The Exiles of Florida / or, The crimes committed by our government against the Maroons, who fled from South Carolina and other slave states, seeking protection under Spanish laws.

by Joshua R. Giddings

“Very, &c., C. A. HARRIS.

Capt. WM. ARMSTRONG,
Washington.”

One feature in these communications stands out prominently to the view of the reader: the number of these victims appears to have undergone constant diminution. General Jessup reported the number sent to Fort Pike at ninety. In his previous letter, addressed to the Secretary of War, Commissioner Harris states the number at eighty; and in this communication, written four days subsequently, he states the number to be between sixty and seventy; while the official registry shows there was one hundred and three—of whom some, however, undoubtedly died.

If the honorable Secretary of War intended these people should be delivered over to the Creek Indians as their property, it would be difficult to understand by what law he should himself attempt to control them, in the subsequent disposition of their legalized chattels, or by what authority he should object to their going West.

It will however be seen that one point yet remained undecided. The negroes were not to be delivered until it was ascertained that the Creeks had not received the eight thousand dollars, agreeably to the order of General Jessup in September, 1837.

Fortunately, a Lieutenant Sloan, who had acted as a disbursing agent of the United States, was at that precise time in Washington City. He stated to the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, in a letter dated May sixth, being the day after this decision of the Secretary of War, assuring him that he had learned from Lieutenant Searle himself that the Indians refused to accept the eight thousand dollars for their interest in the negroes. These statements constituted a series of supposed facts, which appears to have been regarded as necessary to authorize the subsequent proceedings.

This evidence was, accordingly, deemed satisfactory; and the Creek Indians were now declared to be the owners of these ninety Exiles, under the original contract made between them and General Jessup, in 1836: thus abrogating the order of General Jessup, No. 175, and setting aside the approval of that order by the Department of War itself—which was dated the seventh of October, 1837—leaving the United States to sustain the loss incurred by feeding and clothing the prisoners, and guarding them for thirteen months.

At this time a slave-dealer by the name of James C. Watson, said to reside in Georgia, happened to be also at the seat of Government, as was common for Southern gentlemen during the sessions of Congress. To this man the officers of Government now applied for aid, in extricating themselves from the difficulty into which they had been brought by this slave-dealing transaction. Even the Secretary of War is said to have encouraged Watson to purchase those negroes of the Creek Indians.[117] By request of these public functionaries, and at their instance, Mr. Watson declares he was induced to purchase the negroes, and to give between fourteen and fifteen thousand dollars for them.[118] It was perhaps the heaviest purchase of slaves made in the city of Washington during that year, and certainly the most dignified transaction in human flesh that ever took place at the capital of our nation, or of any other civilized people; inasmuch as the high officers of this enlightened and Christian confederation of States constituted a negotiating party to this important sale of human beings.

The purchase appears to have taken place on the seventh of May; and Watson, being unable to go immediately to New Orleans, authorized his brother-in-law, Nathaniel F. Collins of Alabama, as his agent and attorney, to repair to that city and take possession of the prisoners. Yet the whole business appears to have been carried on in the name of the Creek Indians.

On the eighth of May, five persons, styling themselves “chiefs, head-men and delegates of the Creek Tribe of Indians,” filed with the Commissioner of Indian Affairs a request, stating that they had appointed Nathaniel F. Collins, Esq., of Alabama, their agent and attorney, to demand and receive from General Jessup the negro slaves which the Creek warriors had captured in Florida, under their agreement with that officer, made in September, 1836, and requesting the Department to furnish the proper order for obtaining possession of the slaves from the officer having them in charge. This request was communicated to the Secretary of War the next day, by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, and constitutes a part of the record; and, coming from that department of government most implicated in this slave-dealing transaction, we place it before the reader: