Editing Muscogee (section)

==History==

===Precontact===
[[File:Etowah MoundC 1 HRoe 2012.jpg|right|thumb|[[Etowah Indian Mounds|Etowah Mound C]], was part of a precontact [[Mississippian culture]] site, occupied by ancestors of the Muscogee people from {{Circa|1000}}–1550 CE, in [[Cartersville, Georgia]]]] 
At least 12,000 years ago, Native Americans or [[Paleo-Indian]]s lived in what is today the Southern United States.<ref name=guy_prentice>
{{Cite web
 | url = http://www.nps.gov/history/seac/SoutheastChronicles/NISI/NISI%20Cultural%20Overview.htm| title = Pushmataha, Choctaw Indian Chief
 | access-date = February 11, 2008
 | last = Prentice
 | first = Guy
 | year = 2003
 | publisher = Southeast Chronicles
}}
</ref> Paleo-Indians in the Southeast were [[hunter-gatherer]]s who pursued a wide range of animals, including [[megafauna]], which became extinct following the end of the [[Pleistocene]] age.<ref name=guy_prentice /> During the time known as the [[Woodland period]], from 1000 BC to 1000 AD, locals developed pottery and small-scale horticulture of the [[Eastern Agricultural Complex]].

The [[Mississippian culture]] arose as the cultivation of maize from [[Mesoamerica]] led to agricultural surpluses and population growth. Increased population density gave rise to urban centers and regional [[chiefdoms]]. Stratified societies developed, with [[hereditary]] religious and political elites. This culture flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from 800 to 1500, especially along the Mississippi River and its major tributaries.

The early historic Muscogee were descendants of the [[Mississippian culture]] along the [[Tennessee River]] in modern [[Tennessee]],<ref name=Finger_2001>
{{Cite book| last = Finger| first = John R.| title = Tennessee Frontiers: Three Regions in Transition| title-link=Tennessee Frontiers: Three Regions in Transition | pages = 19| publisher = Indiana University Press| year = 2001| isbn = 0-253-33985-5}}</ref> Georgia, and Alabama. They may have been related to the Tama of central Georgia. Muscogee [[oral history]] describes a migration from places west of the [[Mississippi River]], in which they eventually settled on the east bank of the [[Ocmulgee River]].<ref name="Bartram1794">[[William Bartram]], ''Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Muscogulges or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws'' (2nd ed.), London 1794, pp. [https://archive.org/stream/travelsthroughno00bart#page/52/mode/2up 52–53]</ref> Here they waged war against other bands of Native American Indians, such as the Savanna, Ogeeche, Wapoo, [[Santee tribe|Santee]], Yamasee, [[Northern Utina|Utina]], Icofan, Patican and others, until at length they had overcome them,<ref>[[William Bartram]], ''Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Muscogulges or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws'' (2nd ed.), London 1794, p. [https://archive.org/stream/travelsthroughno00bart#page/54/mode/2up 54]</ref> and absorbed some as confederates into their tribe.<ref name="Bartram1794"/>

In the mid-16th century, when explorers from the [[Spanish Empire|Spanish]] made their first forays inland from the shores of the [[Gulf of Mexico]], many political centers of the Mississippians were already in decline, or abandoned.<ref name=north_ga>
{{Cite web
 | url = http://ngeorgia.com/history/early.html
 | title = Moundbuilders, North Georgia's early inhabitants
 | access-date = May 2, 2008
 | author = About North Georgia
 | date = 1994–2006
 | publisher = Golden Ink
}}
</ref> The region is best described as a collection of moderately sized native [[chiefdom]]s (such as the [[Coosa chiefdom]] on the [[Coosa River]]), interspersed with completely autonomous villages and tribal groups. The earliest Spanish explorers encountered villages and chiefdoms of the late [[Mississippian culture]], beginning on April 2, 1513, with [[Juan Ponce de León]]'s landing in Florida. The 1526 [[Lucas Vázquez de Ayllón]] expedition in [[South Carolina]] also recorded encounters with these peoples.

Muscogee people were gradually influenced by interactions and trade with the Europeans: trading or selling deer hides in exchange for European goods such as muskets, or alcohol.<ref>{{cite book
|title=A New Order of Things. Property, Power, and the Transformation of the Creek Indians, 1733–1816
|publisher=Cambridge University Press
|year=1999
|isbn=0521660432
|first=Claudio
|last=Saunt
|pages=38–63
|chapter='Martial virtue, and not riches': The Creek relationship to property
}}</ref> Secondly, the Spanish pressed them to identify leaders for negotiations; they did not understand government by consensus.<ref name=Saunt>{{cite book
|title=A New Order of Things. Property, Power, and the Transformation of the Creek Indians, 1733–1816
|publisher=Cambridge University Press
|year=1999
|isbn=0521660432
|first=Claudio
|last=Saunt
}}</ref>{{rp|19–37}}

===Spanish expedition (1540–1543)===
[[Image:De Soto burns Mabila HRoe 2008.jpg|thumb|right|Hernando de Soto and his men burn Mabila, after a surprise attack by Chief Tuskaloosa and his people in 1540; painting by [[Herb Roe]], 2008]]

After [[Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca|Cabeza de Vaca]], a castaway who survived the ill-fated [[Narváez expedition]], returned to Spain in 1537, he told the Court that [[Hernando de Soto]] had said that America was the "richest country in the world". Hernando de Soto was a Spanish explorer and [[conquistador]] who led the first expedition into the interior of the North American continent. De Soto, convinced of the "riches", wanted Cabeza de Vaca to go on the expedition, but Cabeza de Vaca declined his offer because of a payment dispute.<ref name=smith_desoto>
{{Cite book
 | last = Gentleman of Elva
 | title = Narratives of the Career of Hernando de Soto in the Conquest of Florida as told by a Knight of Elvas
 | year = 1557
 | publisher = Kallman Publishing Co. (1968), Translated by Buckingham Smith
 | chapter = Chapter II, How Cabeza de Vaca arrived at court
 |  asin= B000J4W27Q
}}
</ref> From 1540 to 1543, de Soto explored through present-day Florida and [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]], and then westward into the [[Alabama]] and [[Mississippi]] area. The areas were inhabited by historic Muscogee [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native Americans]]. De Soto brought with him a well-equipped army. He attracted many recruits from a variety of backgrounds who joined his quest for riches in [[the Americas]]. As the de Soto expedition's brutalities became known to the indigenous peoples, they decided to defend their territory. Chief Tuskaloosa led his people in the [[Chief Tuskaloosa#Battle of Mabila|Battle of Mabila]], where the Native Americans were defeated. However, the victory came at great cost to the Spanish campaign in loss of supplies, casualties, and morale. The expedition never fully recovered.

===Rise of the Muscogee Confederacy===
{{see also|Mississippian shatter zone}}
Because of endemic [[infectious diseases]] carried unknowingly by the Europeans, but new to the Muscogee, the Spanish expedition resulted in epidemics of smallpox and measles, and a high rate of fatalities among the [[indigenous peoples]]. These losses were exacerbated by the [[Indian slave trade]] that colonists conducted in the Southeast during the 17th and 18th centuries. As the survivors and descendants regrouped, the Muscogee Creek Confederacy arose as a loose alliance of Muskogee-speaking peoples.

