Creek

Where was Hernando de Soto’s Guaxale?

Blue Ridge Mountains

Guaxale was a Native American village visited by the Hernando de Soto Expedition in late spring of 1541. De Soto and his small army of conquistadors explored what was to become the Southeastern United States between the years 1539 and 1543. Despite the fact that de Soto’s men only visited Guaxale briefly, and the village was not large, it’s location has been a major focus for scholars, studying the earliest Spanish explorers. In North Carolina one suggested location of Guaxale has even been a key element of tourism promotion.

Achese Moves to Florida

In 1690 Scottish traders built a fort and trading post on the plaza of the ancient Ocmulgee acropolis. This development influenced towns located on the Chattahoochee River that were members of the People of One Fire, to move to the Ocmulgee River. The English and Scottish traders called the Ocmulgee River, Ochesee Creek. They mispronounced Achese as Ochesee. From this geographical name, the Creek Indians get their modern identity. The “Creek” village that located closest to the fort was called Oka-mole-ke, which in a Georgia dialect of the Muskogee language means “swirling water.” English speakers mispronounced it as Ok-mul-gee and … Read more

Achese becomes the first capital of the Creek Confederacy

Achese apparently became the most important town in what archaeologists label the Lamar Culture. The Lamar Culture is named after the Lamar Village, which is the name given the site by archaeologists. Lamar Culture towns built smaller mounds that previous phases of the Creek Indian culture. The mounds were oval and faced west. The principal temple mounds of earlier towns were usually pentagonal and extremely large, some of the largest built in North America. By not devoting so much labor into mound-building, the Lamar Culture people were able to grow more food and obtain more game or fish. It was a very prosperous time in the region.

Achese: Birthplace of the Creek Confederacy

Artist rendition of the Town of Ochesee

The four versions of the de Soto Chronicles say very little about this American Indian town, whose ruins are now known as “the Lamar Village Component of Ocmulgee National Monument.” This is surprising, since the town figures prominently in Creek Indian history. In fact, the chroniclers could not even agree on the town’s name. The Gentleman of Elvas called the town, Achese. Other versions called it Ochese, Ichese and Uchese. English colonists, 200 years later, would call it Ochese. That name stuck.

Key to Campbell’s Abstract Index

The following index includes the names of the father and mother, as well as the name of the enrolled citizen. It is arranged alphabetically, both as to the sir and Christian names. We have been very careful in its preparation and have spent months in an effort to make it as complete and useful as possible. We do not expect that it, in connection with the Abstract, will answer all questions in every case. It will however be a very great help to those who will make a proper use of it, and use it in difficult cases in connection … Read more

Tobias Fitch’s Journal to the Creeks

The Creek Indians, at the time of Captain Fitch’s mission, were settled chiefly in the region extending west by north from the middle and upper Chattahoochee River to the west border of Alabama. To the north and northeast of them were the Cherokees; to the northwest, the Chickasaws; and to the west and southwest, the Choctaws. Those in the region of the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers were known as the Upper Creeks and those on the Chattahoochee as the Lower Creeks. The English at Charleston established a trade with the Creeks even earlier than with the Cherokees. But in 1714 … Read more

Muskogean Indians

Muskhogean Family, Muskhogean Stock, Muskhogean People, Muskhogean Indians. An important linguistic stock, comprising the Creeks, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, and other tribes. The name is an adjectival form of Muskogee, properly Măskóki (pl. Maskokalgi or Muscogulgee). Its derivation has been attributed to an Algonquian term signifying `swamp’ or `open marshy land’, but this is almost certainly incorrect. The Muskhogean tribes were confined chiefly to the Gulf states east of almost all of Mississippi and Alabama, and parts of Tennessee, Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina. According to a tradition held in common by most of their tribes, they had reached their historic seats from some starting point west of the Mississippi, usually placed, when localized at all, somewhere on the upper Red River. The greater part of the tribes of the stock are now on reservations in Oklahoma.

