Disgusted with the inability of Pickens and Congress to control states like Georgia, the Creeks accelerated their attacks against encroachments on both their land to the east along the Georgia border and the shared southeastern Indian hunting lands to the north on the Tennessee River. Fighting for these lands was trickier than previous battles because the Chickasaws had agreed to a peace treaty with the United States, known as the Hopewell Treaty, signed earlier that year. This treaty granted the United States five square miles at Muscle Shoals on the Tennessee River to construct a trading post, raising questions about the validity of the Creeks’ claim to the land. McGillivray interpreted the Hopewell Treaty as a violation of the terms of the Southern Confederacy and the Chickasaws’ treaty with Spain, whereas Chickasaws believed they had the right to their own foreign policy. Because McGillivray promised the Creeks that Spain would support them in their war, his relationship with Governor O’Neill was more important than ever.
Sir,
In my last letter to Your Excellency, I explained the state of the negotiations between my nation of the Creek Indians and the American States.
I do not need to tell Your Excellency that all of our attempts to settle the difficulties regarding our hunting lands with the American States in an amicable way have been fruitless and without effect because they not only continue in their earlier pretended rights but have also proceeded in a way that has persuaded us that it is their resolution to dispossess us of all of our lands and possessions, not only of the part that borders on their state of Georgia but also those that we own on the waters of the Mississippi, resulting in a critical and dangerous situation for similar proceedings, and to preserve our lands and families we saw ourselves obligated to adopt the only method that we had left, which was for our nation to take up arms, and we have evicted all the Americans that had established themselves in our hunting lands on the Okoma [Oconee] River to the east of our Nation and to the northwest on the Cherokee [Tennessee] River, a place that the Americans have started to establish called Chake Holocko or the Big Ford by the Indians and by the whites Muscle Shoals.
In the execution of this matter we have taken care to act with moderation and firmness without spilling blood and have evicted them without giving them any injury because we had no intention of making war on the Americans but only to assure our rights to our unquestionable property, which we have resolved to defend at any risk against the Americans’ determination to dispossess us of it.
In consequence of having taken these measures it may be probable that the State of Georgia will commence hostilities against us to support their injustice, for which reason we beseech Your Excellency to assist us with arms and munitions so that we will be prepared to counter and repel whatever attack and invasions that the Americans may make against us or our lands, for although we do not intend to make and have not made war on the Americans we want nonetheless to defend our lives and property against all attacks. In making this request to Your Excellency regarding assistance in defense, we have the utmost confidence that the benevolent and gracious disposition of His Majesty our great protector will approve Your Excellency’s conduct for our benefit and succor, and we have equal confidence in the humane and generous disposition of all of His Majesty’s major officials to give us all possible aid in any disputes in which we engage ourselves against the Americans for our lands, in which His Majesty’s interests are the same as our interests, as I have explained to Your Excellency previously.
I also need to inform Your Excellency that there are one or two Chiefs of the Chickasaw Nation who have been deceived by the Americans to the point of conceding their lands on the Chake-Holoke [Muscle Shoals] which belong to my nation. We have retaken these lands and evicted the Americans. This conduct on the part of the Chickasaw Chiefs has angered most of the rest of the confederated Nations to the point of wanting to attack and castigate them for their fault; but on my return to my house I will take measures to settle this difference between them, going in person to the Chickasaw Nation for this purpose to handle it to the satisfaction of the rest of the Nations that are confederated against the Americans, of which nations ours is the head and principal, and force the Chickasaws to remain firmly loyal to the Spanish Crown whose protection they solicited and received at the same time as us.
Having informed Your Excellency of all of our news I take the liberty of concluding with the most respect….
Source: Mississippi Provincial Archives: Spanish Dominion, 1759–1804, comp. Dunbar Rowland, Jackson, Miss., microfilm reel 2, doc. 52, pp. 655–59 (translated by Kathleen DuVal from the 1786 Spanish translation because McGillivray’s original English letter has been lost).
Evaluating the Evidence