6. Choctaw-Muskoghe group and neighbouring tribes.
Adair, speaking of the Katahba, Cherokee, Muskoghe, Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians, states that they burned their prisoners. Only if a prisoner succeeded in escaping to the house of the high-priest or some other place of refuge, he was not burned; but what his fate was in such a case we are not told. Young prisoners were not killed; but it is not stated what became of them. If warriors had offended a neighbouring tribe, and the chiefs wished to prevent war, they sacrificed either one of the offenders belonging to a weak family or some unfortunate prisoner, who had been incorporated into a declining tribe[68]. [[57]]The last sentence seems to show, that the custom of adopting prisoners prevailed here too. At any rate, no mention is made of slaves.
Rochefort remarks that among the Apalaches (who, according to Roosevelt, included the Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws, Creeks and Seminoles[69]) an enemy who surrendered during the fight, was taken to the conqueror’s home with his wife and children, held in an honourable freedom and treated with as much leniency and care as their own servants[70]. Whether such persons were slaves does not clearly appear from this statement. But Adair’s record tends to prove that slavery did not exist, at least as far as the three former divisions of the Apalaches are concerned.
Loskiel relates that a prisoner was once condemned to death by the Cherokees. He had already been tied to the stake, when a Cherokee woman arrived. She brought a basketful of commodities, which she deposed at the feet of the man to whom the prisoner belonged, and bade him leave this prisoner to her, a childless widow, who wanted to adopt him as a son. This was done[71].
Bartram tells us that the Creeks formerly tortured their captives to death[72].
The Seminoles, too, according to Roosevelt, used to burn their prisoners[73].
From all the foregoing we may safely infer that slavery did not exist in the Apalache group.
Natchez warriors delivered their captives to the relations of those who had fallen in battle. The captives were always burned[74].
Bossu speaks of slaves among the Attakapas; but it does not appear from his notes whether they made slaves for their own use or for sale abroad[75].
Strachey describes the inhabitants of Virginia (several tribes). He makes no mention of slaves. It is stated in his account, that children and foreigners were sacrificed[76]; if there had been slaves, these probably would in the first place have been [[58]]the victims. One of the objects of their wars was to capture women and children. Before the commencement of the battle it was announced that the conquered “upon their submission or comyng in, though two daies after, should live, but their wives and childrene should be prize for the conquerors”[77]. Another ancient writer gives a different description of the fate of their conquered enemies: “when they gain a victory, they spare neither men, nor women, nor children, in order to render revenge impossible”[78]. We cannot arrive at a definite conclusion here.