The Negro Abraham by Kenneth Wiggins Porter Abraham, a Black Seminole Leader in the Second Seminole War (1835-1842). The Indians called him Souanaffe Tustenukke, a title indicating membership in the highest of the three ranks of war leaders. He is wearing typical Seminole dress and holding a rifle. One of the most remarkable personalities produced by the African race in this country before general emancipation was an illiterate runaway slave who spent almost all his mature life among Seminole Indians. This judgment is, perhaps, either too cautious to be meaningful or too bold to be convincing, according to the direction from which one chooses to approach it. “One of the most remarkable?’’ Yes, perhaps ; but one out of how many? Half a dozen? A dozen? Or perhaps a hundred? If one of the smaller numbers is selected the question arises: Where does this “remarkable personality” rank with such a writer as Phyllis Wheatley? such a scientist as Benjamin Banneker? such a minister and theologian as Lemuel Haynes? such insurrectionists as Gabriel, Denmark Vesey, and Nat Turner? such propagandists, orators, and abolitionists as David Walker, William Wells Brown, Samuel Ringgold Ward, Jermain W. Loguen, Lewis Hayden, not to mention Frederick Douglass? Obviously this illiterate runaway slave could have played no significant part in the same arena with any of these, save, perhaps, the insurrectionists; but none of these, on the other hand, could claim to have been so directly and importantly influential in first bringing about and, ultimately,terminating a serious, protracted, and expensive war. It could, I think, be said, at any rate, that our subject received at one important period in his lifemore general and, at the same time, more generally respectful attention, South and North, than any of the others mentioned for comparison, for though he was greatly admired by some and strongly disliked by others, his great ability and influence were recognized by all. Abraham, or Abram, was of middle age when, in the early years of the Seminole War, he first became a figure of national importance, having been born, probably, between 1787 and 1791. Our knowledge of his ancestry, entirely, and of his early life, almost as much so, is derived from inference. He was a full-blooded Negro, 2 who in his youth, had been a slave in Pensacola to Dr. Sierra, but who, despite his residence on Spanish soil and his servitude to a gentleman of Spanish surname, seems to have been himself “English raised,” or the son of parents who were, since there is no evidence that he was ever acquainted with Spanish, or with any language except English and the Muskhogean tongue of the Seminole. Since he was a city Negro, the presumption is that he was a domestic servant of some sort, and this probability is strengthened by the characteristics universally ascribed to him not merely of intelligence, but also of fluency, courtesy, and even courtliness. He always smiles, and his words flow like oil. His conversation is soft and low, but very distinct, with a most genteel emphasis,” commented a careful observer, while another officer, well acquainted with him, referred to “his gentle, insinuating manner, and still another, speaking from hearsay, probably meant the same when he called him “plausible, pliant and deceitful” and spoke of his “exterior of profound meekness.” His carriage was also in conformity with an earlier role as butler or valet, and it is remarkable that observers independently found something decidedly “French” in his manner. “He walks like a courtier of the reign of Louis XVI,” was one comment, while another officer described his “slight inclination forward like a Frenchman of the old school. It is obvious, at least, that here was no heavy-footed field-hand or thick-tongued stevedore, but a Negro who was possessed of manner and “manners.” Abraham’s manner was apparently more distinguished than his physique and, perhaps for that reason, the latter was variously and even somewhat contradictorily described. “Abraham is a non-committal man,” wrote one officer, “with a countenance which none can read, a person erect and active and in stature over six feet.Another wrote that “his figure is large, his face broad and square, having the thick lips of a full-blooded negro. Still another, however, found him to be “of ordinary stature, rather thin, with a slight inclination forward. . . . His countenance is one of great cunning and penetration ; perhaps it was this characteristic courteous stoop which made his height sometimes appear only ordinary. His physiognomy also impressed observers somewhat variously. “He had a remarkably high and broad forehead; but an awful cast in his right eye, which gave to his gentle, insinuating manner a very sinister effect,” commented one officer. Another, more briefly but to the same purpose : “Abraham is an intelligent negro, cross-eyed, with a bad countenance. Still another, more favorably though less vividly: “Abraham’s countenance combines a vast degree of cunning and shrewdness, and he is altogether a remarkable looking negro. An alleged portrait, frequently reproduced, represents him as a rather fine-looking Negro with a slight mustache and the characteristic inclination of his head, wearing the typical Seminole turban and resting on a rifle. Perhaps these varying descriptions may be reconciled to describe Abraham as a full-blooded Negro, of somewhat more than average height, sparely but strongly built, with an intelligent face, a distorted right eye, and conspicuously polished manners. How did it happen that one who, as “a lad,” meaning, no doubt, a young man, had been a slave, probably a domestic servant, in the city of Pensacola, should, when we next encounter trustworthy notice of him, several years later, be a confidential “slave” of Mikonopi, head-chief of the Seminoles, far to the south and east, near the headwaters of the Withlacoochee? What circumstances caused him to flee civilization and seek refuge among a comparatively barbarous people? We cannot answer positively ; we can only draw inferences from the known events of the time and place. In 1812 war had broken out between the United States and Great Britain, and in 1814 the conflict approached the shores of supposedly neutral Spanish Florida. Late in July, seeking bases and support for an attack on New Orleans, a British force of something over a hundred men under Maj. Edward Nicholls, with two sloops of war, occupied Pensacola, hoisted the British flag beside the Spanish, issued a threatening and consoling proclamation to the people of Louisiana and Kentucky, and began to recruit and arm both the Red Stick Creekrefugees from Gen. Jackson, and the runaway slaves from the United States, many of whom were in the vicinity. He also swelled his scanty force by enlistingand drilling a number of slaves belonging to residents of Pensacola, to whom he offered freedom and free lands in the British West Indies. Among these recruits, very probably, was young Abraham, and when Gen. Jackson stormed Pensacola on November 7, and the British, who had withdrawn to Ft. Barrancas