Stories Of Georgia

by Joel Chandler Harris

On his way to the Creek nation, he fell in with Leclerc Mil-fort, an adventurous Frenchman, who afterwards wrote a book of travels, and was made a general of brigade by Napoleon. Milfort married one of McGillivray's sisters, was made Tustenug-gee (or grand war chief), and was the right-hand man of his powerful brother-in-law. The first that was heard of McGillivray after he left Charleston, he was presiding at a grand national council of the Creeks at the town of Coweta on the Chattahoochee. When Alexander arrived among the Creeks, Colonel Tait of the British army was stationed on the Coosa, and he used all his tact and influence to prevail upon the young man to take the side of the English in the war that was then going on between the Colonies and the mother country. To this end Colonel Tait pursued McGillivray with attentions, loaded him with favors, and finally caused him to be given the rank and pay of a colonel in the army. The result was that the great chief was throughout the war devoted to the cause of the British. This would have been natural in any event, for his father was a stanch Royalist. During the war, McGillivray frequently acted in concert with the notorious Daniel McGirth, sometimes leading his Indians in person; but his main dependence was on his brother-in-law Milfort, who was possessed of the most daring spirit. McGillivray preferred to plan and engage in intrigue, which gave the remarkable powers of his mind full play.

There is no doubt that the authorities of Georgia made a great mistake, after the war, in neglecting to win the friendship of McGillivray. Such a course would have prevented much suffering and bloodshed. The father of the great chief, Lachlan McGillivray, was living in Savannah at the close of the Revolution; and when the British were compelled to evacuate the city, he scraped together an immense amount of money and other valuables, and sailed for Scotland. He abandoned his plantations and negroes, in the hope that his wife and three children might be permitted to inherit them; but the Georgians confiscated the whole of the valuable estate, and thus the Creek leader had another reason for entertaining a bitter prejudice against the Whigs.

The result was, that until the day of his death, which occurred in 1792, he succeeded in baffling all the efforts of the Federal and State authorities to come to an understanding with the Creek nation. He was perhaps the most accomplished diplomat in the country,—a veritable Talleyrand, able to cope with the most distinguished statesmen among the Americans. Such of his letters as have been preserved do not suffer by comparison with the writings of even the greatest of the Americans. The most of these depended on a stately and scholarly diction to attract attention. McGillivray paid little regard to diction; but his letters possess the distinction of style, and in this particular but one American writer can be compared to him,—Benjamin Franklin. There is, in fact, a modern touch and flavor about McGillivray's letters that even the writings of Franklin do not possess. He wrote thus to Andrew Pickens, who had addressed him on behalf of the United States Government:—

"When we found that the American independence was confirmed by the peace, we expected that the new government would soon have taken some steps to make up the differences that subsisted between them and the Indians during the war, to have taken them under their protection and confirmed to them their hunting grounds. Such a course would have reconciled the minds of the Indians, and secured the States their friendship, as they considered your people their natural allies. The Georgians, whose particular interest it was to conciliate the friendship of this nation, have acted in all respects to the contrary. I am sorry to observe that violence and prejudice have taken the place of good policy and reason in all their proceedings with us. They attempted to avail themselves of our supposed distressed situation. Their talks to us breathed nothing but vengeance, and, being entirely possessed with the idea that we were wholly at their mercy, they never once reflected that colonies of a powerful monarch were nearly surrounding us, to whom, in any extremity, we might apply for succor and protection, and who, to answer some ends of their policy, might grant it to us. However, we yet deferred any such proceeding, still expecting that we could bring them to a true sense of their interest; but still finding no alteration in their conduct towards us, we sought the protection of Spain, and treaties of friendship and alliance were mutually entered into; they guaranteeing our hunting grounds and territory, and granting us a free trade in the ports of the Floridas.

"How the boundary and limits between the Spaniards and the States will be determined, a little time will show, as I believe that matter is now on foot. However, we know our limits and the extent of our hunting grounds. As a free nation, we have applied, as we had a right to do, for protection, and obtained it. We shall pay no attention to any limits that may prejudice our claims, that were drawn by an American and confirmed by a British negotiator. Yet, notwithstanding we have been obliged to adopt these measures for our preservation, and from real necessity, we sincerely wish to have it in our power to be on the same footing with the States as before the late unhappy war, to effect which is entirely in your power. We want nothing from you but justice. We want our hunting grounds preserved from encroachments. They have been ours from the beginning of time, and I trust that, with the assistance of our friends, we shall be able to maintain them against every attempt to take them from us."