The Muscogee lived in autonomous villages in river valleys throughout present-day [[Tennessee]], [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]], and [[Alabama]], speaking several related [[Muskogean languages]]. [[Muscogee language|Muskogee]] was spoken from the [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]] to the [[Alabama River]]. [[Koasati]] (Coushatta) and [[Alabama language|Alibamu]] were spoken in the upper Alabama River basin and along parts of the [[Tennessee River]]. [[Hitchiti]] was spoken in several towns along the Chattahoochee River and across much of present-day Georgia. The Muscogee were a confederacy of tribes consisting of [[Yuchi]], [[Koasati]], [[Alabama people|Alabama]], [[Coosa chiefdom|Coosa]], [[Tuskegee]], [[Coweta (tribal town)|Coweta]], [[Cusseta, Creek Nation|Cusseta]], [[Chehaw]] (Chiaha), [[Hitchiti]], [[Tuckabatchee]], [[Okfuskee|Oakfuskee]], and many others.<ref name=confederacy_of_tribes>{{Cite book | last = Ethridge | first = Robbie | title = Creek Country: The Creek Indians and their World | year = 2003 | publisher = The University of North Carolina Press | chapter = Chapter 5: 'The People of Creek Country' | page = 93 | isbn = 0-8078-5495-6 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Goddard |first=Ives |author-link=Ives Goddard |date=Spring 2005 |title=The Indigenous Languages of the Southeast |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/25132315.pdf |journal=Anthropological Linguistics |volume=47 |issue=1 |pages=11, 34 |jstor=25132315 }}</ref>

The basic social unit was the town (''[[Tribal town|idalwa]]''). [[Abihka]], [[Coosa chiefdom|Coosa]], [[Tuckabutche]], and [[Coweta tribal town|Coweta]] are the four "mother towns" of the Muscogee Confederacy.<ref>Isham, Theodore and Blue Clark. [http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/C/CR006.html "Creek (Mvskoke)."] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100720043504/http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/C/CR006.html |date=July 20, 2010 }} ''Oklahoma Historical Society's Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture.'' Retrieved August 20, 2012.</ref> Traditionally, the Cusseta and Coweta bands are considered the earliest members of the Muscogee Nation.<ref name="Transcribed documents"/> The [[Apalachicola Province|Lower Towns]], along the [[Chattahoochee River]] (before 1690 and after 1715), and farther east along the [[Ocmulgee River|Ocmulgee]], [[Oconee River|Oconee]], and [[Savannah River]] rivers (between 1690 and 1715), were Coweta, Cusseta (Kasihta), Koloni, Tuskegee, [[Chiaha]], [[Hitchiti]], Oconee, Ocmulgee, Apalachicola, and [[Sabacola|Sawokli]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hann |first=John H. |title=The Native American World Beyond Apalachee |publisher=University Press of Florida |year=2006 |pages=6, 87, 88–91 |isbn=978-0-8130-2982-5}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last=Worth |first=John E. |chapter-url=https://pages.uwf.edu/jworth/Worth%202000_Lower%20Creeks.pdf |title=Indians of the Greater Southeast: Historical Archaeology and Ethnohistory |publisher=University of Florida Press |year=2000 |isbn=9-780-8130-2086-0 |editor-last=McEwan |edition=Bonnie G. |chapter=The Lower Creeks: Origin and History |pages=271, 279–282}}</ref>

[[File:King Site Aerial HRoe 2018.jpg|thumb|right|The protohistoric [[King Archaeological Site|King site]], occupied during the mid-1500s]]
The Upper Towns, located on the [[Coosa River|Coosa]], [[Tallapoosa River|Tallapoosa]] and [[Alabama River|Alabama]] rivers, were [[Tuckabatchee]], [[Abhika]], [[Coosa chiefdom|Coosa]] (Kusa; the dominant people of [[East Tennessee]] and [[North Georgia]] during the Spanish explorations), Itawa (original inhabitants of the [[Etowah Indian Mounds]]), Hothliwahi (Ullibahali), Hilibi, [[Eufaula tribe|Eufaula]], Wakokai, Atasi, [[Alibamu]], [[Coushatta]] (Koasati; they had absorbed the Kaski/Casqui and the [[Toqua (Tennessee)|Tali]]), and Tuskegee ("Napochi" in the de Luna chronicles).<ref>[http://www.accessgenealogy.com/native/tribes/creek/creektowns.htm Creek Towns] (accessed May 12, 2010).</ref>

The most important leader in Muscogee society was the ''mico'' or village chief. ''Micos'' led warriors in battle and represented their villages, but held authority only insofar as they could persuade others to agree with their decisions. ''Micos'' ruled with the assistance of ''micalgi'' or lesser chiefs, and various advisers, including a second-in-charge called the ''heniha'', respected village elders, medicine men, and a ''tustunnuggee'' or ranking warrior, the principal military adviser. The ''heles hayv'' or [[medicine man|medicine maker]] officiated at various rituals, including providing [[black drink]],<ref name="LewisJordan2008">{{cite book |last1=Lewis |first1=David Jr |last2=Jordan |first2=Ann T. |title=Creek Indian Medicine Ways: The Enduring Power of the Mvskoke Religion |date=2008 |publisher=UNM Press |isbn=978-0-8263-2368-2 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HXY1Xh0IfXUC&pg=PA6}}</ref> used in purification ceremonies.

The most important social unit was the [[clan]]. Clans organized hunts, distributed lands, arranged marriages, and punished lawbreakers. The authority of the ''micos'' was complemented by the clan mothers, mostly women elders. The Muscogee had a [[matrilineal]] [[kinship]] system, with children considered born into their mother's clan, and inheritance was through the maternal line. The Wind Clan is the first of the clans. The majority of ''micos'' have belonged to this clan.<ref>"[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2550 Creek Indian Leaders] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120925190725/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-2550 |date=September 25, 2012 }}." ''[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/ New Georgia Encyclopedia].'' Accessed May 12, 2010.</ref>

===British, French, and Spanish expansion===
{{Further|Yamasee War}}
[[File:OcmulgeeRaid.JPG|thumb|left|A raiding party against Spanish missions in Florida passes the Ocmulgee [[trading post]]]]

Britain, France, and Spain all established colonies in the present-day Southeastern woodlands. Spain established [[Jesuit missions in North America|Jesuit missions]] and related settlements to influence Native Americans. The British and the French opted for trade over conversion. In the 17th century, [[Franciscan]] friars in [[Spanish Florida]] built [[Spanish missions in Florida|missions]] along [[Apalachee Bay]]. In 1670, English colonists from [[Barbados]] founded [[Charleston, South Carolina|Charles Town]] (modern-day Charleston), the capital of the new [[Province of Carolina|colony of Carolina]]. Traders from Carolina went to Muscogee settlements to exchange [[firearm]]s, gunpowder, axes, glass beads, cloth and West Indian rum for [[white-tailed deer]] pelts (as part of the [[deerskin trade]]) and [[Indian slave trade in the American Southeast|Indian slaves]]. The Spanish and their "mission Indians" burned most of the towns along the Chattahoochee after they welcomed Scottish explorer [[Henry Woodward (colonist)|Henry Woodward]] in 1685. In 1690, English colonists built a trading post on the [[Ocmulgee River]], known as Ochese-hatchee (creek), where a dozen towns relocated to escape the Spanish and acquire English goods. The name "Creek" most likely derived from a shortening of Ocheese Creek (the [[Hitchiti]] name for the body of water known today as the [[Ocmulgee River]]), and broadly applies to all of the Muscogee Confederacy, including the [[Yuchi]] and [[Natchez people|Natchez]].<ref>Walker 390</ref><ref>Incomplete source</ref>

In 1704, Irish colonial administrator [[James Moore Sr.|James Moore]] led the Carolina militia and Ochese Creek and Yamasee warriors on a [[Apalachee massacre|series of raids]] against [[Spanish missions in Florida|Spanish missions in the Florida interior]] during [[Queen Anne's War]]. These raids captured thousands of Spanish-allied Indians, primarily [[Apalachee]], who were sold into slavery in Carolina and the West Indies. A decade later, tensions between colonists and Indians in the American Southwest led to the [[Yamassee War]] of 1715–17.<ref name="RowlandMoore1996">{{cite book|last1=Rowland|first1=Lawrence Sanders|last2=Moore|first2=Alexander|last3=Rogers|first3=George C.|title=The History of Beaufort County, South Carolina: 1514–1861|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WjdhnfG0tYcC&pg=PA88|access-date=8 October 2011|year=1996|publisher=Univ of South Carolina Press|isbn=978-1-57003-090-1|pages=88–89}}</ref>

[[Image:ChiefTomochichiAndNephew.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Yamacraw]] leader [[Tomochichi]] and nephew in 1733]]

