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Yuchi Indian Tribe
History
Yuchi. Significance unknown,
but perhaps, as suggested by Speck (1909), from a native word meaning
"those far away," or "at a distance," though it is also possible that it
is a variant of Ochesee or O eese, which was applied by the Hitchiti and
their allies to Indians speaking languages different from their own.
Also
called:
Ani'-Yu'tsl, Cherokee name.
Chiska, probably a Muskogee translation of the name of one of their
bands.
Hughchee, an early synonym.
Round town people, a name given by the early English colonists.
Rickohockans, signifying "cavelanders" (Hewitt, in Hodge, 1907),
perhaps an early name for a part of them.
Tahogalewi, abbreviated to Hogologe, name given them by the
Delaware and other Algonquian people.
Tamahita, so called by some Indians, perhaps some of the eastern Siouans.
Tsoyaha, "People of the sun," their own name, or at least the name
of one band.
Westo, perhaps a name applied to them by the Cusabo Indians of
South Carolina though the identification is not beyond question.
Connections
The Yuchi constituted a
linguistic stock, the Uchean, distinct from all others, though structurally
their speech bears a certain resemblance to the languages of the Muskhogean and
Siouan families.
Location
The earliest
known location of the Yuchi was in eastern Tennessee, perhaps near
Manchester, but some of them extended still farther east, while others
were as far west as Muscle Shoals. On archeological grounds Prof. T. M. N.
Lewis believes that one main center of the Yuchi was on Hiwassee River. We
find settlements laid down on the maps as far north as Green River,
Kentucky. In later times a part settled in West Florida, near the present
Eucheeanna, and another part on Savannah and Ogeechee Rivers. (See also
Alabama,
Florida, Oklahoma,
Tennessee, and
South Carolina.)
Subdivisions
There appear to have been three
principal bands in historic times: one on Tennessee River, one in West Florida,
and one on Savannah River, but only a suggestion of native band names has
survived. Recently Wagner has heard of at least three subdivisional names, including the Tsoyaha, or "Sun
People" and the Root People.
Villages
Most of their settlements are given the name of the
tribe, Yuchi, or one of its synonyms. In early times they occupied a town
in eastern Tennessee called by the Cherokee Tsistu'yǐ,
"Rabbit place," on the north bank of Hiwassee River at the entrance of
Chestua Creek in Polk County, Tenn., and at one time also that of
Hiwassee, or Euphasee, at the Savannah Ford of Hiwassee River. The
Savannah River band had villages at Mount Pleasant, probably in Screven
County, Ga., near the mouth of Brier Creek, 2 miles below Silver Bluff on
Savannah River in Barnwell County; and one on Ogeechee River bearing the
name of that stream, though that was itself perhaps one form of the name
Yuchi. Hawkins (1848) mentions former villages at Ponpon and Saltketchers
in South Carolina, but these probably belonged to the Yamasee.
The following Yuchi settlements
were established after the tribe united with the Lower Creeks:
Arkansaw River, in Oklahoma.
Big Pond Town, Polecat Creek, and Sand Creek, in and near Creek
County, Okla.
Blackjack Town.
Deep Fork Creek, Okla.
Duck Creek Town.
Intatchkĺlgi, on Opilthlako
Creek 28 miles above its junction with Flint River, probably in Schley County, Ga.
Padshilaika, at the junction of
Patchilaika Creek with Flint River, Macon County, Ga.
Red Fork, location uncertain.
Snake Creek, location uncertain.
Spring Garden Town, above Lake George, Fla.
Tokogalgi, on Kinchafoonee Creek, an affluent of Flint River, Ga.