Black-Indian History

The first black slaves were introduced into the New World (1501-03) ostensibly to labor in the place of the Indians, who showed themselves ill-suited to enforced tasks and moreover were being exterminated in the Spanish colonies. The Indian-black inter-mixture has proceeded on a larger scale in South America, but not a little has also taken place in various parts of the northern continent. Wood (New England’s Prospect, 77, 1634) tells how some Indians of Massachusetts in 1633, coming across a black in the top of a tree were frightened, surmising that; ‘he was Abamacho, or the devil.” Nevertheless, inter-mixture of … Read more

Creek Indian Research

Creek Indians, A confederacy forming the largest division of the Muskhogean family.  They received their name form the English on account of the numerous streams in their country.  During early historic times the Creek occupied the greater portion of Alabama and Georgia, residing chiefly on Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers, the two largest tributaries of the Alabama river and on the Flint and Chattahoochee Rivers.  Read more about the Creek Tribe History. Creek Indian Biography Biography of General William Augustus Bowles Biography of General William Mcintosh Biography of General Alexander McGillivray Creek Indian Chiefs and Leaders Benjamin Hawkins (hosted at About … Read more

Koasati Tribe

Koasati Indians. An Upper Creek tribe speaking a dialect almost identical with Alibamu and evidently nothing more than a large division of that people. The name appears to contain the word for ‘cane’ or ‘reed,’ and Gatschet has suggested that it may signify ‘white cane.’ During the middle and latter part of the 18th century the Koasati lived, apparently in one principal village, on the right bank of Alabama river, 3 miles below the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa, where the modern town of Coosada, Alabama, perpetuates their name; but soon after west Florida was ceded to Great Britain, … Read more

Creek Indian Chiefs and Leaders

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Mary Bosomworth A noted Creek Indian woman, also known as Mary Mathews and Mary Musgrove, who created much trouble for the Georgia colonial government about 1752, nearly rousing the Creek confederacy to war against the English. She seems to have been of high standing among her own people, being closely related to leading chiefs both of the Upper and Lower Creeks, possessed of unusual intelligence and knowledge of English, for which reason, and to secure her good will, Oglethorpe, the founder of the colony, made her his interpreter and negotiator with the Indians at a salary of $500 per year. … Read more

Creek Tribe

Yoholo-Micco. A Creek Chief, from History of the Indian Tribes of North America

Creek Indians. A confederacy forming the largest division of the Muskhogean family. They received their name form the English on account of the numerous streams in their country. Where did the Creek Indian tribe live? During early historic times the Creek occupied the greater portion of Alabama and Georgia, residing chiefly on Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers, the two largest tributaries of the Alabama river and on the Flint and Chattahoochee Rivers. They claimed the territory on the east from the Savannah to St. Johns river and all the islands, thence to Apalachee Bay, and from this line northward to the … Read more

Creek Indian Towns and Villages

Below is a list of the Creek towns and villages. The smaller contained 20 to 30 cabins and the larger as many as 200. Tukabatchi, the largest, is said to have had 386 families in 1832. The towns were composed of irregular clusters of 4 to 8 houses, each cluster being occupied by the representatives of a clan. Upper Creek towns Abihka, Abikudshi, Alkehatchee, Anatichapko, Assilanapi, Atasi, Atchinaalgi, Atchinahatchi, Aucheucaula, Canjauda, Cayomulgi, Chakihlako, Chananagi, Chatoksofki, Chatukchufaula, Chiaha, Cholocco Litabixee, Conaliga, Coosahatchi, Cow Towns, Eufaula, Fusihatchi, Ghuaclahatche, Hatchichapa, Hillabi, Hlanudshiapala, Hlaphlako, Hlahlokalka, Huhliwahli, Ikanachaka, Ikanhatki, Imukfa, Ipisogi, Istapoga, Istudshilaika, Kailaidshi, Keroff, … Read more