The Ochese Creeks joined the Yamasee, burning trading posts, and raiding back-country settlers, but the revolt ran low on gunpowder and was put down by Carolinian militia and their [[Cherokee]] allies. The Yamasee took refuge in [[Spanish Florida]], the Ochese Creeks fled west to the [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]]. [[French Canadian]] explorers founded [[Mobile, Alabama|Mobile]] as the first capital of [[Louisiana (New France)|Louisiana]] in 1702, and took advantage of the war to build [[Fort Toulouse]] at the confluence of the [[Tallapoosa River|Tallapoosa]] and [[Coosa River|Coosa]] in 1717, trading with the [[Alabama (people)|Alabama]] and [[Coushatta]]. Fearing they would come under French influence, the British reopened the deerskin trade with the Lower Creeks, antagonizing the Yamasee, now allies of Spain. The French instigated the Upper Creeks to raid the Lower Creeks. In May 1718, the shrewd [[Emperor Brim]], ''mico'' of the powerful [[Coweta (tribal town)|Coweta]] band, invited representatives of Britain, France, and Spain to his village and, in council with Upper and Lower Creek leaders, declared a policy of Muscogee neutrality in their colonial rivalry. That year, the Spaniards built the presidio of [[San Marcos de Apalache]] on [[Apalachee Bay]]. In 1721, the British built [[Fort King George]] at the mouth of the [[Altamaha River]]. As the three European colonial powers established themselves along the borders of Muscogee lands, the latter's strategy of neutrality allowed them to hold the balance of power.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Purcell |first1=Kim |title=Fort King George |url=https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/fort-king-george/ |website=New Georgia Encyclopedia |publisher=Georgia Center for the Book |access-date=18 February 2025 |language=English |date=5 September 2018 |url-status=live}}</ref>

[[Image:Tomo-chi-chi and other Yamacraws Native Americans.jpg|thumb|left|Yamacraw [[Creek (people)|Creek]] Native Americans meet with the trustee of the colony of Georgia in England, July 1734. Notice the Native American boy (in a blue coat) and woman (in a red dress) in European clothing.]]
The colony of [[History of Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] was created in 1732; its first settlement, [[Savannah, Georgia|Savannah]], was founded the following year, on a river bluff where the [[Yamacraw]], a Yamasee band that remained allies of Britain, allowed John Musgrove to establish a fur-trading post. His wife [[Mary Musgrove]] was the daughter of an English trader and a Muscogee woman from the powerful Wind Clan, half-sister of 'Emperor' Brim. She was the principal interpreter for Georgia's founder and first Governor Gen. [[James Oglethorpe]], using her connections to foster peace between the Creek Indians and the new colony.<ref>"[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-3543&hl=y Mary Musgrove] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130614175158/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-3543&hl=y |date=June 14, 2013 }}", [http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/ Georgia Encyclopedia Online] (accessed May 12, 2010).</ref> In 1735, Georgia constructed [[Fort Okfuskee]] near Oakfuskee to compete with French trade with the Creeks at Fort Toulouse.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wood |first1=Brian M. |editor1-last=Waselkov |editor1-first=Gregory A. |title=Fort Toulouse Studies |date=1984 |publisher=Auburn University at Montgomery |location=Montgomery, Alabama |chapter=Fort Okfuskee: A British Challenge to Fort Toulouse aux Alibamons |page=41}}</ref> The deerskin trade grew, and by the 1750s, [[Savannah, Georgia|Savannah]] exported up to 50,000 deerskins a year.<ref>"[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-579 Creek Indians] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130723170652/http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/nge/Article.jsp?id=h-579 |date=July 23, 2013 }}", ''[http://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/ New Georgia Encyclopedia]'' (accessed May 12, 2010).</ref>

In 1736, Spanish and British officials established a neutral zone from the [[Altamaha River|Altamaha]] to the [[St. Johns River]] in present-day Florida, guaranteeing Native hunting grounds for the deerskin trade and protecting [[Spanish Florida]] from further British encroachment.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Kokomoor|first1=Kevin|title='Burning & Destroying All Before Them': Creeks and Seminoles on Georgia's Revolutionary Frontier|journal=Georgia Historical Quarterly|year=2014|volume=98|issue=4|page=300|url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=110131795&site=eds-live&scope=site|access-date=February 14, 2018}}</ref> Ca. 1750 a group of [[Hitchiti|Ochese]] moved to the neutral zone, after clashing with the [[Creek language|Muskogee]]-speaking towns of the [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]], where they had fled after the [[Yamasee War]].

Led by Chief Secoffee ([[Cowkeeper]]), they became the center of a new tribal confederacy, the [[Seminole]], which grew to include earlier refugees from the [[Yamasee War]], remnants of the 'mission Indians,' and escaped African slaves.<ref>Forbs, Gerald, "[http://digital.library.okstate.edu/chronicles/v015/v015p102.html#fn30 The Origin of the Seminole Indians] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080509185956/http://digital.library.okstate.edu/Chronicles/v015/v015p102.html#fn30 |date=May 9, 2008 }}", p. 108, ''Chronicles of Oklahoma'', Vol. 15, No. 1, March 1937.</ref> Their name comes from the Spanish word ''cimarrones'', which originally referred to a domestic animal that had reverted to the wild. ''Cimarrones'' was used by the Spanish and Portuguese to refer to fugitive slaves—"[[maroon (people)|maroon]]" emerges linguistically from this root as well—and American Indians who fled the Europeans. In the [[Hitchiti]] language, which lacked an 'r' sound, it became ''simanoli'', and eventually Seminole.

=== Intermarriage ===
Many Muscogee Creek leaders, due to intermarriage, have British names: [[Alexander McGillivray]], [[Josiah Francis (Hillis Hadjo)|Josiah Francis]], [[William McIntosh]], [[Peter McQueen]], [[William Weatherford]], William Perryman, and others. These reflect Muscogee women having children with British colonists. For instance, [[Indian agent]] [[Benjamin Hawkins]] married a Muscogee woman.<ref name=Jackson>{{cite book
|title=Old Hickory's War. Andrew Jackson and the Quest for Empire
|first1=David S.
|last1=Heidler
|first2=Jeanne T.
|last2=Heidler
|edition=revised
|isbn=0807128678
|publisher=Stackpole Books
|year=2003}}</ref>{{rp|9}} In Muscogee culture, unmarried Muscogee women had great freedom over their own sexuality compared to European and European-American counterparts.<ref name=Saunt/>{{rp|161–162}} Under the customs of Muscogee [[matrilineal]] society, their children belonged to their mother's clan. With the exception of McGillivray, mixed-raced Muscogee people worked against Muscogee Creek interests, as they understood them{{clarify|date=August 2018}}; to the contrary, in many cases, they spearheaded resistance to settler encroachment on Muscogee Creek lands. That they usually spoke English as well as [[Muscogee language|Mvskoke]], and knew European customs as well, made them community leaders; they "dominated Muskogee politics".<ref name=Jackson />{{rp|236 n. 7}} As put by [[Claudio Saunt]]:

{{blockquote|These offspring of mixed marriages occupied a different position in the economy of the Deep South than did most Creeks and Seminoles. They worked as [[trading post|trader]]s and [[Factor (agent)|factor]]s. ... By virtue of their ancestry and upbringing, they had greater cultural, social, linguistic, and geographic ties to the colonial settlements, traveling periodically to Pensacola and the Georgia trading posts to unload their skins and pick up more trade goods.<ref name=Saunt />{{rp|54}}}}

As Andrew Frank writes, "Terms such as mixed-blood and half-breed, which imply racial categories and partial Indianness, betray the ways in which Native peoples determined kinship and identity in the eighteenth- and early-nineteen-century southeast."<ref>{{cite book|last1=Frank|first1=Andrew K.|title=Creeks and Southerners|date=2005|publisher=University of Nebraska Press|location=Lincoln|page=4|isbn=0803220162|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aDtwYNCPe1kC&q=muscogee%20creek%20nation%20intermarriage%20British%20traders&pg=PA83|access-date=May 26, 2018}}</ref>

===American Revolutionary War===
With the end of the [[French and Indian War]] (also known as the [[Seven Years' War]]) in 1763, France lost its North American empire, and British-American settlers moved inland. Indian discontent led to raids against back-country settlers, and the perception that the royal government favored the Indians and the deerskin trade led many back-country white settlers to join the [[Sons of Liberty]]. Fears of land-hungry settlers and need for European manufactured goods led the Muscogee to side with the British, but like many tribes, they were divided by factionalism, and, in general, avoided sustained fighting, preferring to protect their sovereignty through cautious participation.

