COMMENCEMENT OF THE SECOND SEMINOLE WAR.
The number of Exiles in Florida—Spanish Maroons—Seminole Slaves—Osceola—His Parentage—His Character—His Wife—Her Parentage and sad Fate—Imprisonment of Osceola—His Release—He swears Vengeance against Mr. Thompson—Decree of General Council—Fate of Charley E. Mathler—Osceola and followers seek the life of Thompson—Lay in wait near Fort King—Fate of Mr. Thompson and Lieut. Smith—Of the Sutler and his Clerks—General Clinch orders Major Dade to Fort King—The Major seeks a faithful Guide—Engages the Services of Louis, a Slave—His Learning and Character—He meditates the Massacre of Dade and his men—Councils with the Exiles—Arranges the plan of Massacre, and informs them of the time—Exiles and Indians rendezvous in Wahoo Swamp—Dade’s Approach—The preparation—The Massacre—Osceola and Louis—The Exiles and Indians again meet in the Swamp for the night—Digression—Incidents.
The number of Exiles at the commencement of the Second Seminole War, has been variously estimated. Probably their whole number, including women and children, was not less than twelve hundred. To these may be added the slaves belonging to the Seminoles, estimated at two hundred, making a population of fourteen hundred blacks. Most of the slaves lived with the Exiles, separate and apart from their masters, paying a certain quantity of vegetables annually, for the partial freedom which they enjoyed. There were many half-breeds, however, some of whom resided with the Indians, and others were located with the Exiles.
The Spanish population called the Exiles “Maroons,” after a class of free negroes who inhabit the mountains of Cuba, Jamaica, and other West Indian islands. Indeed, some of the Maroons of Cuba appear to have found their way to Florida,[78] and many of the Exiles passed from that Territory to the West India Islands. Many officers of Government appear to have known or cared little for these people, while others manifested much intelligence and humanity in regard to them. We have already noticed the efforts of Mr. Thompson, the Indian Agent, of Colonel Clinch, and of Colonel Eaton, in behalf of the Exiles, who had long resided in Florida.
During the summer, the Indians committed various depredations upon the white people, such as stealing horses and killing cattle; but the first open hostilities occurred on the twenty-eighth of December, when two important and bloody tragedies took place, which left the country no longer in doubt as to the actual existence of war.
A young and gallant warrior, named Osceola, was the principal actor in one of these scenes. He was the son of an Indian trader, a white man, named Powell. His mother was the daughter of a Seminole chief.
He had recently married a woman said to have been beautiful. She was the daughter of a chief who had married one of the Exiles; but as all colored people by slaveholding laws are said to follow the condition of the mother, she was called an African slave. Osceola was proud of his ancestry. He hated slavery, and those who practiced the holding of slaves, with a bitterness that is but little understood by those who have never witnessed its revolting crimes.
He visited Fort King, in company with his wife and a few friends, for the purpose of trading. Mr. Thompson, the Agent, was present, and, while engaged in business, the wife of Osceola was seized as a slave. Evidently having negro blood in her veins, the law pronounced her a slave; and, as no other person could show title to her, the pirate who had got possession of her body, was supposed of course to be her owner.
As.se.he.ho.lar. (known as Osceola, or Powell.)
As.se.he.ho.lar. (known as Osceola, or Powell.)
Osceola became frantic with rage, but was instantly seized and placed in irons, while his wife was hurried away to slaveholding pollution.[79] He remained six days in irons, when, General Thompson says, he became penitent, and was released.
From the moment when this outrage was committed, the Florida War may be regarded as commenced. Osceola swore vengeance upon Thompson, and those who assisted in the perpetration of this indignity upon himself, as well as upon his wife, and upon our common humanity.
The Exiles endeavored to stimulate the Indians to deeds of valor. In general council, they decreed that the first Seminole who should make any movement preparatory to emigration, should suffer death. Charley E. Mathler, a respected chief, soon after fell a victim to this decree. Osceola commanded the party who slew him. He had sold a portion of his cattle to the whites, for which he had received pay in gold. This money was found upon his person when he fell. Osceola forbade any one touching the gold, saying it was the price of the red man’s blood, and with his own hands he scattered it in different directions as far as he was able to throw it.
But his chief object appeared to have been the death of General Thompson. Other Indians and Exiles were preparing for other important operations; but Osceola seemed intent, his whole soul was absorbed, in devising some plan by which he could safely reach Mr. Thompson, who was the object of his vengeance. He, or some of his friends, kept constant watch on the movements of Thompson, who was unconscious of the danger to which he was exposed. Osceola, steady to his purpose, refused to be diverted from this favorite object. Thompson was at Fort King, and there were but few troops to protect that fortress. But Indians seldom attempt an escalade, and Osceola sought an opportunity to take it by surprise. With some twenty followers, he lay secreted near the fort for days and weeks, determined to find some opportunity to enter by the open gate, when the troops should be off their guard.
