Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. II, Part 36

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association
Number of Pages: 1032

USA > Mississippi > Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. II > Part 36

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the year 1772. There were four small mercantile establishments in the town; these were owned by Blomart, James Willing, Bar- ber, and the firm of Hanchet & Newman. Blomart was a reduced British officer, and Hanchet was one of the followers or associates of Lyman."

The revolution of the Thirteen Colonies against the king began in 1775, and the people of South Carolina, in the course of that year, were involved in serious difficulties, with promise of actual warfare between the revolutionists and the settlers of the back country, who in considerable measure adhered to the king. In Georgia, also, there was a large party opposed to revolution, so large that that State was generally, when not under control of the British after 1775, in a condition of civil war. The Scotch Highlands of North Carolina were in arms for the king early in the war, under Allan McDonald, and were defeated in battle by the revolutionists in February, 1776. So it happened that the great natural attractions of Natchez district were enhanced, after that date, by the fact that it promised, by its remoteness, a safe refuge from the horrors of war, to those "whose 'sense of loyalty and of duty forbade them to fight against the king; but rather than stain their hands with kindred blood, renounced home, com- fort, society and position for an asylum in the wilderness."- (Claiborne.) "The opprobrium attached to the name of Tory (which was freely given to all who had either avoided the war by emigration, or who had remained and taken part against the col- onies, and then, to avoid the disgrace they had earned at home, and also to escape the penalties of the laws of confiscation, had brought here their property) induced most families to observe silence respecting their early history, or the causes which brought them to the country, and especially to their children. This was true even as late as forty years ago. There were then in these counties many families of wealth and polish, whose ancestors were obnoxious on account of this damaging imputation; and it was remembered as a tradition carefully handed down by those who at a later day came to the country from the neighborhoods left by these families, and in most instances for crimes of a much more heinous character than obedience to conscientious allegiance to the government."-(W. H. Sparks, The Memories of Fifty Years, probably written before 1870.)

Wailes, explaining a later situation, says: "Many of the older inhabitants had been royalists from principle. Some of them were British officers and continued to receive their pay and pensions even after the acquisition of the country by the United States. Not a few had migrated from the sister States, with strong sus- picions of having fought on the wrong side of King's Mountain. With a change of circumstances and of political institu- tions came also a change of views and opinions, and many of these persons became none the worse citizens, from their antecedents. The descendants of many of them, grown up with attachments to American institutions, have earned for themselves positions of

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respectability and influence. It would answer no good purpose, therefore, to annoy the over-sensitive of the present age, by rend- ing the veil which time has spread over the 'bygones' of a past generation. Let them rest in oblivion."

Without accepting the standpoint of any of these authors, or admitting that anything in the records of the settlers deserve the sentence of oblivion, it may be observed that these differences of attitude toward the revolution can be discussed now without prejudice, and charitably understood. Historically, it is necessary to remember the way the people of the United States were divided in hostile camps during the revolution in order to understand the events along the Mississippi and properly weigh the opinions ex- pressed then, and by later, but not remote, chroniclers. Elihu Hall Bay, of South Carolina, one of the refugees called Tories, served as an official under Gov. Chester during the Revolution, received a large grant of land in the Natchez district, and became the owner by purchase of large bodies on the Homochitto and at Walnut Hills.

In later years he was honored with a position on the bench of South Carolina. Anthony Hutchins, who had obtained a grant of about 1,500 acres on Second creek in 1772-73, brought his fam- ily and a large party of loyalists from the Santee Hills of South Carolina in 1777. They packed their belongings over the moun- tains to the Holston river, built a fleet of flatboats, floated down the Tennessee river, passed the dangerous Mussel shoals, infested by Indian pirates (with the loss of only a few boats, and the wounding of Hutchins, who was shot in the back), floated on into the Ohio and Mississippi; stopped at L'anse a la Graisse, after- ward known as New Madrid, where they hurriedly pushed out in the night for fear of robbery and murder, and so came on down the great river to Walnut Hills, whence some proceeded to Cole's Creek and some to St. Catherine. After 1776 also came the rep- resentatives of the Scotch Highlanders of Cape Fear river, whose "worthy and industrious descendants may be found from Pensa- cola to Natchez." These earliest Scotch immigrants were of the people that had fought for the Hanovers at Moore's Creek as their ancestors did for the Stuarts at Culloden.

The Carolinians led by Hutchins followed the river route sev- eral years before a party of daring pioneers of the Holston valley, including the future wife of Andrew Jackson, had dared to make their voyage to settle Nashville, a voyage made memorable also by the capture at Mussel Shoals of three of their number, who were tortured to death by the Chickamaugas. Others came with packhorses on the trail from Georgia through the Creek and Choctaw country ; the Northerners came by ship to Pensacola and New Orleans, and thence by boat up the river, or down the Ohio from Pittsburg. Of the settlers in general from 1765 to 1779, Clai- borne says: "Nine-tenths of them came to cultivate the soil; they brought intelligence and capital; and they embarked at once upon the production of supplies for home consumption."