During the [[American Revolution]], the Upper Creeks sided with the [[Kingdom of Great Britain|British]], fighting alongside the [[Chickamauga Cherokee|Chickamauga]] (Lower Cherokee) warriors of [[Dragging Canoe]], in the [[Cherokee–American wars]], against white settlers in present-day [[Tennessee]]. This alliance was orchestrated by the [[Coushatta]] chief [[Alexander McGillivray]], son of [[Lachlan McGillivray]], a wealthy Scottish [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]] fur-trader and planter, whose properties were confiscated by Georgia. His ex-partner, [[Scots-Irish American|Scots-Irish]] [[Patriot (American Revolution)|Patriot]] [[George Galphin]], initially persuaded the Lower Creeks to remain neutral, but [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]] Capt. William McIntosh led a group of pro-British [[Hitchiti]], and most of the Lower Creeks nominally allied with Britain after the 1779 [[Capture of Savannah]]. Muscogee warriors fought on behalf of Britain [[Spain in the American Revolution|during the Mobile and Pensacola campaigns of 1780–81]], where Spain re-conquered [[British West Florida]]. Loyalist leader [[Thomas Brown (loyalist)|Thomas Brown]] raised a division of [[King's Rangers]] to contest [[Patriot (American Revolution)|Patriot]] control over the Georgia and Carolina interior and instigated Cherokee raids against the [[North Carolina]] back-country after the [[Battle of King's Mountain]]. He seized [[Augusta, Georgia|Augusta]] in March 1780, with the aid of an Upper Creek war-party, but reinforcements from the Lower Creeks and local white [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]]s never came, and [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]] militia led by [[Elijah Clarke]] retook Augusta in 1781.<ref>Edward Cashin ''The King's Ranger: Thomas Brown and the American Revolution on the Southern Frontier'' p. 130</ref> The next year an Upper Creek war-party trying to relieve the British garrison at [[Savannah, Georgia|Savannah]] was routed by [[Continental Army]] troops under Gen. [[Anthony Wayne|'Mad' Anthony Wayne]].

After the war ended in 1783, the Muscogee learned that Britain had ceded their lands to the now independent United States. That year, two Lower Creek chiefs, Hopoithle Miko (Tame King) and Eneah Miko (Fat King), ceded {{convert|800|sqmi|km2|sigfig=2}} of land to the state of Georgia. [[Alexander McGillivray]] led pan-Indian resistance to white encroachment, receiving arms from the [[Spanish Florida|Spanish in Florida]] to fight trespassers. The bilingual and bicultural McGillivray worked to create a sense of Muscogee nationalism and centralize political authority, struggling against village leaders who individually sold land to the United States. He also became a wealthy landowner and merchant, owning as many as sixty black slaves.

In 1784, he negotiated the [[Treaty of Pensacola]] with Spain, recognizing Muscogee control over {{convert|3000000|acre|km2|sigfig=2}} of land claimed by Georgia, and guaranteeing access to the British firm [[Panton, Leslie & Company|Panton, Leslie & Co.]] which controlled the deerskin trade, while making himself an official representative of Spain.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-2313|title=Alexander McGillivray – Encyclopedia of Alabama|access-date=December 22, 2009|archive-date=October 15, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131015211441/http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/face/Article.jsp?id=h-2313|url-status=dead}}</ref> In 1786, a council in [[Tuckabatchee]] decided to wage war against white settlers on Muscogee lands. War parties attacked settlers along the [[Oconee River]], and Georgia mobilized its militia. McGillivray refused to negotiate with the state that had confiscated his father's plantations, but President [[George Washington]] sent a special emissary, Col. [[Marinus Willet]], who persuaded him to travel to New York City, then the capital of the U.S., and deal directly with the federal government. In the summer of 1790, McGillivray and 29 other Muscogee chiefs signed the [[Treaty of New York (1790)|Treaty of New York]], on behalf of the 'Upper, Middle and Lower Creek and Seminole composing the Creek nation of Indians,' ceding a large portion of their lands to the federal government and promising to return fugitive slaves, in return for federal recognition of Muscogee sovereignty and promises to evict white settlers. McGillivray died in 1793, and with the invention of the [[cotton gin]] white settlers on the Southwestern frontier who hoped to become cotton planters clamored for Indian lands. In 1795, [[Elijah Clarke]] and several hundred followers defied the Treaty of New York and established the short-lived [[Trans-Oconee Republic]].

===Muscogee and Choctaw land dispute (1790)===
In 1790, the Muscogee and [[Choctaw]] were in conflict over land near the [[Noxubee River]]. The two nations agreed to settle the dispute by ball-play. With nearly 10,000 players and bystanders, the two nations prepared for nearly three months. After a day-long struggle, the Muscogee won the game. A fight broke out and the two nations fought until sundown with nearly 500 dead and many more wounded.<ref>{{cite web |title=Relationship With Other Tribes |url=https://sites.google.com/site/southeastindiantribes/home/creek-indians/relationship-with-other-tribes |website=South East Indian Tribes |access-date=February 24, 2019 |archive-date=March 19, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319051652/https://sites.google.com/site/southeastindiantribes/home/creek-indians/relationship-with-other-tribes |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===State of Muskogee and William Bowles===
{{Further|State of Muskogee}}

[[Image:William Bowles.jpg|thumb|upright|William Augustus Bowles (1763–1805) was also known as Estajoca, his Muscogee name.]]

[[William Augustus Bowles]] was born into a wealthy [[Maryland]] [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Tory]] family, enlisting with the [[Maryland Loyalists Battalion]] at age 14 and becoming an ensign in the [[Royal Navy]] by age 15. Cashiered for dereliction of duty after returning too late to his ship at [[Pensacola, Florida|Pensacola]], Bowles escaped north and found refuge among the Lower Creek towns of the [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]] basin. He married two wives, one [[Cherokee]] and the other a daughter of the Hitchiti Muscogee chieftain [[William Perryman]], and later used this union as the basis for his claim to exert political influence among the Creeks.<ref name="Landers2010">{{cite book|author=Jane G. Landers|title=Atlantic Creoles in the Age of Revolutions |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EdvO5XnDvWUC&pg=PT113|year=2010|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-05416-5|page=113}}</ref> In 1781, a 17-year-old Bowles led Muscogee forces at the [[Battle of Pensacola (1781)|Battle of Pensacola]]. After seeking refuge in the [[Bahamas]], he travelled to London. He was received by King [[George III]] as 'Chief of the Embassy for Creek and Cherokee Nations'; it was with British backing that he returned to train the Muscogee as pirates to attack Spanish ships.

In 1799, Bowles formed the [[State of Muskogee]], with the support of the [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]] Creeks and the [[Seminoles]]. He established his capital at [[Miccosukee, Florida|Miccosuki]], a village on the shores of [[Lake Miccosukee]] near present-day [[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]]. It was ruled by ''Mico'' Kanache, his father-in-law and strongest ally. Bowles envisioned the [[State of Muskogee]], with its capital at [[Miccosukee, Florida|Miccosuki]], encompassing large portions of present-day Florida, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, and Tennessee, and incorporating the [[Cherokee]], Upper and Lower Creeks, [[Chickasaw]] and [[Choctaw]]. Bowles' first act was declaring the 1796 [[Second Treaty of San Ildefonso]], which drew the boundary between the U.S. and [[West Florida]], [[null and void]], because the Indians were not consulted.