with their Indian and Negro allies, blew up and evacuated the fortifications on the following day and sailed for the Apalachicola, he was probably one of the “about one hundred negro slaves’’ who were landed on the eastern bank of that river, about fifteen miles from the mouth, at a place called Prospect Bluff, and employed in building a fort which was called British Post and used by Nicholls as a headquarters for his negotiations with Seminole and Red Stick Indians and with the runaway Negroes from the United States in whom the region already abounded. Nicholls remained at the fort even after the Treaty of Ghent, negotiating with the Seminole chief Bowlegs and frequently writing letters on his behalf to the United States Indian agent, but early in the summer of 1815 finally set sail for London, taking with him his troops and a few Red Stick chiefs, but leaving behind him most of the Red Sticks, all the Negroes, and great quantities of arms and ammunition, including ten pieces of artillery. The Red Sticks soon moved off to the eastward, but 300 Negroes, including women and children, established themselves in the fort under the strict discipline of a Negro chief named Garcon or Garcia, and were joined by about twenty renegade Choctaw and a few Seminoles from Bowlegs’ town on the Suwanee. They summoned the thousand or more runaway Negroes then estimated to be in Florida to settle under the protection offered by the guns o fthe fort, and soon their settlements were extending fifty miles up and down the river, causing such alarm to Georgia planters that Gen. Jackson ordered that the fort be destroyed, regardless of its location on Spanish territory, and the Negroes “restored to their rightful owners.” By July, 1816, the Negro Fort was invested from the river by a little fleet of two gunboats and two transports and on land by United States troops assisted by slavehunting Creeks. On the 17th a boat’s crew from one of the gun-boats was nearly annihilated by ambushed Negroes, but on the 27th, after a brisk exchange of artillery fire, one of the gun-boats succeeded in planting a red-hot shot in the fort’s magazine, which was blown into the air, killing 270 of the garrison and mortally injuring nearly all the others. The Negro chief Garcon and the Choctaw chief, who were among the few survivors, were turned over to the Creeks, who shot Garcon, scalped the Choctaw chief alive, and subsequently stabbed him to death. The Negro prisoners were returned to slavery. This destruction, however, extended only to the garrison, who seem to have been almost entirely Spanish-speaking Negroes from Pensacola. TheAmerican Negroes, refugees from Georgia plantations, who were settled along the river, escaped into the forest at the approach of the blockading force, and were able to reach King Bowlegs’ villages on the Suwanee, already a resort for fugitive Negroes. If we are right in our assumption that Abraham was among the Negroes who left Pensacola with the British and settled on Prospect Bluff, we can account for his escape from the general destruction which befell the garrison by imagining that he hadearlier left the fort and settled among the possibly more congenial English-speaking runaways. Abraham, whenever and however he reached Bowlegs’ town on the Suwanee, became, on his arrival, the “slave” either of Bowlegs himself or ofthe heir-apparent, his nephew, Mikonopi. He did not thereby merely exchange one form of servitude for another of a less onerous nature, for so-called slavery among the Seminoles was so utterly unlike that among the whites that the difference was one of kind rather than merely of degree. The Seminoles, observing that prestige was attached among the powerful whites to the presence of black people were glad to have Negroes associated with them, but had no idea of exploiting them, day by day,either as plantation laborers or domestic servants. The so-called slaves, whether legally purchased from Spanish or British owners, or, as was more frequently the case, runaways or the descendants of runaways who had put themselves under the protection of a Seminole chief, lived, according to a contemporary account, “in villages separate, and, in many cases, remote from their owners, and enjoying equal liberty with their owners, with thesingle exception that the slave supplied his ownerannually, from the product of his little field, with corn, in proportion to the amount of the crop; and in no instance, that has come to my knowledge, exceeding ten bushels; the residue is considered the property of the slave. Many of these slaves have stocks of horses, cows, and hogs, with which the Indian master never assumes the right to intermeddle. . . . An Indian would almost as soon sell his child as his slave. The Negroes were thus in the position of dependents, or proteges, of the Indians, rather than that of slaves, the understanding being that in re-turn for a tribute of corn and other agricultural products from the Negro, the Indian master would protect him against being claimed as a slave by any white man. The Negroes not merely lived apart from their masters, in their own villages-an evidence of independence which they greatly prized-frequently possessed large herds, and were under no supervision by their masters or patrons, but also dipped their spoons into the sofky pot with their lord and his family whenever they happened to be at his home, habitually carried arms, went into battle along with the Seminole warriors, under their own captains, and, save for the slight annual tribute, were under no greater subjection to the chiefs than were the Seminole tribesmen themselves. The relationship might be described as one of primitive democratic feudalism, involving no essential personal inequality. General Gaines spoke with approximate accuracy, when, avoiding the more common term of “slaves,” he referred to “the Seminole Indians with their black vassals and allies. The Indians found the Negroes useful not merely as tributary agriculturists and auxiliaries in battle, but also as interpreters and counsellors. Their knowledge of European languages, their better acquaintance with the mysterious ways of the white men, gave them an advantage over the less sophisticated Indians, who came to depend on them for advice to such an extent that white observers began to say that the Indians were ruled by the Negroes and that the Seminole government was actually a doulocracy, a government by slaves. It was in this situation that Abraham became an element, and to its development an important contributor.His early life among the Indians is obscure. If our assumption that he was one of the Pensacola Negroes who left that city with the British, and subsequently fled to the Suwanee from the destruction of the Negro Fort, is correct, he must have been at Bowlegs’ Town at the time of the Battle of the Suwanee, in April, 1818, when the Negroes, after most of the Indians had fled, though hopelessly outnumbered put up to the inexorable advance of Andrew Jackson’s army a brief but desperate resistance which won them the admiration of some of their enemies. Perhaps it