The Seminoles of Florida

by Minnie Moore-Willson

By the courtesy of the American Bureau of Ethnology.

A SEMINOLE DWELLING

The life of the Seminole has been without any aid or instruction from the white man. He has adopted a few of the implements, weapons and utensils of civilization; but in no other way has he imitated his pale-faced brother. In the natural course of evolution he has made some progress; he has not degenerated.

Government reports show an annual appropriation of almost $7,000,000 for the Indian service; yet the Florida Indian has not received any part of it and without it he has shown a prosperous condition. The Smithsonian report, in comparing this interesting people with the native white settlers, says “that success in agriculture and domestic industries is not to be attributed wholly to the favorable character of the climate and soil; for, surrounded by the same conditions, many white men are lazy and improvident, while the Seminoles are industrious and frugal.”

President Cleveland in his message for 1895 pertinently says, “In these days, when white agriculturists and stock raisers of experience and intelligence find their lot a hard one, we ought not to expect Indians to support themselves on lands usually allotted to them.”

Years later, while the late lamented ex-President was fishing in New River at the edge of the Everglades, he said, “This country was made for the Seminoles and they should be permitted to live here undisturbed forever.”

Yet in Florida, we find the red race not only self-sustaining, but refusing any aid from our Government. Twenty years ago the Government appropriated $6,000, “to enable the Seminoles of Florida to obtain homesteads upon the public lands, and to establish themselves thereon.” A few of the Indians consented to accept; but the agent, on investigation, found that the lands which the Indians desired had passed into State or Improvement Companies. Today the Seminole is embittered; and, having been driven from one reservation to another, he refuses to exchange “Indian’s good lands for white man’s bad lands,” and in the bitterness of his conquered spirit, takes his dusky tribe to the dark shadows of the cypress swamps, where no pale-faced Government officer dare disturb him. Again Congress tacked an item to the appropriation act, giving $7,000 “for the support of the Seminoles of Florida, for the erection and furnishing of a school for teachers and the furnishing of seeds and implements for agricultural purposes.” In the winter of 1889, an agent inspired with confidence in himself, and with the hope of manipulating a $12,000 appropriation, came to Florida by appointment from Washington to renew the effort “to find suitable lands upon which to settle the Indians, and to furnish the seat of an educational establishment.” Securing an interpreter the agent visited the Indian camp. A council of chiefs listened quietly to his overtures, but with the same proud spirit of Osceola’s day, they refused firmly to accept any aid from a Government which they regard as having stolen from them the lands of their fathers. As the agent dwelt on the presents the red men of Florida should receive from the big white chief, Tiger Tail, a worthy descendant of the invulnerable Tustenuggee, replied, “You came from Great Chief? You say that Great Chief give Indian plow, wagon, hoe?” Then pointing in the direction of a small settlement of shiftless whites, he added, “He poor man, give ’em him. Indian no want ’em.” Delivering his speech with the spirit of an old Norse King, the chief strode majestically away, leaving the agent no nearer the fulfillment of his trust.

An Indian Agency was established, however, in Florida in 1892, located east of Fort Myers, and about thirty-five miles from the nearest Seminole camp. It was supported by a yearly appropriation of $6,000, the appropriation act reading, “For the support, civilization and instruction of the Seminole Indians in Florida $6,000, one-half of which sum may be expended at the discretion of the Secretary of Interior in procuring permanent homes for said Indians.”

The Government built a saw mill, and attempted a school, but the Indians, according to the statement of Col. C. C. Duncan, U. S. Indian Inspector at that time, refused to send their children to the school or to work at the saw mill. Many white traders who purchase hides, plumes and furs from the Indians, tell them that the establishment of an agency is for the purpose of rounding them up and sending them west. These Indians have been cheated and baffled so often by knaves, who go among them for that purpose, that they imagine all whites to be of the same character, and cannot tell whether a “talk” comes from their great white father at Washington, or whether some imposter be imposing upon them for his own gains; hence, the Seminole never removed his cloak of suspicion. Little progress was made and the work of the agency as a government institution was abandoned.

Once or twice it has been tried to locate the Seminoles, but when the chiefs examined the land, they found it “ho-lo-wa-gus” (no good) and they refused the offer.