He denounced the treaties [[Alexander McGillivray]] had negotiated with Spain and the U.S., threatening to declare war on the United States unless it returned Muscogee lands, and issuing a death sentence against [[George Washington]]'s [[Indian agent]] [[Benjamin Hawkins]], who won the loyalty of the Lower Creeks. He built a tiny navy, and raided Spanish ships in the [[Gulf of Mexico]], and, in 1800, declared war on Spain, briefly capturing the presidio and trading post of [[San Marcos de Apalache]] before being forced to retreat. Although a Spanish force that set out to destroy Mikosuki got lost in the swamps, a second attempt to take San Marcos ended in disaster. After a European armistice led to the loss of British support, Bowles was discredited. The Seminole signed a peace treaty with Spain. The following year, he was betrayed by Lower Creek supporters of Hawkins at a tribal council. They turned Bowles over to the Spanish, and he died in prison in [[Havana, Cuba]] two years later.<ref>[http://www.southernhistory.us/wabowles.htm Chris Kimball, "W.A. Bowles"], Southern History</ref>

===Pre-removal (late 18th–early 19th centuries)===
{{Further|Five Civilized Tribes}}

[[Image:Benjamin Hawkins and the Creek Indians - higher resolution.jpg|thumb|Painting (1805) of Benjamin Hawkins on his plantation, instructing Muscogee Creek in European technology]]

[[George Washington]], the first U.S. president, and [[Henry Knox]], the first U.S. Secretary of War, proposed a cultural transformation of the Native Americans.<ref name=perdue>
{{Cite book
 | last = Perdue
 | first = Theda
 | title = Mixed Blood Indians: Racial Construction in the Early South
 | year = 2003
 | publisher = The University of Georgia Press
 | chapter = Chapter 2 'Both White and Red'
 | page = 51
 | isbn = 0-8203-2731-X
}}
</ref> Washington believed that Native Americans were equals as individuals but that their society was inferior. He formulated a policy to encourage the "civilizing" process, and it was continued under President [[Thomas Jefferson]].<ref name=remini_reform_begins>
{{Cite book
 | last = Remini
 | first = Robert
 | title = Andrew Jackson
 | publisher = History Book Club
 | chapter = The Reform Begins
 | page = 201
 | id = {{Listed Invalid ISBN|0-9650631-0-7}}
 }}</ref> Noted historian Robert Remini wrote, "[T]hey presumed that once the Indians adopted the practice of private property, built homes, farmed, educated their children, and embraced Christianity, these Native Americans would win acceptance from white Americans."<ref name=remini_submit_adoption>
{{Cite book
 | last = Remini
 | first = Robert
 | title = Andrew Jackson
 | publisher = History Book Club
 | chapter = Brothers, Listen ... You Must Submit
 | page = 258
 | id = {{Listed Invalid ISBN|0-9650631-0-7}}
 }}</ref> Washington's six-point plan included impartial justice toward Indians; regulated buying of Indian lands; promotion of commerce; promotion of experiments to civilize or improve Indian society; presidential authority to give presents; and punishing those who violated Indian rights.<ref name=eric_miller>
{{Cite web
 | url = http://www.dreric.org/library/northwest.shtml
 | title = George Washington And Indians
 | access-date = May 2, 2008
 | last = Miller
 | first = Eric
 | year = 1994
 | publisher = Eric Mille
}}

</ref> The Muscogee would be the first Native Americans to be "civilized" under Washington's six-point plan. Communities within the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole tribes followed Muscogee efforts to implement Washington's new policy of civilization.

In 1796, Washington appointed [[Benjamin Hawkins]] as Principal Temporary Agent for Indian Affairs, dealing with all tribes south of the [[Ohio River]]. He personally assumed the role of principal agent to the Muscogee. He moved to the area in Creek country that is now [[Crawford County, Georgia|Crawford County]] in [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]]. He began to teach agricultural practices to the tribe, starting a farm at his home on the Flint River. In time, he brought in [[slaves]] and workers, cleared several hundred acres, and established mills and a trading post as well as his farm. The goal was to transform the Natives into "respectable Americans" in the republic, in a way that didn't involve violence. 

One of the ways Hawkins did this was that he worked to change the gender roles that had been established in Creek society long before, to how the new American republic considered gender roles. For example, convincing the men to take up things like ranching and planting, and giving up things like hunting and being warriors, and for the women to leave behind their roles in farms and instead participate in “household manufactures.” Hawkins also tried to convince the men to take over family property and “assume command over their wives and daughters.”  

There were many different factors that explained how men and women considered the plan of civilization:“Deep-seated tensions, characterized relations between sexes in the 1700s, rather than static balance; etc.” <ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last=Saunt |first=Claudio |title=A New Order of Things: Property, Power, and the Transformation of the Creek Indians, 1733-1816 |date=1999 |publisher=Cambridge: Cambridge University Press |year=1999 |isbn=0521660432 |pages=139-165}}</ref>Men and women were separated starting from childhood, including having masculine and feminine versions of the Muscogee language where both genders had different dialects. The men and women would live separated for weeks on end; men hunting and going to war and the women caring for the children, elderly, and making clothes and preparing food. There were many instances where men and women avoided each other in ceremonies due to fear of any type of consequences, like war, childbirth, or menstruation. 

Defeat during war was seen as feminine, which was considered negative. Enemies who lost or ceded land would be degraded by being called “old women,” and how it was seen as a disgrace and humiliating to be referred to as a woman. Later around the 1760s, there were changes to the deerskin trade that affected the relationship between women and men. European markets had an increased need for raw deerskin which meant that the labor of women who would dress the skins was no longer needed, while before that happened both men and women shared labor from the deerskin trade. <ref name=":0" />

There was also a huge issue with drunknesses, in which the state of being drunk was associated with madness and bravery of warriors as well as distancing themselves from “household-oriented and feminine trade in clothing,” because they traded deerskin for sugar-cane liquor. Creek men drank much more than the women did, many young Creek men when drunk thinking they were warriors. The women were against the behavior of how these warriors acted as well as against drinking rum. <ref name=":0" />

Women’s labor and manufacturing grew less needed as deerskin trade increased and the clothing was from foreign traders, their main job later being to finish the clothes with beads and gartering, but women had no say in the actual material or use of it. Even most kettles and bowls grew to be from foreign traders. There were also plantations that were started by traders, these plantations were pushing women who farmed and traded produce out of the market. <ref name=":0" />

Creek women didn’t agree with the “masculine pursuits” that their male family members had done, including instances of hostility towards women, humiliating enemies and others by calling them “old women,” the raping, murder, and mutilation of white women that happened because of how some Creek warriors violently expressed their masculinity, as well as the Creek women thinking of the safety of their own households. The women considered Hawkins “plan of civilization” around 1797 with interest compared to most of the men. The plan didn’t agree with the warrior culture and promised availability of goods like food and clothing. The ranchers and planters also seemed in agreement with Hawkins, while many warriors didn’t agree with his ideas nor liked his plan because they didn’t want to give up hunting or their warrior culture. <ref name=":0" />

The Plan of Civilization wanted them to take up farming, which was seen as women’s work and the Creek warriors resisted that because they saw it as their masculinity being taken away. The alcohol consumption among Creek men had increased because of this shift in their gender roles as many of the warriors resisted being farmers, and the violence against women, mainly domestic, also increased. 

While the women agreed with many of the changes and reforms that started happening from Hawkins’ plan, they refused to submit to the patriarchy, and they used the economic changes to their advantage. <ref name=":0" />

The Creeks had started to gain property of their own, and Hawkins had said that “they had began to know the value of property and the necessity of defending it.” From the lead of Hawkins, the Creeks had formed a national police force to force Muscogees to “respect their neighbors property,” also because there were some Creeks who were protective of their land and violent in the defense of the land. 

