USA > Alabama > The formative period in Alabama, 1815-1828 > Part 2
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2+ Henry Adams, History of U. S., VII, 228-229; Pickett, History of Alabama, 523-524.
25 McMaster, History of the United States, IX, 162-170. Bassett, J. S., Andrew Jackson, I, 91-92, 116-117.
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17
THE MISSISSIPPI TERRITORY
The battle of Horseshoe Bend broke the power of the hos- tile Creeks. Many were dead, and others fled across the Spanish line into Florida. In 1814 the chiefs who remained met Jackson at the confluence of the Coosa and Tallapoosa, where Fort Jackson was erected, and were forced to surrender a broad strip of their land running along the Florida border, and all that which lay west of the Coosa River. Thus prac- tically the entire Alabama-Tombigbee basin was cleared of the Indian title and secured for settlement by the whites. Mississippi Territory was indebted to Jackson not only for safety, but also for room in which to grow.
That the Southwest was to become a cotton kingdom was foreshadowed by the early history of Madison County. When the old tobacco-growing districts of the Southern seaboard began to overflow into the piedmont region, a number of Vir- ginia immigrants established the town of Petersburg where the Broad River flows into the Savannah, in Elbert County, Georgia. Here tobacco warehouses were erected and a brisk business ensued. But it did not last long. When the in- vention of the cotton gin made short staple cotton available for commercial purposes, this crop supplanted tobacco as the prin- cipal product of the piedmont region in Georgia and South Carolina. Tobacco warehouses were no longer necessary and Petersburg was abandoned.26 Its inhabitants were the chief founders of the town of Huntsville.27 In the small triangle which was the Madison County of that day, nearly a hundred and fifty thousand acres of land were sold between 1809 and 1812.
During this period the sales of land in the Tombigbee set- tlement were relatively small excepting that, in the single year 1812, sixty-four thousand acres were disposed of at St. Steph- ens.
The war naturally halted the progress of the westward movement, but with the coming of peace, the migration was resumed with greatly renewed vigor. The Indians were no longer to be feared, a vast expanse of new territory had been cleared of the native title, cotton was in great demand, and a spirit of adventure and speculation took hold upon the coun- try. In 1816 more than a hundred seventy thousand acres were sold at St. Stephens.28
26 C. C. Jones, Jr., Dead Towns of Georgia, 234-238.
27 Betts. History of Huntsville, 22-24.
** 28 American State Papers, Misc., II, 417.
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THE FORMATIVE PERIOD IN ALABAMA
The territory secured from the Creeks had to be surveyed before it could be placed upon the market, and surveys took time. But the westward rush of land-hungry men did not wait upon the Government. Settlers pushed into the country in great numbers. They were usually poor men who had sold all they possessed to secure the necessary means of transport- ation, and at the end of the journey they sometimes found themselves stranded without food to last until the first crop could be made.29 There were also land speculators who were engaged in seeking out choice tracts for purchase when the Government sales should begin; there were merchants who had brought wagon loads of goods, which they displayed in hastily-erected huts to the settlers; and there were fugi- tives from justice seeking refuge in a country where the hand of the law was weak.
Crimes were, of course, committed in such a community as this ;30 and to make the situation worse, those Creeks who had remained friendly to the United States during the war felt, with reason, that they had been unjustly treated' when their lands were taken away; and they threatened to give trouble.31 Since no civil jurisdiction was established in the region, Gov- ernor Holmes, of Mississippi Territory, issued a proclamation on June 29, 1815, incorporating the whole of the Creek cession as Monroe County.32
This action was not in accord with the ideas of the Govern- ment, for an act of 1807 had forbidden intrusion upon the public lands. In accordance with this act, President Madison issued a proclamation in December, 1815, ordering the remov- al of squatters and authorizing the use of military force to ac- complish that purpose.33 Some ejections were made, but Con- gress heard the plea of the squatters and, by an act of April 26, 1816, those who had come in before Feburary of that year were to be allowed to remain until the land upon which they were settled should be sold.34
29 Indian Office files, R. J. Meigs, to Andrew Jackson, Jan. 17, 1816; Jackson Papers. E. P. Gaines to Andrew Jackson, March 6, 1817.
