the earliest period

William Bartram, the botanist, passed through the Creek nation, and went from thence to Mobile. He found that that town extended back from the river nearly half a mile. Some of the houses were vacant, and others were in ruins. Yet a few good buildings were inhabited by the French gentlemen, and others by refined emigrants of Ireland, Scotland, England, and the Northern British Colonies. The Indian trade was under management of Messrs. Swanson and McGillivray. They conducted an extensive commerce with the Chickasaws, Choctaws, and Creeks. Their buildings were commodious, and well arranged for that purpose. The principal houses … Read more

Prominent White Men among the Chickasaws

Holmes Colbert

At an early day a few white men of culture and of good morals, fascinated with the wild and romantic freedom and simplicity of the Chickasaw life, cast their lot among that brave and patriotic nation of people. I read an article published in Mississippi a few years ago, which stated that a man by the name of McIntosh, commissioned by British authorities to visit the Chickasaw Nation and endeavor to keep up its ancient hostility to the French, was so delighted with the customs and manners of that brave, free and hospitable people that, after the accomplishment of his mission, he … Read more

Slave Narrative of Charity Anderson

Charity Anderson, age 101

Charity Anderson, 101 years old, lived near Mobile, Alabama at the time she was interviewed. She was born at Belle’s Landing, in Monroe County, Alabama. Her master operated a wood yard that supplied fuel to river boats. Anderson was a house slave. She recalls that her master treated all his slaves well, but she also remembered seeing slaves torn up by dogs and whipped unmercifully.

Slave Narrative of Aunt Betty Cofer

Interviewer: Esther S. Pinnix Person Interviewed: Betty Cofer Location: North Carolina Date of Birth: 1856 Age: 81 Negro Folk Lore Of The Piedmont. Sources of Information: Aunt Betty Cofer–ex-slave of Dr. Beverly Jones The ranks of negro ex-slaves are rapidly thinning out, but, scattered here and there among the ante-bellum families of the South, may be found a few of these picturesque old characters. Three miles north of Bethania, the second oldest settlement of the “Unitas Fratrum” in Wachovia, lies the 1500 acre Jones plantation. It has been owned for several generations by the one family, descendants of Abraham Conrad. … Read more

Mobile Tribe and Tohome Tribe

So far as our information goes, the first white men to have dealings with the Indians of Mobile Bay were probably the Spaniards under Pinedo. Pinedo was sent out by Garay, governor of Jamaica, in the year 1519, to explore toward the north, and he appears to have coasted along the northern shore of the Gulf of Mexico from the peninsula of Florida to Panuco. In the description of this voyage in the Letters Patent we read that after having covered the entire distance “they then turned back with the said ships, and entered a river which was found to … Read more

The Discovery Of This Continent, it’s Results To The Natives

Columbus Landing on Hispaniola

In the year 1470, there lived in Lisbon, a town in Portugal, a man by the name of Christopher Columbus, who there married Dona Felipa, the daughter of Bartolome Monis De Palestrello, an Italian (then deceased), who had arisen to great celebrity as a navigator. Dona Felipa was the idol of her doting father, and often accompanied him in his many voyages, in which she soon equally shared with him his love of adventure, and thus became to him a treasure indeed not only as a companion but as a helper; for she drew his maps and geographical charts, and also … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Judge Mark W. Delahay

Judge Mark W. Delahay, of Leavenworth, a pioneer newspaper man of that place, founder of the first paper at Wyandotte, a father of the territory and the state and an honored Federal judge during the later period of his life, was a native of Maryland. Although his father was a slaveholder, his maternal ancestors were members of the Society of Friends, and he was averse to buying and selling slaves. Soon after attaining his majority he located in Illinois, where he wrote for different journals; studied law, and was admitted to the bar. In 1853 he went to Mobile, Alabama, … Read more

Chatot Indians

Chatot Tribe. Meaning unknown, but the forms of this word greatly resemble the synonyms of the name Choctaw. Chatot Connections. The language spoken by this tribe belonged, undoubtedly, to the southern division of the Muskhogean stock. Chatot Location. West of Apalachicola River, perhaps near the middle course of the Chipola. (See also Georgia, Alabama, and Louisiana). Chatot Villages. From the names of two Spanish missions among them it would appear that there were at least two towns in early times, one called Chacato, after the name of the tribe, and the other Tolentino. Chatot History. The Chatot are first mentioned … Read more

Biography of Quitman U. Newell, M. D.