There were different changes in the settlement, those who were going by Hawkins’ plan of civilization and those who didn't go along with the plan that was happening under fenced communities in the Deep South. This was causing conflict between the Creek settlements. <ref name=":0" />

For years, Hawkins met with chiefs on his porch to discuss matters. He was responsible for the longest period of peace between the settlers and the tribe, overseeing 19 years of peace. In 1805, the Lower Creeks ceded their lands east of the [[Ocmulgee River|Ocmulgee]] to Georgia, with the exception of the sacred burial mounds of the [[Ocmulgee National Monument|Ocmulgee Old Fields]]. They allowed a [[Federal Road (Creek lands)|Federal Road]] linking [[New Orleans]] to Washington, D.C. to be built through their territory. A number of Muscogee chiefs acquired slaves and created cotton plantations, grist mills and businesses along the Federal Road. In 1806, [[Fort Benjamin Hawkins]] was built on a hill overlooking the [[Ocmulgee National Monument|Ocmulgee Old Fields]], to protect expanding settlements and serve as a reminder of U.S. rule.

Hawkins was disheartened and shocked by the outbreak of the [[Creek War]], which destroyed his life work of improving the Muscogee quality of life. Hawkins saw much of his work toward building a peace destroyed in 1812. A faction of Muscogee joined the Pan-American Indian movement of [[Tenskwatawa]] and [[Tecumseh]], rejecting accommodation with white settlers and adaptation of European-American culture. Although Hawkins personally was never attacked, he was forced to watch an internal civil war among the Muscogee develop into a war with the United States.

===A comet, earthquakes, and Tecumseh (1811)===
{{Further|Great Comet of 1811}}
{{Further|1812 New Madrid earthquake}}

[[Image:Comet of 1811.jpg|upright|left|thumb|The Great Comet of 1811, as drawn by [[William Henry Smyth]]]]

A comet appeared in March 1811. The [[Shawnee]] leader [[Tecumseh]], whose name meant "shooting star",<ref>Sugden, John. [https://www.nytimes.com/books/first/s/sugden-tecumseh.html "The Shooting Star.'] ''New York Times: Books.'' 1997 (retrieved December 5, 2009)</ref>
traveled to [[Tuckabatchee]], where he told the Muscogee that the comet signaled his coming. McKenney reported that Tecumseh would prove that the [[Great Spirit]] had sent him by giving the Muscogee a sign. Shortly after Tecumseh left the Southeast, the sign arrived as promised in the form of an earthquake.

On December 16, 1811, the [[New Madrid earthquake]] shook the Muscogee lands and the [[Midwestern United States|Midwest]]. While the interpretation of this event varied from tribe to tribe, one consensus was universally accepted: the powerful earthquake had to have meant something. <!--(Ehle p. 102-104)--> The earthquake and its aftershocks helped the Tecumseh resistance movement by convincing, not only the Muscogee, but other Native American tribes as well, that the Shawnee must be supported.

[[Image:New Madrid Erdbeben.jpg|thumb|The New Madrid earthquake was interpreted by the Muscogee to support the Shawnee's resistance.]]

{{blockquote|The Indians were filled with great terror ... the trees and wigwams shook exceedingly; the ice which skirted the margin of the Arkansas river was broken into pieces; and most of the Indians thought that the Great Spirit, angry with the human race, was about to destroy the world.|Roger L. Nichols, ''The American Indian''}}

The Muscogee who joined Tecumseh's confederation were known as the Red Sticks. Stories of the origin of the Red Stick name varies, but one is that they were named for the Muscogee tradition of carrying a bundle of sticks that mark the days until an event occurs. Sticks painted red symbolize war.<ref>[http://www.galafilm.com/1812/e/people/creeks.html "The Creeks."] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051118194415/http://galafilm.com/1812/e/people/creeks.html |date=November 18, 2005 }} ''War of 1812 People and Stories.'' (retrieved December 5, 2009)</ref>

===Red Stick rebellion===
{{Further|Creek War|Red Sticks|Fort Mims massacre}}

[[Image:Menawa high resolution.jpg|upright|thumb|[[Menawa]] was one of the principal leaders of the Red Sticks. After the war, he continued to oppose white encroachment on Muscogee lands, visiting Washington, D.C., in 1826 to protest the [[Treaty of Indian Springs (1825)|treaty of Indian Springs]]. Painted by [[Charles Bird King]], 1837.]]

The Creek War of 1813–1814, also known as the ''Red Stick War'', began as a civil war within the Muscogee Nation, only to become enmeshed within the [[War of 1812]]. Inspired by the [[Shawnee]] leader [[Tecumseh]] (to whom 19th-century writers attributed fiery speeches that he "must have said"){{citation needed|date=May 2018}} and their own religious leaders, and encouraged by British traders, Red Stick leaders such as [[William Weatherford]] (Red Eagle), [[Peter McQueen]], and [[Menawa]] won the support of the Upper Creek towns. Allied with the British, they opposed white encroachment on Muscogee lands and the "civilizing programs" administered by [[Indian agent]] [[Benjamin Hawkins]], and clashed with many of the leading chiefs of the Muscogee Nation, most notably the Lower Creek ''Mico'' [[William McIntosh]], Hawkins' most powerful ally. Before the Muscogee Civil War began, the Red Sticks attempted to keep their activities secret from the "old chiefs" of the Creek national government. They were emboldened when [[Tecumseh]] rallied his followers and joined with a British invasion to [[Siege of Detroit|capture Fort Detroit]] in August 1812.

In February 1813, a small party of Red Sticks, led by Little Warrior, was returning from Detroit when they killed two families of settlers along the [[Duck River (Tennessee)|Duck River]], near [[Nashville]]. Hawkins demanded that the Muscogees turn over Little Warrior and his six companions. Instead of handing the marauders over to the federal agents, Big Warrior and the old chiefs decided to execute the war party. This decision was the spark which ignited the civil war among the Muscogee.<ref>Adams, 777–778</ref>

The first clashes between Red Sticks and the American whites took place on July 21, 1813, when a group of American soldiers from [[Fort Mims]] (north of [[Mobile, Alabama]]) stopped a party of Red Sticks who were returning from [[West Florida]], where they had bought munitions from the Spanish governor at [[Pensacola]]. The Red Sticks fled the scene, and the U.S. soldiers looted what they found, allowing the Red Sticks to regroup and retaliate with a surprise attack that forced the Americans to retreat. The [[Battle of Burnt Corn]], as the exchange became known, broadened the Creek Civil War to include American forces, and was interpreted as a good omen, showing that in fact the Creeks could defeat the whites.

On August 30, 1813, Red Sticks led by Red Eagle [[William Weatherford]] attacked [[Fort Mims]], where white settlers and their Indian allies had gathered. The Red Sticks captured the fort by surprise, and carried out a massacre, killing men, women, and children. They spared only the black [[slaves]] whom they took as captured booty. After the Indians killed nearly 250–500 at the fort, settlers across the American southwestern frontier were in a panic. Although the Red Sticks won the battle, they had lost the war.

{{blockquote|On the morning of August 30, 1813, few of Fort Mims' defenders stirred in the steaming heat. In the forested shade, the Creeks watched and waited. The fort's main gate, located on the east side of the stockade, had not been closed by the garrison troops ... No sentries occupied the blockhouse.|A Short History of the Ft. Mims Massacre of 1813 during the Creek Indian War<ref name=fort_mims>
{{Cite web
 | url = http://www.canerossi.us/ftmims/massacre.htm
 | title = Ft. Mims Massacre Baldwin County, Alabama August 30, 1813
 | access-date = October 4, 2009
 | author = Steve Canerossi
 }}
</ref>
}}

The Fort Mims Massacre was followed two days later by the smaller [[Kimbell-James Massacre]].

The only explanation of this catastrophic event is that the Upper Creek leaders thought that fighting the United States was like fighting another Creek tribe, and taking Fort Mims was an even bigger victory than the Battle of Burnt Corn had been.