History
The chroniclers of the De Soto
expedition mention the Yuchi under the name Chisca, at one or more points in
what is now Tennessee. In 1567 Boyano, an
officer under Juan Pardo, had two desperate encounters with these Indians
somewhere in the highlands of Tennessee or North Carolina, and, according
to his own story, destroyed great numbers of them. In 1670 Lederer (1912)
heard of people called Rickohockans living in the mountains who may have
been Yuchi, and two white men sent from Virginia by Abraham Wood visited a
Yuchi town on a head stream of the Tennessee in 1674. About this time
also, English explorers and settlers in South Carolina were told of a
warlike tribe called Westo (probably a division of Yuchi) who had struck
terror into all of the coast Indians, and hostilities later broke out
between them and the colonists. At this juncture, however, a band of
Shawnee made war upon the Westo and drove them from the Savannah. For a
time they seem to have given themselves up to a roving life, and some of
them went so far inland that they encountered La Salle and settled near
Fort St. Louis, near the present Utica, Ill. Later some were located among
the Creeks on Ocmulgee River, and they removed with them to the
Chattahoochee in 1715. Another band of Yuchi came to live on Savannah
River about 20 miles above Augusta, probably after the expulsion of the
Westo. They were often called Hogologe. In 1716 they also moved to the
Chattahoochee but for a time occupied a town distinct from that of the
other Yuchi. It was probably this band which settled near the Shawnee on
Tallapoosa River and finally united with them. Still later occurred a
third influx of Yuchi who occupied the Savannah between Silver Bluff and
Ebenezer Creek. In 1729 a Kasihta chief named Captain Ellick married three
Yuchi women and persuaded some of the Yuchi Indians to move over among the
Lower Creeks, but Governor Oglethorpe of Georgia guaranteed them their
rights to their old land until after 1740, and the final removal did not,
in fact, take place until 1751.
A still earlier invasion of southern territories by
Yuchi is noted by one of the governors of Florida in a letter dated 1639.
These invaders proved a constant source of annoyance to the Spaniards.
Finally they established themselves in West Florida not far from the
Choctawhatchee River, where they were attacked by an allied Spanish and
Apalachee expedition in 1677 and suffered severely. They continued to live
in the same region, however, until some time before 1761 when they moved
to the Upper Creeks and settled near the Tukabahchee. Eucheeanna in Walton
County, Fla. seems to preserve their name.
A certain number of Yuchi remained in the neighborhood
of Tennessee River, and at one time they were about Muscle Shoals. They
also occupied a town in the Cherokee country, called by the latter tribe Tsistu'yl, and Hiwassee at Savannah Ford. In 1714, the former was cut off
by the Cherokee in revenge for the murder of a member of their tribe,
instigated by two English traders. Later tradition affirms that the
surviving Yuchi fled to Florida, but many of them certainly remained in
the Cherokee country for a long time afterward, and probably eventually
migrated west with their hosts.
A small band of Yuchi joined the Seminole just before
the outbreak of the Seminole War. They appear first in West Florida, near
the Mikasuki but later had a town at Spring Garden in Volusia County.
Their presence is indicated down to the end of the war in the Peninsula,
when they appear to have gone west, probably reuniting with the remainder
of the tribe.
The Yuchi who stayed with the Creeks accompanied them
west and settled in one body in the northwestern part of the old Creek
Nation, in Creek County, Okla.
Population
For the year 1650 Mooney (1928)
makes an estimate of 1,500 for the Yuchi in Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee, but
this does not include the "Westo," for whom, with the Stono, he allows 1,600.
The colonial census of 1715 gives 2 Yuchi towns with 130 men and 400 souls, but
this probably takes into consideration only 1 band out of 3 or 4. In 1730 the
band still on Tennessee River was supposed to contain about 150 men. In 1760, 50
men are reported in the Lower Creek town and 15 in one among the Upper Creeks.
In 1777 Bartram (1792) estimated the number of Yuchi warriors in the lower town
at 500 and their total population as between 1,000 and,1,500. In 1792 Marbury
(1792) reports 300 men, or a population of over 1,000, and Hawkins in 1799 says
the Lower Creek Yuchi claimed 250 men. According to the census of 1832—33 there
were 1,139 in 2 towns known to have been occupied by Indians of this connection.
In 1909 Speck stated that the whole number of Yuchi could "hardly exceed five
hundred," but the official report for 1910 gives only 78. That, however, must
have been an underestimate as the census of 1930 reported 216. Owing to the
number of Yuchi bands, their frequent changes in location, and the various terms
applied to them, an exact estimate of their numbers at any period is very
difficult. In the first half of the sixteenth century they may well have
numbered more than 5,000.
Connection in which they have
become noted
The Yuchi have attained an
altogether false reputation as the supposed aborigines of the Gulf region. They
were also noted for the uniqueness of their language among the Southeastern
tongues. The name is preserved in Euchee, a post hamlet of Meigs County, Tenn.; Eucheeanna,
a post village of Walton County, Fla.; Euchee (or Uchee) Creek, Russell
County, Ala.; Uchee, a post station of Russell County, Ala.; Uchee Creek,
Columbia County, Ga.; and an island in Savannah River near the mouth of
the latter.
Resources:
Notes About the Book:
Source: The Indian Tribes of North America, by John R. Swanton, 1953, Bureau of
American Ethnology, Bulletin 145, US Government Printing Office, Washington DC.
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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