RED EAGLE BEFORE FORT MIMS.
Now that it was determined that General Claiborne should not invade the Creek country and crush Weatherford before that chieftain's forces should be fully gathered and fully armed, there was nothing for General Claiborne to do but wait the attack of his Indian adversary with what patience he could, taking care to neglect no precaution which might help to secure safety. He visited all the forts one after another, inspected them, and gave minute and careful instructions for their strengthening, everywhere cautioning their commanders to beware of surprise, and to avoid the danger of falling into careless habits. He knew the Indians well, and knew that they would seek with great care to make their first attack unexpectedly, and also that they would bring as heavy a force as possible to bear upon the point of attack. He knew the temper of the militiamen too, and seems to have specially feared that they would be lulled into a dangerous feeling of security by delay and by repeated false alarms.
Against all of these dangers this thoroughly capable commander continually cautioned his subordinate officers to whom he committed the command of the several forts. Had his warnings been duly heeded, a result far different from that which we shall have to record would have followed.
Having delivered his orders, General Claiborne went to the most exposed point, a small fort about sixty miles further into the Indian country, confidently believing that Red Eagle would make his first attack there, with a view of freeing the country of white men before making a decided advance against any of the forts near the confluence of the two rivers. In this he erred, as the event showed, but the error was one which no foresight or judgment could have avoided. Red Eagle was a bold and a shrewd warrior, and when he was free to choose his time and place of attack, as he was at this time, it was simply impossible to conjecture with accuracy where or when he would strike. He was like the lightning, dealing his blows without a hint, in advance, of their object. General Claiborne having no means of ascertaining what his adversary would do, and no chance to guess, simply went to the front as a brave commander should.
Meantime Major Beasley soon began to neglect proper precautions. He left the new blockhouse and the new line of picketing unfinished, although he had idle men in plenty who could have completed them with very little effort. The accounts which have been given of the life in the fort indicate that the commander was utterly wanting in the first qualification of an officer for command—namely, a due regard for discipline. He had raw troops under his command—troops whose efficiency as soldiers would have been more than doubled during those days of inaction and waiting if daily or twice daily drills had been ordered and anything like discipline or military order maintained. That a commander intrusted with the charge of so important a fort, especially with the lives of so many helpless women and children committed to his care, should have neglected so good an opportunity to convert his raw recruits into drilled and disciplined soldiers, would scarcely be credible if the fact were not fully attested.
Instead of improving the precious days of waiting in this way, Major Beasley wholly relaxed the reins of discipline. The men gave themselves up to roystering, card-playing, and uproarious fun-making.
About this time a negro, whom Weatherford had captured near McGirth's plantation, escaped, and, making his way to Fort Mims, informed Major Beasley of the whereabouts of the Indian force, telling him also that the Indian chieftain had made careful inquiries about this particular fort, its strength, the number of persons in it, and other details, his anxiety about which indicated his purpose to attack the post. Major Beasley sent out scouting parties; but as they discovered no Indians in the neighborhood he appears immediately to have relapsed into his former state of listlessness. He did not respect his enemy, as Claiborne had so earnestly warned him to do. The men, calling the negro from McGirth's plantation a liar, returned to their frolics and their idleness.
Red Eagle, wiser than his enemy, respected him, and advanced so cautiously that he actually placed his army within striking distance of the fort without Beasley's knowledge, and concealed his men so adroitly that Beasley's scouting parties failed to discover them. Beasley was as brave a man as Red Eagle, but Red Eagle had the other qualities of a soldier—sagacity, caution, tireless watchfulness—which Beasley lacked; in a contest between the two as commanders, Red Eagle was Beasley's master. One day, while Red Eagle was thus hovering about the fort, watching it as a cat watches its prey, two negroes, who had been guarding some cattle, ran in great terror to the fort, and reported that they had seen Indians in the immediate neighborhood. Major Beasley at once sent a body of horsemen under command of Captain Middleton to ascertain the facts of the case. Captain Middleton, accompanied by the negroes, went to the spot where they said they had seen the savages; finding no Indians there, Captain Middleton, who appears to have thought that Indians are like trees, staying in one place, returned to the fort and reported that a false alarm had been given. The poor negroes were denounced as liars, and one of them was flogged for having given a false alarm. The other was saved for a while by the intercession of his master, but he was afterward arraigned again, his master's consent having been gained by Major Beasley's threat to expel him and his family from the fort if he persisted in his refusal; and it is upon record that when the fort was attacked the negro was standing tied, and awaiting his flogging.
This incident is mentioned here in illustration of the unaccountable folly of Major Beasley. The writers who have recorded the facts of this officer's behavior have touched them as lightly as possible, sparing him probably because he fought manfully and fell at his post at last; but it is impossible to regard his conduct with any thing like respect or even patience. His carelessness was a crime, and history must condemn it as such. Charged with the duty of defending an important post, he neglected the most essential measures of defence; intrusted with the lives of more than five hundred persons, he carelessly, criminally, permitted them to be butchered. We have already seen that he neglected discipline in the fort; he neglected also to surround the fort, as he should have done, with a cordon of picket-guards, who might have been so placed that ample warning would have been given of the approach of the enemy. Instead of that, he actually subjected the negroes who gave warning to ignominious punishment, and, most incredible thing of all, permitted the gates of the fort to stand open until the accumulation of sand at their base rendered it impossible to shut them promptly!
The alarm given by the negroes was given on the 29th day of August. The next morning the negro who had been flogged was again sent out to guard the cattle, and his companion was detained to receive his punishment.
Meantime Red Eagle lay within a few hundred yards of the fort, at the head of a thousand warriors. While Major Beasley was using his authority to compel the negro's master to consent to the infliction of the penalty, Red Eagle and his men were quietly watching the fort, looking in at the open gate and making ready to destroy the garrison. The negro who had been whipped again saw the Indians, he being where a picket-guard ought to have been; but he was afraid to report the fact lest he should be whipped again, and so between his fear of the Indians on the one hand and of Major Beasley's peculiar notions of discipline on the other, the poor fellow determined to flee to another fort, two or three miles east of Fort Mims. No alarm was given, therefore. Nobody in the fort suspected Red Eagle's presence or prepared to meet his assault. Nobody shut the gate. Nobody did any thing, in short, which ought to have been done, or any thing which indicated that this was a fort, or that its commander knew that a war existed or was likely to exist anywhere on earth. Worst of all, Red Eagle lay there watching his prey like a tiger, and seeing just how matters stood. The able commander of the red men knew his business and attended to it. His plan was formed, his men were ready, and he only awaited the coming of the right moment to spring upon his unsuspecting prey. It was nearly noon, and it was the most critical hour of the war.