was on this occasion that he won the war-title of “Souanaffe Tustenukke” which he was using twenty years later, and which, although interpreted as “Shawnee Warrior,” might perhaps signify “Suwanee Warrior. Perhaps he was the “Indian Negro, named Abraham,” whom Harmon H. Holliman “employed. . . to go into the nation for the purpose of bringing in . . . a Negro woman and her child,” who had been plundered by the Seminoles from Georgia. On his return to “Hope Hill on the St. Johns river, about three miles south of Volutia,” in March, 1822, he announced his arrival by a “loud whoop. He was probably by this time living at the Negro town of Pilaklikaha, occupied chiefly by “runaway slaves from Georgia who have put themselves under the protection of Micanopy, or some other chiefs,” and who possessed fine fields and good houses. An officer who visited it in September, 1826, remarked that the “three principal men . . . bear the distinguished names of July, August, and Abraham. . . shrewd, intelligent fellows, and to the highest degree obsequious. The first unmistakable episode of importance in his career was his accompanying as interpreter to Washington in 1825-1826 a delegation of Seminoles headed by his master Mikonopi, who had been principal chief at least since 1823 and probably for two or three years earlier. On his return he was liberated “in consequence of his many and faithful services and great merits,” though his emancipation was not formally recorded until June 18, 1835. He had already been rewarded by being given for a wife “the widow of the former chief of the nation,” 25 presumably a woman of Negro, or part- Negro blood, and a slave, who had been the wife or mistress of King Bowlegs. She was probably the woman by the name of Hagar whose son by Abraham, named Renty, was freed by his father in 1839; Abraham had at least one or two other sons, one named Washington, and at least one daughter, probably all by this same woman. The United States government had determined to make room for white settlers and prevent Indian wars by removing the tribes east of the Mississippi to the Indian Territory, a region including much of the area now occupied by the states of Oklahoma and Kansas. The Seminole, alone of the Five Civilized Tribes of the south, put up a violent and protracted resistance to removal. It was natural that they should object to leaving the forests and swamps of their fatherland for the unfamiliar prairies and more severe climate of the Indian Territory-a land, too, which bordered on the territory of wild and potentially hostile Indians. The reluctance of the Negroes to depart was intensified by the fact that as the agriculturists of the nation they had a special attachment for the fields they had cleared and tilled. The unwillingness of the Seminole Indians to be domiciled, as was the plan, with and under the control of their kinsmen the Creeks, from whom they had seceded nearly a century before, was an important consideration. But the decisive factor was the presence and peculiar position of the Negroes. Some of the Seminole Negroes, such as Abraham himself, were comparatively recent runaways from servitude among the whites, and when Indians and Negroes should be assembled at a central point, under military supervision, for transportation to the west, white slaveowners would not lose this opportunity to reclaim their human property. Even legally-purchased Seminole slaves were not immune from this danger, for it was an old trick for white men to lay claim to Seminole Negroes-sometimes after having themselves just sold them!-and their demands were usually accepted by white authorities. Negroes among the Seminoles, furthermore, were frequentlythe wives, husbands, children, of Indians. The Seminole Indians, strongly influenced by the Negroes, among whom Abraham was the leading figure, determined to place every obstacle possible in the way of their removal. On May 9, 1832, however, their principal men were induced to sign the treaty of Payne’s Landing, which provided that a delegation of Seminoles should visit the Indian Territory and report on its suitability as a new home. This treaty further provided that “their faithful interpreters Abraham and Cudjo” in case of removal “shall receive two hundred dollars each, . . . in full remuneration for the improvements to be abandoned on the lands now cultivated by them.” “Abraham, Interpreter, his X mark” appears as a witness. Maj. Ethan Allen Hitchcock, in a letter of Oct. 22, 1840, asserts that Abraham was bribed,by the insertion in the treaty of a sum of $100 for his services as interpreter, to exert his influence toward its acceptance, which otherwise could not have been achieved. But the amount provided for the interpreters was merely a proportion of the sum to be divided among the entire nation only in case of removal, of which Abraham was actually a leading opponent, though Cudjo seems to have been early won over to the emigration policy. Abraham no doubt felt it would do no harm to send a delegation to the Indian Territory to inspect the land set aside for the Seminoles, and could hardly have anticipated that, once in the west, the delegation which he accompanied would be bullied, as it was, into signing, March 28, 1833, the Treaty of Ft. Gibson, in which the members agreed, for the nation, to removal from Florida-an agreement completely outside their authority. ‘‘Abraham Seminole Interpreter” witnessed this treaty. Those officials best acquainted with the situation recognized the importance of winning over Abraham to the emigration policy, for, whatever disagreement there was about his appearance or his character, there was none whatsoever concerning his intelligence, ability, and, particularly, his influence with his former master, head-chief Mikonopi. “The negro Abraham is obviously a great man ; ” wrote an officer, “though a black he has long been appointed ‘sense-bearer’ to the King (Mickenopah) . . . . ‘‘Abra’m, or Yobly, as the Indians call him,’’ commented another, “is the chief Interpreter, and latterly succeeded Jumper as ‘sense carrier’ to Miconope. This high chancellor and keeper of the king’s conscience, also heads about five hundred negroes of whom he is legislator, judge, and executioner through his influence with the Governor . . . under an exterior of profound meekness, [he] cloaks deep, dark, and bloody purposes. He has at once the crouch and spring of the panther, and certain traits of his character liken him to the Cardinal De Retz. Again, in this rather romantic description, the “French” qualities of Abraham’s character are emphasized. “Abraham,” we read again, “who is sometimes dignified with the title of ‘Prophet’, . . . is the prime minister and privy counsellor of Micanopy ; and has through his master, who is somewhat imbecile, ruled all the councils and actions of the Indians in this region. “Micanopy owned many negroes,” begins one of the most careful analyses of the situation, “who partook of the feeling exhibited around them. Hisprincipal slave Abraham, was the most noted, and for a time an influential man in the nation. He dictated