The Red Stick victory spread panic throughout the southeastern United States, and the cry "Remember Fort Mims!" was popular among the public wanting revenge. With Federal troops tied up on the northern front against the British in Canada, the [[Tennessee]], [[Georgia (U.S. state)|Georgia]], and the [[Mississippi Territory]] militias were commissioned and invaded the Upper Creek towns. They were joined by Indian allies, the Lower Creek under [[William McIntosh]] and the Cherokee under [[Major Ridge]]. Outnumbered and poorly armed, much too far from Canada or the Gulf Coast to receive British aid, the Red Sticks put up a desperate fight. On March 27, 1814, General [[Andrew Jackson]]'s Tennessee [[militia]], aided by the 39th U. S. [[Infantry]] Regiment and [[Cherokee]] and Lower Creek warriors, crushed the Red Sticks at the [[Battle of Horseshoe Bend (1814)|Battle of Horseshoe Bend]] on the [[Tallapoosa River]]. Though the Red Sticks had been soundly defeated and about 3,000 Upper Muscogee died in the war, the remnants held out several months longer.

===Muscogee diaspora (1814)===
[[Image:Jackson and Weatherford.jpg|thumb|Depiction of Red Eagle's surrender to Andrew Jackson after the Battle of Horseshoe Bend. Jackson was so impressed with Weatherford's boldness that he let him go.]]

In August 1814, the Red Sticks surrendered to Jackson at [[Wetumpka, Alabama|Wetumpka]] (near the present city of [[Montgomery, Alabama]]). On August 9, 1814, the Muscogee nation was forced to sign the [[Treaty of Fort Jackson]]. It ended the war and required the tribe to cede some {{convert|20|e6acres|km2}} of land—more than half of their ancestral territorial holdings—to the United States. Even those who had fought alongside Jackson were compelled to cede land, since Jackson held them responsible for allowing the Red Sticks to revolt. The state of Alabama was created largely from the Red Sticks' domain and was admitted to the United States in 1819.

{{blockquote|WHEREAS an unprovoked, inhuman, and sanguinary war, waged by the hostile Creeks against the United States, hath been repelled, prosecuted and determined, successfully, on the part of the said States, in conformity with principles of national justice and honorable warfare … And whereas consideration is due to the rectitude of proceeding dictated by instructions relating to the re-establishment of peace: Be it remembered, that prior to the conquest of that part of the Creek nation hostile to the United States, numberless aggressions had been committed against the peace, the property, and the lives of citizens of the United States ...|Treaty of Fort Jackson, 1814<ref name=treaty_1814>
{{Cite web
 | url = http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Treaties/TreatyWithTheCreeks1814.html
 | title = Treaty with The Creeks
 | access-date = October 4, 2009
 | author = Paul Burke
 | publisher = First People
}}
</ref>}}

Many Muscogee refused to surrender and escaped to Florida. They allied with other remnant tribes, becoming the [[Seminole]]. Muscogee were later involved on both sides of the [[Seminole War]]s in Florida.

===Seminole War===
The Red Stick refugees who arrived in Florida after the [[Creek War]] tripled the Seminole population, and strengthened the tribe's Muscogee characteristics.<ref>Merwyn Garbarino, ''The Seminole'' p. 40</ref> In 1814, British forces landed in [[West Florida]] and began arming the Seminoles. The British had built a strong fort on the [[Apalachicola River]] at [[Prospect Bluff Historic Sites|Prospect Bluff]], and in 1815, after the end of the [[War of 1812]], offered it, with all its ordnance ([[musket]]s, cannons, powder, shot, cannonballs) to the locals: Seminoles and [[Maroon (people)|maroon]]s (escaped slaves). A few hundred maroons constituted a uniformed [[Corps of Colonial Marines]], who had had military training, however rudimentary, and discipline (but whose English officers had departed). The Seminole only wanted to return to their villages, so the maroons became owners of the Fort. It soon came to be called the '[[Negro Fort]]' by Southern planters, and it was widely known among enslaved blacks by word of mouth – a place nearby where blacks were free and had guns, as in [[Haiti]]. The white pro-slave holding planters correctly felt its simple existence inspired escape or rebellion by the oppressed African-Americans, and they complained to the US government. The maroons had not received training in how to aim the Fort's cannons. After notifying the Spanish governor, who had very limited resources, and who said he had no orders to take action, U.S. General [[Andrew Jackson]] quickly destroyed the Fort, in a famous and picturesque, though tragic, incident in 1816 that has been called "the deadliest cannon shot in American history"<ref name="ESH2018">{{cite web|author1=Administrative staff|title=The Deadliest Cannon Shot in American History (July 27, 1816)|url=http://exploresouthernhistory.com/mobile/2016/07/27/destruction/|website=Explore Southern History|publisher=Old Kitchen Media|access-date=May 15, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170914045854/http://exploresouthernhistory.com/mobile/2016/07/27/destruction/|archive-date=September 14, 2017|date=July 27, 2016|url-status=live}}</ref> (see [[Battle of Negro Fort]]).

The Seminole continued to welcome fugitive black slaves and raid American settlers, leading the U.S. to declare war in 1817. The following year, General [[Andrew Jackson]] invaded Florida with an army that included more than 1,000 Lower Creek warriors; they destroyed Seminole towns and captured [[Pensacola]]. Jackson's victory forced Spain to sign the [[Adams–Onís Treaty]] in 1819, ceding Florida to the U.S. In 1823, a delegation of Seminole chiefs met with the new U.S. governor of Florida, expressing their opposition to proposals that would reunite them with the Upper and Lower Creek, partly because the latter tribes intended to enslave the [[Black Seminole]]s. Instead, the Seminoles agreed to move onto a reservation in inland central Florida.

===Treaties of Indian Springs===
[[Image:William McIntosh by Charles Bird King.JPG|thumb|upright|[[Charles Bird King]]'s portrait of [[William McIntosh]]]]

''Mico'' [[William McIntosh]] led the Lower Creek warriors who fought alongside the U.S. in the [[Creek War]] and the [[Seminole War|First Seminole War]]. The son of the [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]] officer of the same name who had recruited a band of [[Hitchiti]] to the British cause, McIntosh never knew his white father. He had family ties to some of Georgia's planter elite, and after the wars became a wealthy cotton-planter. Through his mother, he was born into the prominent Wind Clan of the Creek; as the Creek had a [[matrilineal]] system of descent and inheritance, he achieved his chieftainship because of her. He was also related to [[Alexander McGillivray]] and [[William Weatherford]], both mixed-race Creek.

In the late 1810s and early 1820s, McIntosh helped create a centralized police force called 'Law Menders,' establish written laws, and form a National Creek Council. Later in the decade, he came to view relocation as inevitable. In 1821, McIntosh and several other chiefs, including Chief [[Shelocta]], signed away Lower Creek lands east of the [[Flint River (Georgia)|Flint River]] at the [[first Treaty of Indian Springs]]. As a reward, McIntosh was granted {{convert|1000|acre|km2|sigfig=1}} at the treaty site, where he built a hotel to attract tourists to local hot springs.

The [[Creek National Council]] responded by prescribing the death penalty for tribesmen who surrendered additional land. Georgian settlers continued to pour into Indian lands, particularly after the discovery of gold in northern Georgia. in 1825 McIntosh and his first cousin, Georgia Governor [[George Troup]], a leading advocate of [[Indian removal]], signed the [[second Treaty of Indian Springs]] at his hotel. Signed by six other Lower Creek chiefs, the treaty ceded the last Lower Creek lands to Georgia, and allocated substantial sums to relocate the Muscogee to the [[Arkansas River]]. It provided for an equally large payment directly to McIntosh.

In April, the old [[Red Stick]] [[Menawa]] led about 200 Law Menders to execute McIntosh according to their law. They burned his upper [[Chattahoochee River|Chattahoochee]] plantation. A delegation of the Creek National Council, led by the speaker ''[[Opothleyahola]]'', traveled to Washington D.C. to protest the 1825 treaty. They convinced President [[John Quincy Adams]] that the treaty was invalid, and negotiated the more favorable [[Treaty of Washington (1826)]]. The tribe ceded their lands to Georgia in return for $200,000, although they were not required to move west. Troup ignored the new treaty and ordered the eviction of the Muscogee from their remaining lands in Georgia without compensation, mobilizing state militia when Adams threatened federal intervention.