30 Toulmin-Holmes correspondence, Gen. E. P. Gaines to Judge Har- ry Toulmin, June 1, 1815; Judge Toulmin to Gov. Holmes, June 5, 1815. 31 Washington Republican, Oct. 21, 1815.
32 Gov. Holmes, Executive Journal. 1814-1817; Proclamation of June 29, 1815.
33 Washington Republican, Jan. 10, 1816; Jackson Papers, Wm. H. Crawford to Andrew Jackson, Jan. 27, 1816.
&! Ibid., June 12, 1816.
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THE MISSISSIPPI TERRITORY
The Creek cession overlapped, on the north and west, lands claimed by the Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Cherokee Indians. The Government commissioned Andrew Jackson to treat with these tribes for their claims to the disputed areas, and treaties providing for the relinquishment of all three tracts were drawn up in 1816. This cleared up the Indian title to the greater part of that territory which was soon to become the State of Alabama. The Creeks still held the entire tract lying east of the Coosa River; the Cherokees held the northeastern corner above this; the Chickasaws held a small tract in the northwestern corner ; and the Choctaws retained a little land west of the Tombigbee.25
On May 9, 1817, Governor Holmes issued a proclamation cre- ating three new counties which included the new cessions and a part of the Creek cession. Elk County was to comprise the land lying north of the Tennessee River and west of Madi- son County ; Blount County was to be made up of that lying south of the Tennessee and north of the watershed between that river and the Alabama-Tombigbee basin; and Shelby County was to comprise the country lying south of Blount County bounded on the west by the Tombigbee, on the south by Clarke County, and on the east by the watershed between the Tombigbee and Alabama Rivers. 36 But the act dividing the Territory had already passed in Congress, and these three counties never had a concrete existence. An Elk County is sometimes enumerated in the early gazetteers, and a Blount and a Shelby County were established in Alabama Territory in 1818, but they have no continuity with those established by Governor Holmes.
35 See Eighteenth Annual Report, Bureau of Ethnology, Plate I.
36 Gov. David Holmes, Executive Journal, 1814-1817, Proclamation of May 9, 1917.
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CHAPTER II.
THE NEW COUNTRY1
The new country which was soon to become Alabama is di- vided, from an agricultural point of view, into three principal regions : the Tennessee Valley, the Alabama-Tombigbee bas- in, and the central hilly region which separates these two. Fed by streams which drain the country as far north as the Tennessee Valley, the Alabama and Tombigbee Rivers traverse the central and southwestern portions of the area, and empty their united waters into Mobile Bay. In the early days of Alabama, these streams furnished the only. good commercial highway into the State. They bound her southern section into one cotton-growing community, and their fertile bottom lands furnished most desirable fields for the planter of the staple.
The central hilly region is drained by southward-flowing streams which are not navigable; and the inaccessibility of the region, together with the rugged nature of the land, prevented it from attaining agricultural importance. Yet the isolated valleys were often fertile, and a scattered population main- tained frontier conditions here for a long time.
Making a large bend across the northern end of Alabama, the Tennessee River flows through a wide and fertile valley. During the early days the produce of this region had to be floated down the long and tortuous courses of the Tennessee and Mississippi Rivers to New Orleans, but the soil was fertile and attracted, from the very first, planters in large numbers.
Looked at more in detail, the surface of Alabama is divided into several areas differing in formation and fertility of soil.2 Entering the northeastern corner of the State with the Ten- nessee River and running down toward the center, is the southern extremity of the Cumberland Plateau. Here the ridges run in long sweeps and give a really mountainous as- pect to the region. Lookout Mountain is the most pronounced
1 The description given here is based almost entirely upon that by Roland M. Harper in A Preliminary Soil Census of Alabama and in his Economic Botany of Alabama, though the writer has relied to some ex- tent upon his personal knowledge of the country.
2 In addition to the map given here, sce that by Eugene A. Smith, U. S. Census, 1880, VI. 9; and that in the Atlas of American Agriculture, cotton section, 8.
21
THE NEW COUNTRY
of the highlands. South of the Tennessee Valley the ridges give way to the broken hills of the north-central portion of the State.
Skirting the plateau to the eastward and running parallel with it, lies the Coosa Valley, which represents the southern extremity of the great valley extending from Virginia. There are stretches of good land here, but the early communities were isolated and it did not become a region of extensive ag- riculture.