to those of his own color, who to a great degree controlled their masters. They were a most cruel and malignant enemy. For them to surrender would be servitude to the whites; but to retain an open warfare secured to them plunder, liberty, and importance. The briefer characterizations were in agreement. “Abraham is a cunning negro, of good consideration with the Seminoles, and who cando more than any other.” “Micanope is a fat, lubberly . . . kind of man, and is ever a stupid fool, when not replenished by his ‘sense bearer’; (as he calls him) Abraham. “Abraham . . . his interpreter . . . exercised a wonderful influence over his master. “Abraham . . . has as much influence in the nation as any other man,” “he is a sensible shrewd negro, and has ever been the principal counsellor of his master,” “with an appearance of great modesty, he is ambitious, avaricious, and withal very intelligent. One officer, however, makes Abraham more of a behind-the-scenes operator than the others: “Abram, a free negro, who, like all the ‘Indian negroes’, spoke English, was always present at the councils, and frequently interpreted what was said, but seemed publicly to have no voice or influence. In point of fact, however, though not a chief, he had much influence. Abraham’s “influence is unlimited” was the view of another, while still another sweepingly stated that Mikonopi was never known to do anything against his advice. “We have a perfect Talleyrand of the Savage Court in the person of a Seminole negro, called Abraham, was the summation of one of the commentators with a fondness for comparisons drawn from French history. The principal and indeed the only method advocated for winning Abraham over, was, however, the sort of covert bribery which, it is alleged, was intended by the insertion of a provision for payment to the interpreters in the treaty of Payne’s Landing. Abraham had been cheated out of $280, which he had expended on the trip to the Indian Territory, by Maj. John Phagan, the Indian agent who had accompanied the delegation, by the agent’s telling him that it was necessary for Abraham, in order to be paid, to give Phagan a receipt for the money, to be sent to Washington; the agent then submitted the receipt, himself received payment, and the interpreter was left holding an empty sack, it seems permanently. At some point in the transaction, the agent, evidently a thorough scoundrel who, it is interesting to note, was the instrument through which the delegation were induced, or forced, to sign the Ft. Gibson treaty, had refused to pay Abraham unless he would buy the agent’s gun at double its price. Abraham was still complaining about this as late as 1852. Abraham’s persistent attempts to obtain payment seem to have inspired in the mind of Phagan’s successor as agent the not particularly startling conclusion that a Negro, as well as a white man, might be interested in gaining and saving money. Abraham, he announced with an air of discovery, “loves money, I believe, as well as any person I ever saw . . . a few hundred dollars,” he continued, “would make him zealous and active” in the cause of emigration. Promises of this character were probably extended to Abraham and, if so, it is evident that he pretended to fall in with them. Actually he was determined to encourage his sluggish master to resist a removal which, he believed, as projected would be fatal to his people. Publicly, Abraham, during the two or three years of controversy which elapsed between the signing of the Treaty of Ft. Gibson and the outbreak of open hostilities, confined himself to interpreting at the various councils held between the Seminole agent and the chiefs, in which the agent insisted that they must prepare to depart for the West, while most of the chiefs refused, asserting the earlier treaty of 1823 guaranteed for 20 years their possession of the reservation assigned to them at that time. Secretly, however, he was instigating the head-chief Mikonopi to resistance, and strengthening him in that resolve whenever the indolent old man wavered in his determination. He was also, through free Negroes and Spanish fishermen, building up a reserve of ammunition and making arrangements for a continued supply of powder and lead during the hostilities, whenever they should break out. When the war had been going on for over a year, he was reported as still receiving consignments of powder, disguised as barrels of flour, from a free Negro in St. Augustine. Abraham recognized that the Seminole Indians and Negroes possessed valuable potential allies in the slaves on the sugar-plantations of the St. Johns river, and he and another Negro leader, John Caesar, accompanied by such Indian chiefs as Yaha Hajo (Mad Wolf), visited all the plantations and encouraged the Negroes, by promises of freedom and plunder, to be prepared to revolt simultaneously with the inevitable outbreak of hostilities. Since it was not uncommon for Indian Negroes to have wives and other relatives on the plantations, and since, for a number of years, the prevalence of peace had encouraged intercourse between Negro slaves and Seminole Indians, it was easy to convince the slaves, well aware of the advantageous position of the Seminole Negroes, that their interests and those of the Indians were the same. At the same time, however, Abraham gave the whites the impression that he was working in their interests and in favor of emigration. Up to the day of his death, Maj. Dade, who was the first to fall in the heavy fighting which marked the outbreak of the Seminole War, was convinced of the “salutary influence” of Abraham on Mikonopi. Near the end of 1835, when it had been announced that the Seminoles must assemble for emigration by the first of the next year or be deported forcibly, Abraham was preparing to throw off his mask. Some chiefs, reluctantly convinced that resistance was hopeless, prepared to yield, and began to sell off their livestock preparatory to departure. The principal man in the emigration party was Charley, or Chalo, Emathla (Trout Leader), an able and public-spirited chief whose example was likely to be influential. Some of the leaders of the faction militantly opposed to emigration, Osceola, a young Red Stick Creek who, though not a chief, exerted great influence particularly upon the young warriors, Holata Micco (Billy Bowlegs), a nephew of Mikonopi, and Abraham, determined that he must be made an example, and on Nov. 26, 1835, “a party of about four hundred warriors . . . proceeded to the residence” of the doomed man. Abraham, at the last moment, perhaps not having previously realized that more than a warning was intended at this time, endeavored to induce Osceola to spare his life, and succeeded in getting the leaders to delay and hold a council, but his intervention was ultimately futile and Osceola and others proceeded to waylay and shoot down the chief as he was returning from selling his cattle. Abraham, who was also sometimes known as The Prophet, and seems to have been imbued with the religious enthusiasm of the time, stirred up excitement among the Indians and Negroes, particularly