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Alabama History
and Incidentally Georgia and
Mississippi
Table of Contents
About four years since, feeling impressed
with the fact that it was the duty of every
man to make himself, in some way, useful to
his race, I looked around in search of some
object, in the pursuit of which I could
benefit my fellow-citizens; for, although
much interested in agriculture, that did not
occupy one-fourth of my time. Having no
taste for politics, and never having studied
a profession, I determined to write a
History. I thought it would serve to amuse
my leisure hours, but it has been the
hardest work of my life. While exhausted by
the labor of reconciling the statements of
old authors, toiling over old French and
Spanish manuscripts, traveling through
Florida, Alabama and Mississippi for
information, and corresponding with persons
in Europe and elsewhere for facts, I have
sometimes almost resolved to abandon the
attempt to prepare a History of my State.
In reference to that portion of the work
which relates to the Indians, I will state
that my father removed from Anson county,
North Carolina, and carried me to the wilds
of the "Alabama Territory," in 1818, when I
was a boy but eight years of age. He
established a trading-house in connection
with his plantation, in the present county
of Autauga. During my youthful days, I was
accustomed to be much with the Creek
Indians-- hundreds of whom came almost daily
to the trading-house. For twenty years I
frequently visited the Creek nation. Their
green corn dances, ball plays, war
ceremonies, and manners and customs, are
fresh in my recollections. In my intercourse
with them I was thrown into the company of
many old white men, called "Indian
countrymen, " who had for years conducted a
commerce with them. Some of these men had
come to the Creek nation before the
revolutionary war, and others being Tories,
had fled to it during the war, and after it,
to escape from Whig persecution. They were
unquestionably the shrewdest and most
interesting men with whom I ever conversed.
Generally of Scotch descent, many of them
were men of some education. All of them were
married to Indian wives, and some of them
had intelligent and handsome children. From
these Indian countrymen I learned much
concerning the manners and customs of the
Creeks, with whom they had so long been
associated, and more particularly with
regard to the commerce which that carried on
with them. In addition to this, I often
conversed with the Chiefs while they were
seated in the shades of the spreading
mulberry and walnut, upon the banks of the
beautiful Tallapoosa. As they leisurely
smoked their pipes, some of them related to
me the traditions of their country. I
occasionally saw Choctaw and Cherokee
traders, learned much from them. I had no
particular object in view at that time,
except the gratification of a curiosity,
which led me for my own satisfaction alone,
to learn something of the early history of
Alabama.
In relation to the invasion of Alabama by De
Soto, which is related in the first chapter
of this work, I have derived much
information in regard to the route of that
earliest discoverer from statements of
General McGillivray, a Creek of mixed blood,
who ruled this country with eminent ability
from 1776 to 1793. I have perused the
manuscript history of the Creeks by
Stiggins, a half-breed, who also received
some particulars of the route of De Soto
during his boyhood from the lips of the
oldest Indians. My library contains many old
Spanish and French maps, with the towns
through which De Soto passed correctly laid
down. The sites of many of these are
familiar to the present population. Besides
all these, I have procured from England and
France three journals of De Soto's
expedition.
One of these journals was written by a
cavalier of the expedition, who was a native
of Elvas, in Portugal. He finished his
narrative on the 10th February, 1557, in the
city of Evora, and it was printed in the
house of Andrew de Burgos, printer and
gentleman of the Lord Cardinal and the
Infanta. It was translated into English by
Richard Hakluyt in 1609, and is to be found
in the supplementary volume of his voyages
and discoveries; London, 1812. It is also
published at length in the Historical
Collections of Peter Force, of Washington
City.
Another journal of the expedition was
written by the Inca Garcellasso de la Vega,
a Peruvian by birth and a native of the city
of Cuzco. His father was a Spaniard of noble
blood, and his mother the sister of Capac,
one of the Indian sovereigns of Peru.
Garcellasso was a distinguished writer of
that age. He had heard of the remarkable
invasion of Florida by De Soto, and he
applied himself diligently to obtain the
facts. He found out an intelligent cavalier
of that expedition, with whom he had minute
conversations of all the particulars of it.
In addition to this, journals were placed in
his hands written in the camp of De Soto,
one by Alonzo de Carmona, a native of the
town of Priego, and the other by Juan Coles,
a native of Zafra. Garcellasso published his
work at an early period in Spanish. It has
been translated into French, but never into
English. The copy in our hands is entitled
"Histoire de la Conquete de la Floride ou
relation, de ce qui s'est passé dans la
découverte de ce pais, par Ferdinand De
Soto, Composée en Espagnol, par L'Inca
Garcellasso de la Vega, et traduite en
François, par Sr. Pierre Richelet, en deux
tomes; A. Leide: 1731."
I have still another journal, and the last
one, of the expedition of De Soto. It was
written by Biedma, who accompanied De Soto
as his commissary. The journal is entitled,
"Relation de ce qui arriva pendant le voyage
du Captaine Soto, et details sur la nature
du pas qu'il parcourut; par Luis Hernandez
de Biedma," contained in a volume entitled "Recuil
de Pieces sur la Floride," one of a series
of "Voyages et memoires originaux pour
servir a L'Histoire de la decouverte de
L'Amerique publies pour la premier fois en
Francois: par H. Ternaux-Compans. Paris:
1841"
In Biedma there is an interesting letter
written by De Soto, while he was at Tampa
Bay, in Florida, which was addressed to some
town authorities in Cuba. The journal of
Biedma is much less in detail than those of
the Portuguese Gentleman and Garcellasso,
but agrees with them in the relation of the
most important occurrences.
Our own accomplished writer and earliest
pioneer in Alabama history--Alexander B.
Meek, of Mobile--has furnished a condensed,
but well written and graphic account of De
Soto's expedition, contained in a monthly
magazine, entitled "The Southron,"
Tuscaloosa, 1839. He is correct as to the
direction assumed by the Spaniards over our
soil, as well as to the character of that
extraordinary conquest.
Theodore Irving, M. A., of New York, has
recently issued a revised edition of his
Conquest of Florida. Its style is easy and
flowing, when the author journalizes in
regard to marches through the country, and
is exceedingly graphic, when he gives us a
description of De Soto's battles. As I have
closely examined the sources from which Mr.
Irving has collated his work, I am prepared
to state that he has related all things as
they are said to have occurred. For the
complimentary terms which Mr. Irving has
employed in the preface, and also in many of
the notes of his late edition, in relation
to my humble efforts in endeavoring to throw
new light upon the expedition of De Soto, I
beg him to accept my profound
acknowledgements.
Albert James Pickett
Table of Contents
Notes About Book:
Source: History of Alabama, Incidentally of Georgia and Mississippi, From the
Earliest Period, Albert James Pickett, 1851, Walker and James, Charleston.
Online Publication: The manuscript was scanned and then ocr'd. Minimal editing
has been done, and readers can and should expect some errors in the textual
output.
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