Near the close of December, a runner brought him information that Major Dade, with his command, was to leave Fort Brooke on the twenty-fifth of that month, and that those who intended to share in the attack upon that regiment, must be at the great “Wahoo Swamp,” by the evening of the twenty-seventh. This had no effect whatever upon Osceola. No circumstance could withdraw him from the bloody purpose which filled his soul.
On the twenty-eighth, in the afternoon, as he and his followers lay near the road leading from the fort to the house of the sutler, which was nearly a mile distant, they saw Mr. Thompson and a friend approaching. That gentleman and his companions had dined, and, on taking their cigars, he and Lieut. Smith, of the Second Artillery, had sallied forth for a walk, and to enjoy conversation by themselves.
At a signal given by Osceola, the Indians fired. Thompson fell, pierced by fourteen balls; Smith received about as many.[80] The shrill war-whoop followed the sound of the rifles, and alarmed the people at the fort. The Indians immediately scalped their victims, and then hastened to the house, where Mr. Rogers, the sutler, and two clerks, were at dinner. These three persons were instantly massacred and scalped. The Indians took as many valuable goods as they could carry, and set fire to the building. The smoke gave notice to those in the fort of the fate that had befallen the sutler and his clerks. But the condition in which the commandant found his troops, forbade his sending out any considerable force to ascertain the fate of Thompson and his companion. Near nightfall, a few daring spirits proceeded up the road to the hommock, and brought the bodies to the fort; but Osceola and his followers had hastened their flight, not from fear of the troops, but with the hope of joining their companions at Wahoo in time to engage in scenes of more general interest.
General Clinch had foreseen that hostilities were unavoidable, and, as early as the fifteenth of November, had sought to increase the number of troops at Fort King by such reinforcements as could be spared from other stations. For this purpose, he ordered Major Dade, then at Fort Brooke, near Tampa Bay, to prepare his command for a march to Fort King. The distance was one hundred and thirty miles, through an unsettled forest, much diversified with swamps, lakes and hommocks. No officer nor soldier could be found who was acquainted with the route, and a guide was indispensable: yet men competent to the discharge of so important a trust were rarely to be found, for the lives of the regiment might depend upon the intelligence and fidelity of their conductor.
At this point in our history, even before the commencement of general hostilities, we are led to the acquaintance of one of the most romantic characters who bore part in the stirring scenes of that day. On making inquiry for a suitable guide, the attention of Major Dade was directed to a colored man named Louis. He was the slave of one of the old and respectable Spanish families, named Pacheco, who resided in the vicinity of Fort Brooke. Major Dade applied to the master, Antonio Pacheco, for information concerning his slave, and was assured that Louis, then near thirty years of age, was one of the most faithful, intelligent, and trustworthy men he had ever known. He had also been well bred, was polite, accomplished, and learned. He read, wrote, and spoke, with facility, the Spanish, French, and English languages, and spoke the Indian, and was perfectly familiar with the route to Fort King, having frequently traveled it.
Pleased with the character and appearance of Louis, Major Dade entered into an agreement with the master for his services in conducting the troops through the forest to Fort King, at the rate of twenty-five dollars per month, and stated the time at which the service was to commence. The contract was made in the presence of Louis, who listened attentively to the whole arrangement, to which he of course gave his own consent.
Louis Pacheco was too enlightened to smother the better sympathies of the human heart. He was well informed, and understood the efforts that were making to re?nslave his brethren, the Exiles. With many of them he had long been acquainted; he had witnessed the persecutions to which they had been subjected, the outrages heaped upon them, and now saw clearly the intention to subject them to slavery among the Creeks. He had spent his own life thus far in servitude, and, although his condition was regarded with envy by the plantation servants around him, he yet sighed for freedom.
Blessed with an intellect of no ordinary mould, he reflected deeply upon his condition, and determined upon his course. Hostilities had not yet commenced, and he was in the daily habit of conversing with Indians, and often with Exiles. He was well acquainted with the character of each, and knew the men to whom he could communicate important information with safety. To a few of the Exiles, men of integrity and boldness, he imparted the facts that Dade, with his troops, would leave Fort Brooke about the twenty-fifth of December, for Fort King, and that he, Louis, was to act as their guide; that he would conduct them by the trail leading near the Great Wahoo Swamp, and pointed out the proper place for an attack.[81]
This information was soon made known to the leading and active Exiles, and to a few of the Seminole chiefs and warriors. The Exiles, conscious that the war was to be waged on their account, were anxious to give their friends some suitable manifestation of their prowess. They desired as many of the Exiles capable of bearing arms as could assemble at a certain point in the Great Wahoo Swamp, to meet them there as early as the twenty-seventh of December, armed, and prepared to commence the war by a proper demonstration of their gallantry.