the latter, by assuring them that “God was in their favor.” He prophesied concerning General Wiley Thompson, the Seminole agent, that “he would be killed by Indians while walking about his place.” The general was actually put to death at the beginning of the war by Osceola and some of his followers while enjoying a stroll and a cigar after dinner. When the war finally began with the ambushing and annihilation of Major Dade’s command of more than a hundred men, Dec. 28, 1835, Abraham was for over a year one of the leading war-spirits. He was said to be in personal command of eighty warriors, and “no action was complete unless Abraham was reported to be in it, with his big gun. He was undoubtedly a leader in most of the principal actions of the first year or so, particularly Dade’s defeat and the various battles on the Withlacoochee. A prisoner, to be sure, reported that “Abraham was . . . at [the first battle of the] Withlacoochee but made off on the first fire, but he may have been saying what he thought would please his captors, as this is the only report on record adverse to the Negro chiefs courage, the prevalent opinion being that he was a good soldier and an intrepid leader, an enemy by no means to be despised. Abraham, as regards to emigration, belonged before the war to the left-wing militant element of the Seminole tribe; afterwards, however, when the emigration party had seceded and taken refuge with the whites, his position among the hostiles became somewhat to the right of center so far as intransigency was concerned. This was partly, on doubt, because of his association with Mikonopi. His position in the tribe depended largely on his influence over the head-chief, and even Abraham was able to move the sluggish Mikonopi only so far. It was primarily, however, in all probability, a matter of temperament and information. Abraham had been to Washington and knew the white man’s power. He was consequently aware that the Seminole could not hope actually to defeat the United States government. He did hope, however, that they could put up such a fight that the government would permit the Indians and Negroes to remain in Florida, even on a more restricted reservation, particularly since there was actually as yet no pressure of settlers on the land occupied by the Seminole. Abraham had also been to the Indian Territory and knew that, with all its disadvantages, it was not a bad country; he was consequently also prepared, as an alternative, to accept emigration, provided that satisfactory assurances were given that transportation to the West would not be employed as a device to enslave the Seminole Negroes. He was therefore always willing to negotiate with the whites, in the hope that one or the other of the above arrangements could be attained without further fighting, but to that end his plan was to resist so fiercely in the meantime that the whites would be discouraged into granting satisfactory terms. Abraham, accordingly, on March 6, 1836, during the siege of Camp Izard on the banks of the Withlacoochee, was instrumental in negotiating a truce with General Gaines which might have resulted in a permanent arrangement had not the Seminoles been fired on, through a misunderstanding, by members of another officer’s force which arrived during a parley. John Caesar, chief Negro of King Philip, Mikonopi’s brother-in-law, chief of the St. Johns river Seminoles, and second in authority only to Mikonopi himself, was also concerned in the negotiations and, indeed, probably initiated them, though this may have been after consultation with Abraham. After nearly a year of hostilities the Seminoles were still more than holding their own. The whites had been repulsed time and time again, from the Withlacoochee crossing, in the Big Wahoo swamp; one large detachment had been wiped out. The “celebrated negro Abraham and many others had been prophesying . . . that God was in their favor; . . . they had lost only twenty warriors during the whole war,’’ whereas the whites had lost five times that number in the single action which began the war. A new commander-in-chief, General T. S. Jesup, took over in December, however, and under his leadership a vigorous campaign was initiated which drove the Indians and Negroes out of their former lurking-places along the Withlacoochee and in the Wahoo swamp and sent them south and east toward the Everglades. Abraham, among other principal chiefs, was reported as being resolved on Fabian tactics, intending “to fly before the army and avoid a battle,” taking refuge “in the dense swamps and hammocks of the Everglades.” The army, however, moved too rapidly for him to be able to carry out these tactics of avoidance, and on Jan. 27, 1837, according to a prisoner, Abraham, with ‘‘from forty to fifty Indians,” was in the Big Cypress swamp, hovering on the rear of Colonel Henderson’s detachment, preparing to co-operate with “a large number of negroes” who “were in advance.” In the sharp fight which followed, the Seminoles suffered heavily, not so much in dead and wounded as in prisoners and materiel, for the whites captured their baggage-train with their provisions and munitions and a large number of women and children, particularly Negroes. Abraham later said that he lost most of his property. “at the Cypress. . . . I lose most every ting-all my powder and blankets; a hundred dollars in silver; pots; kettles -every ting”-including, in addition, his freedom papers and his little boy’s favorite pony. General Jesup felt that the Seminoles now might be ready to treat and, having captured one of Mikonopi’s principal Negroes, named Ben, along with his wife and all his children, sent him out to the hostiles with the offer of a liberal treaty, and on Jan. 31 “Abraham made his appearance bearing a white flag on a small stick which he had cut in the woods, and walked up to the tent of General Jesup with perfect dignity and composure. He stuck the staff of his flag in the ground, made a salute or bow with his hand, without bending his body, and then waited for the advance of the General with the most complete self-possession. He . . . since stated that he expected to be hung, but concluded to die, if he must, like a man, but that he would make one more effort to save his people.” General Jesup, however, convinced him of the government’s good faith and, with great difficulty, Abraham succeeded on February 3 and 18 in bringing in Jumper, Alligator, and other Indian and Negro chiefs, for peace negotiations. Eventually, “largely through the negotiations of the negro, Abraham, on March 6, 1837 at Camp Dade, a treaty was concluded between Jesup and the Seminole chiefs Jumper and Holatoochee claiming to represent Mikanopy. . . . By the terms of this treaty the Indians agreed to cease their hostilities, come to Tampa Bay by April 10, and board the transports for the West. The chief Mikanopy was to be surrendered as a hostage for the performance of their promises. However, to induce them to accept these terms, General Jesup was obliged to agree to the one condition that the Indians had insisted on from the beginning; and that was that their allies, the free negroes, should also be secure in their persons and property; and ‘that their negroes, their bona fide property shall accompany them to the West.’ Abraham was active for the next month as interpreter in various subsequent councils, in using his influence to get other Indians and Negroes to come in, and, always with an eye to the main chance, in supplying the officers with such game as wild turkeys, one noted as weighing seventeen pounds, and in rounding up his cattle and bringing them in for sale to the United States. He was also able to reclaim for his “little boy about six years of age ; and a beautiful boy he is,” who, according to the officer commentator, “had hardly ever seen a white person before,” the pony which had been captured at the Tohopkaliga during the Battle of Hatchee Lustee or the Big Cypress. Abraham probably suffered a loss during this period in the death of his father-in-law, whoever he was. He explained his delay in arriving at Ft. Armstrong, where he was expected by the morning of April 1, by stating : “I waited for Wann and Wann’s father; and my father-in-law was sick; and had to be carried, two miles, on the black people’s shoulders. I fraid he won’t live to get to Tampa.” No aged Negro who can be identified as Abraham’s father-in-law appears on any of the lists, so probably his fears were justified. It is possible that “Wann’s father” and “my father-in-law” refer to the same person. “Wann” or “Juan”, whose name on the printed lists appears incorrectly as “Inos,” was one of Mikonopi’s principal Negroes and commanded the Negro forces on the Withlacoochee earlier in the war, possibly being field-commander under Abraham. Unfortunately, however, General Jesup, influenced by the success of the negotiations and under severe pressure from slave-holders, entered into clandestine arrangements with Coi Hajo, second chief of the St. Johns river Seminoles, for the return to their owners of Negroes who had joined the Seminoles during the war, and the appearance of slave-owners, seeking to reclaim their human property, in the emigration-camp at Tampa bay, caused, first, the gradual disappearance into the swamps of many of the Indians and Negroes who had assembled there and, eventually, late in May or early in June, resulted in a mass-stampede of most of the remainder, accompanied by the kidnapping by the militant young chiefs Osceola and Coacoochee (Wild Cat) and the Negro-Indian subchief John Cavallo, of the hostages who had been yielded by the Seminoles for the carrying out of the Camp Dade treaty. Abraham, however, and other principal Negro chiefs, remained in the hands of the troops and General Jesup, angered by the renewal of a war which he had thought safely ended, announced: “The Seminole negro prisoners are now the property of the public. I have promised Abraham the freedom of his family if he be faithful to us, and I shall certainly hang him if he will not be faithful. . .” The Seminoles gave no evidence at this time of intending to renew hostilities, and the sickly summer season was on, which prevented the troops from then taking overt action. Abraham could hardly have remained uninfluenced by General Jesup’s promise of freedom to himself and family, particularly when coupled with a threat of hanging, but he had already committed himself, and won over most of the principal chiefs, particularly head-chief Mikonopi and his brotherin- law and counsellor Jumper, to a policy of emigration under the terms of the Ft. Dade treaty. He may have regretted its later modification in a sense hostile to the runaway plantation-slaves, but the in-terests of the Seminole Negroes of long standing were, of course, pre-eminent in his mind. His influence with Mikonopi remained strong, even when they had been compulsorily separated through the kidnapping of the head-chief, and Mikonopi occasionally succeeded, though a semi-prisoner of the hostiles, in communicating to the whites his strong desire for a consultation with Abraham. When the season was again propitious, the forces of the United States launched a joint campaign of military operations and peace-propaganda, in which latter Abraham was conspicuous. On September 11, 1837, he wrote “Cae Hajo,” second chief of the St. Johns river Seminoles, urging him to surrender, and signing with his war-name, “Souanaffe Tustenukke. Coi Hajo had from the first been weakened in his opposition to emigration, so much so that he had nearly met the fate of Chalo Emathla, and had been particularly cooperative after the Treaty of Ft. Dade; the capture of his superior, King Philip, though perhaps not known at the time of the letter, increased his importance as a key-man. “Abraham,” it was announced Nov. 6, 1837, “has volunteered to act as guide to our troops, and his services will be accepted. He says he knows the spot where his master, Micanopy, is concealed, and that the Indians are nearly out of ammunition.” It was probably in large part through the urgings of Abraham, conveyed to Mikonopi, that the head-chief and most of his followers were induced to surrender again the following month. Abraham did not, so far as the record runs, ever take up arms against his former allies, but confined himself to acting as envoy in urging them to surrender. His approaches were, apparently, always received with respect, and no threats against his life by recalcitrant hostiles are recorded. He inspected the battle-ground after the battle of Lake Okeechobee, December, 25, 1837, the hardest-fought action of the entire war, and “From signs made in the sand, supposed to be by Alligator,” Mikonopi’s nephew and the principal war-chief, gave it “as his opinion that the Indians intend to war to the death. Yet when he was sent with other Seminole chiefs to Colonel Zachary Taylor, March 24, 1838, to negotiate for peace with the hostiles still in the field, he did not hesitate to enter Alligator’s camp and was so successful in his mission that on April 4 it was reported that “Abraham & Echoconee came in with Alligator & two negroes, they found Alligator . . . in a hammock with 88 of his people & 27 blacks to the SW of Okee Chobee. . . . John Co-hi-a [the Indian Negro perhaps better known as John Cavallo, who had been a ringleader in the kidnapping of the hostages and a commander at Okeechobee] is with Alligators people & will come in with him. Alligator will send for Coacoochee [another ringleader and commander, King Philip’s son and the most important hostile still out], who, he states is . . . between here & the head of the St. Johns. Abraham wrote to General Jesup, April 25, 1838, in part as follows : “We wish to get in writing from the General the agreement made with us. We will go with the Indians to our new home, and wish to know how we are to be protected, and who is to have the care of us on the road. We do not live for our selves only, but for our wives & children who are as dear to us as those of any other men. When we reach our home we hope we shall be permitted to remain while the woods remain green, and the water runs. I have charge of all the red people