Dr. Quitman U. Newell, gynecologist and obstetrician, has followed the tendency of the age. toward specialization and in this branch of the profession has developed wide capability and power, bringing him to a prominent position in the ranks of the medical fraternity in St. Louis. He was born in Whistler, Mobile county, Alabama, June 14, 1886, and is a son of William H. and Minerva A. (Thompson) Newell. The father, a native of Louisiana, belonged to one of the old families of New York of Scotch-Irish descent. He became a pattern-maker by trade and had long followed that pursuit. His … Read more

Tawasa Tribe and Pawokti Tribe

The first reference to the Tawasa is by Ranjel and the Fidalgo of Elvas. Tawasa is mentioned as one of the towns at which the De Soto expedition stopped and is placed between Ulibahali (Holiwa-hali) and Talisi (Tulsa). It is called by Ranjel Tuasi, by Elvas Toasi. From this location it is evident that the tribe, or part of it, was at that time among the Upper Creeks, but from Lamhatty’s narrative it appears they had moved southeast before 1706 and settled some where between Apalachicola and Choctawhatchee Rivers. A Spanish letter of 1686 refers to the tribe in one place … Read more

Biographical Sketch of Starke Seibert Saffold

Saffold, Starke Seibert; insurance; born, Mobile, Ala., March 15, 1852; son of Judge Milton J. and Martha Harrison Saffold; educated by private instructor, Graylock and Emerson Institutes; married, Philadelphia, Pa., Sept. 1, 1881, Harriet Webb; issue, one daughter, Mrs. Wm. C. Young, of Texas, and one son, J. Webb Saffold, Cleveland; has occupied official position in eight or ten professional and business concerns, from secretary to president; from which since retired; gen. agt., since 1886, Provident Life & Trust Co.; pres. Acme Eng. & Stamps Co.; director Chippewa Lake Co.; Los Seros Copper Co.; Gold Bug Mining Co.; Ohio Lemon … Read more

Memoirs of the LeFlore Family

The Old Farm House: The Pioneer Home of a Choctaw Chief, Leflore, and of the Oak Hill School

The Cravat families of Choctaws are the descendants of John Cravat, a Frenchman, who came among the Choctaws at an early day, and was adopted among them by marriage. He had two daughters by his Choctaw wife, Nancy and Rebecca, both of whom became the wives of Louis LeFlore. His Choctaw wife dying he married a Chickasaw woman, by whom he had four sons, Thomas, Jefferson, William and Charles, and one daughter, Elsie, who married- a white man by the name of Daniel Harris, and who became the parents of Col. J. D. Harris, whose first wife was Catharine Nail, the … Read more

Mound Builders

Bottle Creek Mounds

The types of the human skulls taken from those ancient mounds said to have been erected by a prehistoric race, and now called “Mound Builders” a race claimed to be far superior to our Indians are characteristic, not only of the ancient Mexicans, Peruvians and other ancient tribes of South America, but also of the ancient Natchez, Muskogee’s, Choctaws, Chickasaws, Cherokees, Seminoles, Yamases and others of the North American continent. And it is a conceded fact that all Indians ever found in North and South America possess many common features. I have seen the native Indians of Mexico, Arizona and … Read more

Mobile Indians

Mobile Tribe: Meaning unknown, but Halbert (1901) suggests that it may be from Choctaw moeli, “to paddle,” since Mobile is pronounced moila by the Indians. It is the Mabila, Mauilla, Mavila, or Mauvila of the De Soto chroniclers. Mobile Connections. The language of the tribe was closely connected with that of the Choctaw and gave its name to a trade jargon based upon Choctaw or Chickasaw. Mobile Location. When the French settled the seacoast of Alabama the Mobile were living on the west side of Mobile River a few miles below the junction of the Alabama and Tombigbee. Mobile History. … Read more

The French In Alabama And Mississippi

History of Alabama and incidentally of Georgia and Mississippi, from the earliest period

After the Spanish invasion of De Soto, to which allusion has so often been made, our soil remained untrodden by European feet for nearly a century and a half. At the end of that long and dark period it became connected with the history of the distant dark period it became connected with the history of the distant French possessions of Canada, which were contemporaneous with the oldest English colonies in America. For more than fifty years the French fur traders of Canada, associated with the enterprising Jesuit Fathers, had continued to advance southwestward upon the great lakes, discovering new … Read more

The Biloxi and Pascagoulas

The French in making their voyages of discovery along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico in 1712, under the command of Iberville, anchored one evening near an island (now known as Ship Island) which they discovered to be intersected with lagoons and inhabited by a strange and peculiar animal seemingly to hold the medium between the fox and cat, and they give it the name Cat Island, by which it is still known; thence they passed over the main land, where they discovered a tribe of Indians called Biloxi, among whom they afterwards located a town and gave it the name Biloxi … Read more