Toward the eastward, the Coosa Valley is bordered by the southern foothills of the Blue Ridge, and, forming a triangle between the Ridge and the Georgia line, lies the piedmont sec- tion which corresponds to that skirting the mountains in Geor- gia, the Carolinas, and Virginia. As in the piedmont regions of the older states, the stiff, red lands here are of unequal quality but capable of improvement and of fair average fertil- ity. Until 1836 the Creek Indians retained possession of the country east of the Coosa River; consequently this section was not settled as early as most of the other parts of the State.
Beginning at the eastern border just below the piedmont section and sweeping across to the northwest corner of Ala- bama in a broadening curve, the short leaf pine belt borders the older country of igneous rock, and marks the beginning of the coastal plain. Here the soil is composed largely of sand and gravel. It is below the average in fertility, rolling piney woods being characteristic of the region.
Next toward the south is the Black Belt,3 or prairie region, which begins within the State and follows the curve of the short leaf pine region. It presents a gently rolling terraine, much more level than any of the surrounding country, and al- so somewhat more depressed. These peculiarities are due, perhaps, like the quality of the soil, to the soft limestone which underlies it. The soil is a sticky, calcareous clay, and a part of it was originally unforested. Holding surface moisture in the winter, it forms a tenacious mud which renders roads all but impassable, and in the summer it bakes to a hard crust. A description of this region given by one of the early settlers in 1821 affords a graphic idea of the appearance of the coun- try :
"Wherever these prairies exist, the lime is this soft con- sistence, when it approaches near the surface, the soil ap- pears whitish, and is clothed with a short growth of grass
3 See H. F. Cleland in Geographical Review, X, 375-387.
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THE FORMATIVE PERIOD IN ALABAMA
and herbage; where it lies deeper the grass is denser and tall- er, and upon the borders, between the wood land and prairies, the growth of weeds and grass is very luxuriant. But upon the prairies themselves, there is not sufficient depth of earth for the growth of trees. Such is the checkered and diversified appearance of this part of the country where those prairies exist. Fancy yourself for a moment in such a situation ; be- fore you a wide and extended meadow, to the right and left intervening strips of oaks and pines; proceeding onwards, the prospect seems terminated by the surrounding woods ; anon, you catch a glimpse of the opening vista ; and now again the prospect expands into the wide spread horizon of an ex- tensive prairie. These prairies are generally rolling; which is a great advantage, as otherwise they retain water, to the great injury of the crops; and as it respects the quality of the soil, it is generally admitted that it is the best the country affords. . . The only objection to these prairies is, the scarcity of good water. ."4
The relative scarcity of running water, together with other disadvantages, affords special problems to the farmer, and the towns which grew up in connection with the cotton indus- try here-Montgomery, Selma, and others-are located on the edge of the prairie rather than within it. Though the plant- ers at first sought the river bottoms and avoided the prairie, the latter came after 1830 to be looked upon as the best cot- ton land in the State. As late as 1880 it formed the principal cotton producing area of Alabama.
Montgomery County has always been a cotton-planting cen- ter, and its early history is illustrative of such settlements. Al- most the entire area of the County consists of fine prairie lands which extend in long, unbroken stretches of fertile fields. But the Alabama River, which forms its northern boundary, is bordered by bottom land which is not of the prairie type. A map of the County, made up from the land records and showing the dates at which the tracts were purchased from the Government, brings out the fact that the great majority of the settlements before 1821 were made in the river bottom area. By 1828 encroachments were being made upon the prai- rie, but the greater part of it was still unsettled. On the oth- er hand. in Clarke County, at the confluence of the Alabama and Tombigbee Rivers, there were extensive settlements be-
4 Letter from Dr. J. W. Heustis, of Cahawba, April 1, 1821, Cahawba Press, June 2, 1821.
23
THE NEW COUNTRY
fore 1821, though very few between that year and 1828. In Dallas and Perry Counties where there is both river and prai- rie land, the river bottoms and the red lands bordering the prairies were taken up, but few settlements were made in the prairies before the end of 1828.5
The Black Belt is bordered on the south by the Chunnen- nuggee Ridge. This runs across the State in a narrow strip, but toward the eastern border where the Black Belt dwindles away, the Ridge broadens and replaces it. A limestone for- mation underlies this section, but it is different from that of the prairie region in being of normal hardness. This accounts for the fact that the Ridge country rises distinctly above the prairie, and that its surface is of a relatively rugged charac- ter. The soil is predominantly a sandy loam and is, like that of the Black Belt, above the average in fertility. Looked at from the standpoint of cotton culture, the two regions might be grouped together.
