In the 1790s and early 1800s, U.S. treaties recognized Creek land ownership, but illegal encroachment by whites began cycles of violence and revenge by both sides. The Creeks disagreed on how to respond, with some accepting white influence and seeking to cooperate with the U.S., while others wanted to defend their land and traditions. These divisions led to civil war in 1813, and the U.S. joined the fight against the traditionalists, known as the Red Sticks. Forces led by Andrew Jackson destroyed Red Stick towns and confronted them in a final great battle at Horseshoe Bend on March 27, 1814. American artillery was ineffective against a massive barricade of pine logs, but after a detachment of U.S. soldiers and Indian allies attacked from a second position across the Tallapoosa River, Jackson's men topped the barricade. More than eight hundred Red Stick warriors died in the hand-to-hand combat that followed, ending Creek resistance. After Horseshoe Bend, the Creeks were forced to surrender most of their lands in Alabama, opening nearly fourteen million acres to settlement as worn-out farmland in Georgia, Carolina, and Virginia pushed thousands westward, many by way of the Federal Road, in a movement known as Alabama Fever. Wealthy planters acquired large tracts in the Black Belt and the Tennessee Valley, while yeoman farmers settled small plots mostly in the hill country. Within another twenty years, the U.S. would forcibly remove nearly all the remaining Indians, opening still more land.

Photo: Mark Hilton

Photo: Mark Hilton

Photo: Mark Hilton

Montgomery, Alabama · USA