coming on to Pease’s Creek, and all are satisfied to go to Arkansas. . . . Whoever is to be chief Interpreter we would wish to know. I cannot do any more than I have. I have done all I can, my heart has been true since I came in at Tohopo Kilika. . . . All the black people are contented I hope. Abraham had finally, he believed, accomplished his objective of bringing about the end of the war through the surrender of nearly all the Seminoles acknowledging allegiance to head-chief Mikonopi, on terms which guaranteed to the Indians their property and to the Negroes their exemption from seizure by whites. He had not, however, fulfilled all the duties demanded of him by General Jesup, and on May 14 it was ordered that he, together with Cudjo and August, the former a partisan of the whites from the beginning, should be retained as interpreters at $2.50 per diem-other interpreters, however, receiving only one dollar. He continued as interpreter, without particular event, for nearly another year, but on February 25, 1839, was finally shipped west. He was noted in the local press en route as “Abraham, well known as an interpreter and a wily and treacherous rascal. The company of which he was the leading member was turned over to the Seminole agent at Ft. Gibson, Indian Territory, April 13, 1839; the muster-roll included two unnamed male slaves belonging to Abraham, who may, however, have been his children. * * * Abraham’s life in the Indian Territory, which was to extend over another generation, was considerably of an anti-climax to a man who had been a principal agent first in bringing about a serious war and second in bringing it to a conclusion. It was not, however, devoid of usefulness. We lose sight of him for a couple of years after his arrival. Presumably he reassumed his position as interpreter to Mikonopi, and no doubt contributed to the notably better adjustment of his band to their new life, settling down, as they did, on Deep Fork, to raise corn, beans, pumpkins, melons, and even a little rice, whereas more recalcitrant bands, such as those of Wild Cat and Alligator, refused to enter the Creek country and squatted on Cherokee territory, where they remained for several years in a miserable state of poverty and uncertainty. During and after 1841 we begin again to get occasional glimpses of Abraham in his new environment. On April 17, 1841, at Ft. Gibson, Mikonopi sold to Abraham for $300 a 16-year-old Negro boy named Washington, whom, on September 14, Abraham emancipated, out of the love and affection he bore the boy, his son-the second of his children whose emancipation is on record. At a conference between Captain Ethan Allen Hitchcock and Coacoochee, at Ft. Gibson, Nov. 28, 1841, Abraham interpreted. During 1843 and 1844 the reports of the Seminole sub-agent listed “Abraham (colored man), interpreter” at a stipend of “$300 per annum,” and on January 24, 1845, at the Creek agency, “Abraham, U. S. Interpreter for Seminoles,” was a witness to a treaty intended to adjust the unhappy relations between the Creeks and the Seminoles by giving the latter local autonomy, subject, however, to the general control of the Creek council, and providing that controversies between the two tribes over property rights, which the Seminoles understood as referring to their Negroes, should be decided by the president of the United States. Abraham did not subsequently appear in the role of government interpreter at the Seminole subagency, as later in the year he was removed from his position by the sub-agent on the charge of unfitness. “The conduct of Abraham,” he wrote, “was such that I was compelled to procure the servicesof young Mr. Brinton . . . Abraham is very much addicted to the use of ardent spirits; so much so that he is entirely incompetent for a Government Interpreter. He was unable to render me any assistance upon the day of issue, being upon the ground intoxicated, and engaged in broils and dissensions with the Indians themselves. Besides, Abraham has by no means the confidence of the Seminoles. It should be noted that, during this general period, no one connected with the Seminole sub-agency, from interpreter and blacksmith up to and including the sub-agent himself, long escaped accusations of drunkenness, venality, inattention to duty, and general worthlessness, from persons coveting these positions for themselves or their friends. No other accusation of this character against Abraham is on record, and one need not imagine him as a teetotaller in order to feel thatthere is probably considerable exaggeration in this portrayal of him as a complete sot. That Abraham lacked the confidence of some, at least, of the Seminoles, is, however, doubtless true. He himself complained a few days after this accusation was lodged against him, and while it was probably still unknown to him, that “his conduct in Florida in favour of the whites has procured himmany enemies, and that he leads an uncertain and unhappy life-knowing ‘Abram,’ ” the writer continued, “you [Gen. Jesup] will be able to judge how much of this is true. Evidently Abraham’s amanuensis had no high personal regard for the interpreter’s veracity. Abraham had probably been drawn into the feud which was racking the Seminole tribe at the time, between the militants, led by Wild Cat and Alligator, who were opposed to Creek domination, even of a qualified character, and those who were inclined to accept it, at least passively. Both factions, however, were accustomed to use the accusation of having assisted the whites in Florida, to arouse sentiment against their opponents. Abraham had taken no part in the activities of the militants-even of the Negroes who, seriously concerned with the menace of kidnapping by whites and half-breeds, were under the leadership of John Cavallo, allied with the Wild Cat-Alligator faction among the Indians. He had been, from hisfirst arrival in the Indian Territory, prepared to accept the plans for the Seminoles drawn up by the United States government, which included residence among the Creeks as a part of the Creek tribe. Shunning anti-Creek agitation, he had probably devoted himself to improving the material welfare of the Seminole, Indians and Negroes, directlyunder Mikonopi’s command, through encouraging agriculture. He was too important a figure, his right to freedom too well established, to be seriously menaced by kidnapping, and it is by no means creditable to his public spirit at this point that we do not find him associated with any of the protests against kidnapping made by John Cavallo, Tony Barnett, and other Seminole Negro leaders. When a delegation headed by Wild Cat and Alligator, with John Cavallo as interpreter, went to Washington in April, 1844, to demand relief for the Seminole, and Mikonopi, jealous of the challenge to his authority involved in Wild Cat’s assumption of leadership, was induced through some influence to head a list of chiefs disclaiming and protesting against the delegation, Abraham signed the document as a witness, indicating where his associations lay. It is unfortunate that the principal and, indeed, the only