Below the Chunnennuggee Ridge and extending to the southern border of the state, lie the Southern Red Hills and Southern Pine Hill regions. Between these lie two small cal- careous areas, but there are no marked transitions in the sur- face here. The appearance of the country and the nature of the soil are fairly uniform, so that from an agricultural stand- point, these areas might be considered together.
In the region of the Red Hills the surface is broken and ris- es almost to mountainous ruggedness in places. One of the two railroad tunnels in the whole coastal plain lies in this sec- tion. Pine predominates over other forest trees, and the soil is reddish sandy clay. Its fertility is only average, but fer- tilizers can be used to advantage.
Proceeding toward the coast, the hills become less pro- nounced and the long leaf pine predominates over all other trees. The character of the soil does not change materially ; it is relatively infertile, but subject to improvement by arti- ficial fertilization.
It is worthy of note that in the Gulf coastal plain there is nothing corresponding to the pine barrens of the South At- lantic States. The reddish sandy clay prevails all the way to the coast, and the surface presents a rolling, and often a rugged, appearance.
5 Based upon maps made from the tract books in the office of the Secretary of State, Montgomery, Alabama.
6 See R. M. Harper in South Atlantic Quarterly, XIX, 201.
CHAPTER III
THE IMMIGRANTS
During the latter half of the seventeenth century, England was developing the spinning and weaving machinery which played such a large part in bringing about the Industrial Rev- olution. The increased demand for raw cotton which resulted from this development was answered in 1793 by Whitney's in- vention of the cotton gin. Until this time, it was necessary to, separate the lint from the seed by hand or by means of a pair of simple rollers. The black seeded sea-island, or long staple, cotton was the only variety amenable to such process- es, for its long fibre did not cling closely to the seed and could be removed easily. The short staple of the green seeded va- riety clung so closely to the seed that it could not be removed profitably by these simple processes in use.
Long staple cotton could be raised only in the tidewater re- gions, and the coast and sea-islands of Georgia and South Car- olina produced practically all the American output. The short staple cotton, on the other hand, could be raised in the uplands, and when the invention of the cotton gin rendered the culture of this variety profitable, the Georgia and South Carolina piedmont supplanted the tidewater as the principal cotton- producing area.1
This region had been settled by men largely from Virginia and Pennsylvania. The culture of tobacco was the main in- dustry for some years, but when upland cotton was introduced it quickly came to predominate. Towns founded for the ware- housing and inspection of tobacco were abandoned because their facilities were no longer necessary .- Such a one was Pe- tersburg, at the confluence of the Broad with the Savannah River, the removal of whose inhabitants to Madison County was mentioned in the first chapter.
That the spread of the culture of cotton into the Southwest was inevitable, is indicated by its early introduction into Miss- issippi Territory. This natural movement was interrupted by the War of 1812. but its pent-up force was precipitated by the
1 Atlas of American Agriculture, cotton section, 16. 18.
2 Phillips, Transportation in the Eastern Cotton Belt, 46-56.
25
THE IMMIGRANTS
conditions which followed the end of the struggle. In Eng- land, cut off from her source of supply during the War, the price of the staple rose to an abnormal level ; while in America, deprived of her usual market, the price fell off sharply. When peace was made and normal trade relations were resumed with the lifting of the blockade of our coast, England again obtain- ed her supply of American cotton and the price in this country rose immediately. The average price for 1815 was almost thirty cents a pound.3
To this situation was added the inducement of new lands cleared of the Indian title during the War, and the innate rest- lessness of the population. Sales of newly surveyed land were opened at St. Stephens during the latter part of 1815, and the following year over a hundred thousand acres were disposed of by the Government." No sales were made in the new Creek cession until 1817, but in that year three-quarters of a million dollars' worth of these lands were sold.5
The old Georgia-South Carolina piedmont region had two distinct disadvantages from the point of view of the cotton planter. Its soil was not considered so fertile as that of the Alabama river-bottoms and prairies ; and it lacked transporta- tion facilities, being cut off from the tidewater by the broad pine-barrens, and being without navigable rivers. Thus, be- fore the culture of upland cotton had reached anything like a mature development here, it began to be transferred to the new Southwest. Population began to flow from the older states into the pioneer country until the drain was keenly felt in the deserted communities.