{{blockquote|text=The government and people of the United States will always find the Muscogees anxious to preserve peace and do justice; and all they ask in return is to be treated in like manner, and spared the afflictions in which the people of Georgia appear determined to involve them. Justice is Justice. There is not one kind for the White man and another for the Red man.|source=[[Opothleyahola|Opothle Yoholo]], [[John Stedham|John Stidham]], [[Ya-ha Hadjo|Mad Wolf]], Menawee, Yoholo Micco, Tuskeekee Tustenuggee, Charles Cornnels, Apauli Tustenuggee, [[Selocta Chinnabby|Selocta]], Timpoochy Bamnett, Coosa Tustenuggee, Nahetlue Hopie, Ledagee, March 3, 1826<ref>{{Cite book |last=Caison |first=Gina |title=Red states: indigeneity, settler colonialism, and southern studies |date=2018 |publisher=The University of Georgia Press |isbn=978-0-8203-5335-7 |series=The new southern studies |location=Athens |pages=109 |language=en-us}}</ref>}}

===Removal (1834)===
In the aftermath of the [[Treaty of Fort Jackson]] and the [[Treaty of Washington (1826)]], the Muscogee were confined to a small strip of land in present-day east central [[Alabama]].

Andrew Jackson was inaugurated president of the United States in 1829, and with his inauguration the government stance toward Indians turned harsher.<ref name="jackson1829-5">
{{Cite web
 | url = http://www.nps.gov/history/seac/benning-book/ch11.htm
 | title = Fort Benning – The Land and the People
 | access-date = August 7, 2010
 | author = Sharyn Kane & Richard Keeton
 | publisher = SEAC
}}
</ref> Jackson abandoned the policy of his predecessors of treating different Indian groups as separate nations.<ref name="jackson1829-5"/> Instead, he aggressively pursued plans to move all Indian tribes living east of the Mississippi River to Oklahoma.<ref name="jackson1829-5"/>

{{blockquote|Friends and Brothers – By permission of the Great Spirit above, and the voice of the people, I have been made President of the United States, and now speak to you as your Father and friend, and request you to listen. Your warriors have known me long You know I love my white and red children, and always speak with a straight, and not with a forked tongue; that I have always told you the truth ... Where you now are, you and my white children are too near to each other to live in harmony and peace. Your game is destroyed, and many of your people will not work and till the earth. Beyond the great River Mississippi, where a part of your nation has gone, your Father has provided a country large enough for all of you, and he advises you to remove to it. There your white brothers will not trouble you; they will have no claim to the land, and you can live upon it you and all your children, as long as the grass grows or the water runs, in peace and plenty. It will be yours forever. For the improvements in the country where you now live, and for all the stock which you cannot take with you, your Father will pay you a fair price ...|President Andrew Jackson addressing the Creeks, 1829<ref name="jackson1829-5"/>}}

At Jackson's request, the United States Congress opened a fierce debate on an Indian Removal Bill.<ref name="jackson1829-5"/> In the end, the bill passed, but the vote was close. The Senate passed the measure 28 to 19, while in the House it squeaked by, 102 to 97. Jackson signed the legislation into law June 30, 1830.<ref name="jackson1829-5"/>

Following the [[Indian Removal Act]], in 1832 the Creek National Council signed the [[Treaty of Cusseta]], ceding their remaining lands east of the [[Mississippi River|Mississippi]] to the U.S., and accepting relocation to the [[Indian Territory]]. Most Muscogee were removed to Indian Territory during the [[Trail of Tears]] in 1834, with additional removals following the [[Creek War of 1836]], although some remained behind.

{{blockquote|By 1836, when extensive Creek removal was underway, Eneah Emathala emerged as leader of the Lower Creeks ... their desire was only to be left alone in their homeland ... Gen. Winfield Scott was ordered to capture Eneah Emathala ... Captured with Emathala were some one thousand other person ... their [racial] colors were black, red, and white ...|Burt & Ferguson- ''Indians of the Southeast: Then and Now'' }}

===American Civil War (1861)===
{{See also|Indian Territory in the American Civil War}}
[[Image:Creeks in Oklahoma.png|thumb|left|Members of the Creek Nation in Oklahoma around 1877. They included men of mixed Creek, European and African ancestry.]]
At the outbreak of the [[American Civil War]], ''[[Opothleyahola]]'' refused to form an alliance with the [[Confederate States of America|Confederacy]], unlike many other tribes, including many of the Lower Creeks. Runaway slaves, free blacks, [[Chickasaw]] and [[Seminole Indians]] began gathering at Opothleyahola's plantation, where they hoped to remain neutral in the conflict between the [[Northern United States|North]] and [[Southern United States|South]]. On August 15, 1861, Opothleyahola and tribal chief ''Micco Hutko'' contacted President [[Abraham Lincoln]] to request help for the Union loyalists. On September 10, they received a positive response, stating the United States government would assist them. The letter directed Opothleyahola to move his people to [[Fort Row]] in [[Wilson County, Kansas]], where they would receive [[right of asylum|asylum]] and aid.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://skyways.lib.ks.us/kansas/genweb/woodson/Yahola.txt|title=Woodson County history|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110628183334/http://skyways.lib.ks.us/kansas/genweb/woodson/Yahola.txt|archive-date=June 28, 2011}}</ref> They became known as Loyalists, and many were members of the traditional Snake band in the latter part of the century.

Because many Muscogee Creek people did support the Confederacy during the Civil War, the US government required a new treaty with the nation in 1866 to define peace after the war. It required the Creek to [[emancipate]] their [[slaves]] and to admit them as full members and citizens of the Creek Nation, equal to the Creek in receiving annuities and land benefits. They were then known as Creek Freedmen. The US government required setting aside part of the Creek reservation land to be assigned to the Freedmen. Many of the tribe resisted these changes. The loss of lands contributed to problems for the nation in the late 19th century.

The Loyalists among the Creek tended to be [[traditional values|traditionalists]]. They formed the core of a band that became known as the Snakes, which also included many Creek Freedmen. At the end of the century, they resisted the extinguishing of tribal government and break-up of communal tribal lands enacted by the US Congress with the [[Dawes Commission]] of 1892. These efforts were part of the US government's attempt to impose assimilation on the tribes, to introduce household ownership of land, and to remove legal barriers to the Indian Territory's achieving statehood. Members of the Creek Nation were registered as individuals on the [[Dawes Rolls]]; the Commission separately registered intermarried whites and Creek Freedmen, whether or not they had any Creek ancestry. This ruined their claims to Creek membership later, even for people who had parents or other relative who were Creek. The Dawes Rolls have been used as the basis for many tribes to establish membership descent. European-American settlers had moved into the area and pressed for statehood and access to some of the tribal lands for settlement.

===Today===
Some Muscogee in Alabama live near the federally recognized [[Poarch Creek Reservation]] in [[Atmore, Alabama|Atmore]] northeast of [[Mobile, Alabama]], and Muscogee live in essentially undocumented ethnic towns in Florida. The Alabama reservation includes a [[Native American gaming|casino]] and 16-story hotel. The Creek tribe holds an annual [[powwow]] on [[Thanksgiving]]. Additionally, Muscogee descendants of varying degrees of acculturation live throughout the southeastern United States. The majority of the Muscogee citizens live in Oklahoma, where the Muscogee Reservation is located. The Muscogee Nation is headquartered out of the nation's capital [[Okmulgee, Oklahoma|Okmulgee]]. The Muscogee Nation has over 100,000 citizens as of 2024,<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024-07-30 |title=Home - The Muscogee Nation |url=https://www.muscogeenation.com/#wpsm_counter_b_row_21918 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240730084150/https://www.muscogeenation.com/#wpsm_counter_b_row_21918 |archive-date=2024-07-30 |access-date=2024-07-30 |website=www.muscogeenation.com |language=en-US}}</ref> The Muscogee Nation has increased in popularity due to the television series [[Reservation Dogs]], which follows the lives of four Creek teens in Oklahoma.