Undoubtedly McGillivray was unscrupulous, and the probability is that he was mercenary; but such charges may be brought against some of the ablest men who have figured in history. When all is said, the fact remains that Alexander McGillivray was one of the most accomplished and ingenious of the politicians of his time. If he had been on the side of the whites, and had managed their interests with the skill and ability which he displayed in behalf of the Creeks, history would have written him down as a great statesman. It was only by an accidental suit at law that some of his most characteristic letters were brought to light; but those that have been rescued from oblivion show that in wielding the pen he was more than a match for the many able men who corresponded with him.

In September, 1789, Washington sent General Andrew Pickens, with three other commissioners, to treat with McGillivray. They found the great chief at Rock Landing, on the Oconee, with two thousand Creek warriors, where he had been encamped more than a week. The Indian camp was on the western bank of the river. The commissioners pitched their tents on the eastern bank. They were received by McGillivray with great courtesy. Everything progressed favorably, so much so that the commissioners read to the assembled chiefs a copy of the treaty which they had drawn up. This treaty was all in favor of the whites. The Indians were offered no equivalent for the terms proposed. It is worthy of note that Andrew Pickens wholly dissented from the terms of the proposed treaty. He knew that the Indians would have to be paid for the valuable land which the Georgians were then cultivating in the neighborhood of the Oconee, and the commissioners had been advised by the Federal authorities to pay for these lands. McGillivray broke up his encampment and retired to the Ocmulgee, nor could he be induced at that time to renew the negotiations.

President Washington was urged by the Georgia delegation in Congress to declare war against the Creeks, and this indeed was his first impulse; but when he found, from a careful estimate, that the expenses of such a war would amount to fifteen millions of dollars, he prudently gave up the idea. He took the matter in hand in a more conservative way. He appointed Colonel Marinus Willett a secret agent to visit Mc-Gillivray, and urge him to visit President Washington in New York. In this Colonel Willett was entirely successful. Accompanied by McGillivray and a number of the leading men of the Creeks, Willett set out on his return journey. At Guilford Court House, McGillivray attracted great attention on account of a very pathetic incident that occurred there some years before. A man named Brown had been killed by the Creeks, and his wife and children captured and made slaves. Their unfortunate condition came to the notice of Alexander McGillivray, and, as he had done in the case of many other captive white women and children, he paid their ransom and redeemed them from slavery. He maintained them at his house for over a year, and finally assisted them to return to their friends. Mrs. Brown, hearing that McGillivray had arrived, went to see him. At that moment he was in the courthouse, the center of a large assembly of ladies and gentlemen who had gathered to pay their respects. But this was no obstacle to Mrs. Brown. She rushed through the assembly, and, in a flood of tears, expressed her gratitude to him for saving her life and the lives of her children. She also expressed her strong admiration for his character.

In due course, McGillivray arrived in New York, where he was treated with great consideration. He had long private conferences with Washington and other officials of the government, and was finally induced to make a treaty which was satisfactory to the United States, and would have been satisfactory to Georgia if it had been carried out, but in fact the terms of it were never fulfilled. While in New York, McGillivray made a secret treaty with Washington, a fact that was not discovered for many years. It provided, that after two years from date (August, 1790) the commerce of the Creek nation should be carried on through the ports of the United States, and in the mean time through the present channels; that a number of chiefs of the Creeks and of the Seminole nation should be paid one hundred dollars a year each, and be furnished with handsome medals; that the United States should feed, clothe, and educate Creek youth at the North, not exceeding five at one time; and that Alexander McGillivray should be constituted agent of the United States, with the rank of brigadier general, and the pay of twelve hundred dollars a year. In 1792, McGillivray was a British colonel, an American brigadier general, an agent of the United States, and an agent of Spain. This extraordinary man died in Pensacola on the 17th of February, having been seized with a fatal illness while returning from one of his plantations on Little River in Putnam or Baldwin.

Another famous Creek was General William Mcintosh, a half-breed. His father was Captain William Mcintosh, and his mother was an Indian of unmixed blood. He was not so brilliant a man intellectually as McGillivray; but he had a native force of character, and an inborn sense of justice, that McGillivray seems to have been a stranger to. History tells us little enough of Mcintosh, but that little is all to his credit. Almost from the days of Oglethorpe, there were two parties in the Creek nation, and the issue on which they divided was the treatment that should be accorded to the whites. The party division was geographical as well as political. The Upper Creeks, living upon the Alabama, Coosa, and Tallapoosa rivers, were not present at the Coweta town when James Oglethorpe treated with the Lower Creeks in August, 1730. At that time they were under the influence of the French, and afterwards they sought the protection of the Spaniards. They refused to recognize any of the treaties made by the Lower Creeks with the English, and the great body of them remained to the end the bitter enemies of the Georgians. On the other hand, the majority of the Lower Creeks were friendly with the English from the days of Oglethorpe; and that friendship continued, with but few interruptions, down to the days of Governor Troup.