Though the statement cannot be backed by statistics, it seems that the majority of the planters who moved westward with their slaves came from the piedmont rather than from the tidewater regions of the South Atlantic states." The tide- water had its staple crops of tobacco, rice, and sea-island cot- ton, which were not disturbed by the new developments. The planters here were usually well established, their investment was heavy, and their land had a certain monoply value. Their slaves could still be employed more or less profitably, and their social position tended to hold them where they were. The
3 Atlas of American Agriculture, cotton section, 18.
4 American State Papers, Misc., II, 417.
5 Ibid., Lands, V, 384-385.
6 This statement is strongly supported by the cases where the writer has been able to ascertain the origin of the immigrants.
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THE FORMATIVE PERIOD IN ALABAMA
piedmont region had never had a staple until upland cotton was introduced, and the west offered it a choicer field.
Few people of extensive wealth moved into the Alabama re- gion during the period of early settlement. Only the man who needed to better his fortune had an inducement to make the necessary sacrifice. Those who had slaves usually owned but a small number, ard many who later became planters had no slaves at all to begin with. In other words, the small farm- er of the piedmont region became the pioneer planter of the Southwest.
When a man prepared to transplant his establishment, he usually sold the land he held and retained the proceeds for the purchase of his new domain. His household goods and farm implements were packed on wagons and started out on the rough road toward the new home. The slaves drove the herds of cattle and hogs, while the planter's family brought up the rear in a carriage.7 It was a tedious journey, the roads being merely clearings through the forest, and without bridges. The smaller streams were forded and crude ferries were establish- ed at the larger ones. Yet there were compensations; hunting along the way afforded diversions for the men, and the camp- fire about which the wayfarers gathered at night shed a ro- mantic glow upon the faces of those who were traveling into a strange land.
Having reached the place where he was to make his home, the planter constructed a log cabin after the usual manner. Two rooms were built opposite each other and joined by a pas- sage-way. Chimneys built of stones or clay-daubed sticks were put up at opposite ends of the structure and great open hearths served for both heating and cooking. A "lean-to" might be attached behind one or both of the rooms, and an at- tic might be constructed above. Before the introduction of saw mills, the floors were made of puncheons. or logs split in halves, with the flat side upward. The chinks between the logs were filled with clay ; the doors and shutters were of crude boards, and the shingles were hand-split. In such a dwelling, the planter who brought his household furnishings could es- tablish a kind of rude comfort, which sufficed even the wealth- iest immigrants during the first few years of their sojourn. The first and only governor of Alabama Territory lived in
7 Hodgson, Letters from North America, I, 138.
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THE IMMIGRANTS
such a log cabin during the years of his administration and until his premature death.S
But all the newcomers were not even thus fortunately sit- uated. No very extensive tracts of the new land were offered for sale before 1818. and men who had homes to sell in the old states would naturally wish to purchase a location in the new country before removing. Yet, from 1815 onward, men poured into the ceded lands and "squatted" upon them in spite of the law and the Government." It was the policy of the United States to prevent intrusion until surveys could be made and the lands offered for sale at auction. Attempts were made to remove the squatters; the troops were called in and ordered to burn the cabins of those who refused to leave, but it was all . of no avail.10
Men of this class, being improvident by nature, did not come to seek wealth, but merely to gain a subsistence, or to enjoy the freedom of the woods. They built their simple cabins and planted their crops of corn between trees which they killed by circling. Their greatest immediate problem was to live until the first crop was made, and here there was much difficulty.11
The influx of immigrants was so great in 1816 and 1817 that the Indians and scattered pioneers were not able to furn- ish enough corn to meet the needs of the new-comers. In 1816 corn brought four dollars a bushel along the highway from Huntsville to Tuscaloosa, 12 and so scarce did this article be- come among the local Indians that the Government had to come to their rescue in 1817 in order to relieve actual distress.13
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