authority in print on Abraham subsequent to the Seminole War, Congressman Joshua R. Giddings, treated him rather as a character in a work of fiction than historically, asserting, on the alleged basis of hearsay evidence and unnamed newspaper accounts, that he was actually the most prominent leader in the Seminole Negro resistance to domination by the Creeks and that, with Wild Cat, he led a migration of Seminole Indians and Negroes to Mexico in 1850. No positive evidence for this assertion is extant, and all available information counts against it. The rather full manuscript material on the Wild Cat migration never so much as mentions Abraham, and all indications are that he was at the time living quietly on Little river and avoiding involvement in the daring plans of the Seminole militants. The Negro leader in the migration was unquestionably the Indian Negro John Cavallo, better known among army officers by his nickname of Gopher John. Abraham was, in 1852, called from the obscurity in which he had been plunged by his dismissal from the position of government interpreter seven years earlier, in order to serve as interpreter to one of the delegations which were sent to Florida with the design of inducing Billy Bowlegs, Mikonopi’snephew, and chief of the largest band of Seminoles still at large, to come in and surrender with his people for transportation to the West. The delegation landed at Tampa and proceeded to Caloosa-hatchee, “confident of being able to induce Billy Bowlegs and Sam Jones to emigrate.” They succeeded in establishing contact with Billy Bowlegs and persuaded him to go, with certain of his chiefs, on an excursion to some of the principal cities of the eastern seaboard, in the hope that he might be sufficiently impressed by the grandeur and power of the whites as to give up the struggle and yield himself and his people to the emigration agents. They left Ft. Myers, August 31, 1852, and proceeded first to Washington, where they had an interview with the president. They arrived in New York on September 11 and put up at the American Hotel. Abraham attracted a great deal of attention from the press. He was described as ‘‘an intelligent old negro, . . . quite a venerable, dignified looking personage, a sort of Indianized major domo, with his face set off with a wooly moustache. . . .” “Time and trial, and anxiety,” a fuller account reads, “have made a wreck of Abraham. Yet he is straight, and active, and looks more intelligence out of his one eye than many people look out of two. He is in the full costume of the Seminoles. Turban, a la Turk, and hunting shirt, leggins, etc. Abraham must be 70 or 80 years old.” He was actually, it is probable, in his early or middle sixties. Sometime during the delegation’s stay in New York, they, including Abraham, became the subjects of the accompanying group-photograph. It was reported in Jacksonville News (Oct. 2, 1852) that “King Billy and cabinet, including the old negro interpreter Abraham, are gone home to the court of the Everglades. They passed up on . . . the Matamoros . . . Billy held his levee in the cabin of the steamboat and received his visitors with royal dignity. We learn from General Blake that Billy has entered into a solemn agreement to emigrate next March with all the Indians he can induce to go, which he thinks will be all in the country. We feel disposed to believe that at last we may succeed in getting rid of our unwelcome neighbors, but shall not feel certain till they are gone.” If he ever so agreed, he did not carry out his promise, for it was not until several years later, and after a third Seminole war, that Billy was finally transported to the Indian Territory. After this brief flare of publicity Abraham sank into an obscurity from which he did not again emerge. He returned to his home on Little river, in the region to which the Seminoles had removed according to the provisions of the treaty of 1845, where his name is still remembered by the older generation. Ed Payne, an intelligent and prosperous Seminole Negro of the Little River (Seminole county) settlement, has heard much of him as a resident of that vicinity. Mr. Payne knew two of his sons, including Washington, whose freedom his father had purchased in 1841. Washington used to mention that he and his father had both been slaves, but had been freed. Washington described his father as an able and successful cattle-raiser, and remembered that he used to come back from the sale of a herd of cattle with a sack full of gold and silver-no paper-money in those days. He would then pry up a plank in the cabin floor and drop the sack into the space beneath-this was his bank. The Civil War, which so convulsed the Indian Territory as well as the United States in general, probably did not greatly affect Abraham. He was in his seventies at its outbreak, and all the serious fighting was to the east, in the vicinity of Ft. Gibson. He probably did not therefore flee to Kansas with the loyal Seminoles, under Halleck Tustenuggree and the Creek chief Opothla Yahola, and as a Negro he could hardly have been a partisan of the Seminole head-chief John Jumper, who served as a colonel in the Confederate army. Doubtless he continued to live quietly on his Little River farm while the storm of war rolled by. He seems to have been still living late in 1870, for a newspaper item notes: “The old interpreter for General Jackson [sic], the Negro Abraham, is still alive on Little River at the advanced age of one hundred and twenty years. A gentleman saw him the other day. The date of Abraham’s death is unknown to me, but presumably it took place not long after 1870. According to Mr. Payne, he is buried at Brunertown, west of the Little River settlement, near Hazel. Mr. Payne has seen a stone shaped into a marker, with his name on it, over the grave, but cannot recall whether or not it bears a date. Some young Oklahoma historian could profitably spend a few days in the vicinity of Wewoka, Sasakwa, Noble Town, Little River, and Brunertown, visiting the grave and searching for further traditional information on the later life of this remarkable personality. Abraham’s record, considering his opportunities, stands out as extraordinary by any standard. Born in slavery among an alien race, he took refuge among another strange but more hospitable people and raised himself by his own exertions to a position of prominence and authority. He clearly recognized the issues and reasonable objectives of the Florida War, fought bravely and skillfully until that latter had, as it seemed, been secured, and then successfully directed his energies toward the termination of hostilities. His activities in the Indian Territory were hardly comparable to those in Florida, but it is probable that he did much, in a conservative fashion, to benefit the Seminole Indians and Negroes with whom he was associated by assisting them in adjustment to their new environment. Interpreter, counsellor, war-leader, diplomat, he deserves a niche in American history.
Posted on: Thu, 18 Dec 2014 10:17:25 +0000
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