Information was sent to Osceola and his followers, inviting them to be present. They were lying secreted near Fort King, too intent upon the death of Thompson to turn their eyes for a moment from their victim. However, many other chiefs and warriors assembled at the time and place designated, in order to witness what they supposed would be the first scene in the great drama about to be acted. Their spies detached for that purpose, arrived at their rendezvous almost hourly, bringing information of the commencement of Dade’s march, the number of men forming his battalion, and their places of encampment each night.
In the evening of the twenty-seventh, their patrols brought word that Dade and his men had arrived within three miles of the point at which they intended to attack them. Of course every preparation was now made for placing themselves in ambush at an early hour, along the trail in which it was expected the troops would pass. The scouts reported that precisely one hundred and ten men constituted the force which they expected to encounter, and the official report fully confirms the accuracy of their intelligence. The Exiles looked to the coming day with great intensity of feeling. More than two hundred years since, their ancestors had been piratically seized in their own country, and forcibly torn from their friends—from the land of their nativity. For a time they submitted to degrading bondage; but more than a century had elapsed since they fled from South Carolina, and found an asylum under Spanish law in the wilds of Florida. There their fathers and mothers had been buried. They had often visited their graves, and mourned over the sad fate to which their race appeared to be doomed. For fifty years they had been subjected to almost constant persecution at the hands of our Government. The blood of their fathers, brothers and friends, massacred at “Blount’s Fort,” was yet unavenged. They had seen individuals from among them piratically seized and enslaved. Their friends, residing with E-con-chattimico and with Walker, had been openly and flagrantly kidnapped, and sold into interminable servitude, where they were then sighing and moaning in degrading bondage. In looking forward, they read their intended doom, clearly written in the slave codes of Florida and the adjoining States, which could only be avoided by their most determined resistance. If they behaved worthy of men in their condition, their influence with their savage allies would be confirmed, and they would be able to control their action on subsequent occasions. Every consideration, therefore, tended to nerve them to the work of death which lay before them.
In the meantime, their victims were reposing at only four or five miles distant in conscious security. Their encampment had been selected according to military science. The men and officers were encamped in scientific order. Their guards were placed, their patrols sent out, and every precaution taken to prevent surprise. They had seen service, and cheerfully encountered its hardships, privations, and dangers, but had no suspicion of the fate that awaited them on the coming day.
At early dawn, the men were paraded, the roll called, and the order for regulating the day’s march given. They were then dismissed for breakfast, and at eight o’clock, resumed their march, and proceeded on their way in the full expectation of reaching their destination by the evening of that day.
But the insidious foe had been equally vigilant. They had left their island encampment with the first light of the morning, and each had taken his position along the trail in which the troops were expected to march, but at some thirty or forty yards distant. Each man was hidden by a tree, which was to be his fortress during the expected action. A few rods on the other side of the trail lay a pond of water, whose placid surface reflected the glittering rays of the morning sun. All was peaceful and quiet as the breath of summer.
Unsuspicious of the hidden death which beset their pathway, the troops entered this defile, and passed along until their rear had come within the range of the enemies’ rifles, when, at a given signal, each warrior fired, while his victim was in full view and unprotected. One-half of that ill-fated band, including the gallant Dade, fell at the first fire. The remainder were thrown into disorder. The officers endeavored to rally them into line; but their enemy was unseen, and ere they could return an effective shot, a second discharge from the hidden foe laid one-half their remaining force prostrate in death. The survivors retreated a short distance toward their encampment of the previous night, and, while most of the Exiles and Indians were engaged in scalping the dead and tomahawking those who were disabled, they formed a hasty breastwork of logs for their defense. They were, however, soon invested by the enemy, and the few who had taken shelter behind their rude defenses were overcome and massacred by the Exiles, who conversed with them in English, and then dispatched them.[82] Only two individuals beside Louis, the guide, made their escape. Their gallant commander, his officers and soldiers, whose hearts had beat high with expectation in the morning, at evening lay prostrate in death; and as the sable victors relaxed from their bloody work, they congratulated each other on having revenged the death of those who, twenty years previously, had fallen at the massacre of “Blount’s Fort.” The loss of the allied forces was—three killed and five wounded.
After burying their own dead, they returned to the island in the swamp long before nightfall. To this point, they brought the spoils of victory, which were deemed important for carrying on the war. Night had scarcely closed around them, however, when Osceola and his followers arrived from Fort King, bringing intelligence of the death of Thompson and Lieutenant Smith, together with the sutler and his two clerks. There, too, was Louis, the guide to Dade’s command. He was now free! He engaged in conversation with his sable friends. Well knowing the time and place at which the attack was to be made, he had professed necessity for stopping by the way-side before entering the defile; thus separating himself from the troops and from danger. Soon as the first fire showed him the precise position of his friends, he joined them; and swearing eternal hostility to all who enslave their fellow men, lent his own efforts in carrying forward the work of death, until the last individual of that doomed regiment sunk beneath their tomahawks.
The massacre of the unfortunate Dade and his companions, and the murder of Thompson and his friends, at Fort King, occurred on the same day, and constituted the opening scenes of the second Seminole Wa............