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In 1773, according to a document in the office of trade, at Lon- don, there were only thirty-three settlements (or plantations) between Natchez and the present Louisiana line. But a few years later, in 1778, the "Western parts had so far increased in its inhabitants that since the last assembly it had been divided from the district of Mobile or Charlotte county, and erected into two districts; viz .: The District of Manschalk and the District of Natches, and contained a greater number of respect- able, wealthy planters and settlers than either of the other Dis- tricts in the Colony." (Letter of Gov. Chester.) In this pro- vincial assembly of West Florida, in 1778, the first one after 1772, Anthony Hutchins and Isaac Johnston were members for the Dis- trict of Natchez.

It appears that they gave considerable attention to stock rais- ing, for which the open ranges were favorable. Col. Hutchins is said to have had 1,000 cattle and 500 horses at the time of the revolt. Indigo was probably cultivated as an export crop, as in other parts of Florida and on the South Atlantic coast. "Bacon, beef, butter and poultry were plentiful. Orchards were on a large scale and the fruit better than at present. It was a common sight to see one hundred bee hives in a farm yard. Beeswax and honey were articles of export. The medicinal roots and herbs, rhubarb, ginger, pimento, saffron, hops, the opium poppy, were grown in the gardens. Many planters tanned their own leather. Shoes were almost always made on the plantation, either by a workman belonging to the place, or by a man hired to do the work. Gen- tlemen and ladies were clad in homespun. Even the bridle-reins, girths and saddle-cloths were made at home." In brief, it was that sort of happy, independent and self-reliant existence that is possible where there is more land than can be utilized. "The land holders were, for the most part, educated men; many of them had held commissions in the British and provincial armies ; others had held civil offices under the crown or the colonies. Such a popu- lation is a guarantee against anarchy or mob rule, and though remote from the provincial government of Pensacola, and no court of record nearer, the Natchez district was proverbial for its im- munity from crime and criminals. The intelligent and cul- tivated class predominated, and this gave tone to the community." There was a darker side, of course, as Mr. Claiborne admits. "Bad men, outlaws and fugitives from justice came likewise, but they were outnumbered and restrained by the better class." There was that spirit of which Wailes gives an intimation in his account of the revolt of 1781: "Having little else to employ them, the people ran to arms in a spirit of reckless frolic and bravado, without duly considering their true situation, and the great evils to which they exposed themselves." But without something of this daring, there would never be any pioneer settle- ments of civilization.

Hardly had the "District of Natchez" been formally erected, when it became evident that Natchez was not to be a secure refuge

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from the influence of the Revolution, which was controlling events, not only as far as the Mississippi river, but throughout the world. Pensacola had some report of trouble from Natchez as early as 1777, and John McGillivray, the Mobile merchant, was authorized to raise a force, including Indians, to march to the support of the settlement.

Oliver Pollock was commissioned as agent of Virginia and the United States in 1777, to purchase military supplies for the fron- tier troops on the Indian border of the Northwest. This had the secret sanction of the Spanish authorities, but the purchase and shipment of supplies up the river was necessarily a matter of as much secrecy as possible, Spain being a neutral power. American officers came down to convey the supplies, and, says Monette, "through the enterprise and discretion of Capt. William Lynn, Colonel Rodgers, Captain James Willing and Captain Benham, the American posts on the Ohio and upper Mississippi were re- peatedly supplied during the years 1777, 1778 and 1779 with mili- tary stores and supplies from New Orleans." This was not only a delicate but a very dangerous service. On the Ohio they were watched by the savages, under the orders of Gen. Hamilton, of Detroit. Rodgers and Benham, going up from New Orleans in 1779, were massacred, with their 90 men. Stephen Minor, another officer in this service, escaped death in 1780, at the Post of Arkan- sas, only by the fact that he was delayed by sickness. All his men were murdered and his stores plundered. Captain Willing came down with 50 men in two keel boats, in the winter and spring of 1778. Remonstrances had been made to the governor of Lou- isiana regarding this contraband trade, and "Willing deemed it prudent that he should have some assurance, as he descended to New Orleans, that the people of the Natchez district would ob- serve a strict neutrality on their part. In order to place this ques- tion beyond doubt, he landed [first at Walnut Hills and then] at Natchez, where he had formerly resided for several years before the war, and having obtained an interview with some of the citi- zens, he took the sense of the town in a public meeting, and with the general approbation entered into a written convention of neu- trality."-(Monette, Hist. Val. Miss.) It will be observed that this was a sort of treaty under which Willing would refrain from attack if the colony would refrain from support of his enemies. There was no garrison of British soldiers at that time. Accord- ing to Monette's account, Willing found it desirable, from infor- mation received, to take Col. Hutchins with him to New Orleans as a hostage. There, Hutchins was released on parole, whereupon he returned home and alarmed the settlements by a report that Willing was preparing to return and plunder the district, as his men had done about Baton Rouge and Manchac. In these lower districts there was wholesale pillage of the property of the promi- nent royalists. Hutchins raised a body of armed men, which, on the return of Willing up the river, fired upon one of his boats as it was coming to land, killing several men.

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Monette describes this as "the first act of open hostility by the people of Natchez district against the American troops . a wanton attack, made by about twenty-five men in ambuscade."

From the narrative by Claiborne and Wailes it would appear that the attack on the boat was in self-defense, not as against sol- diers, but against plunderers. (But see Willing Expedition.) Capt. Phelps wrote in his Journal: "We subsequently held a consultation upon the unhappy condition of our affairs and the course it had become necessary to pursue. Under the advice of Colonel Hutchins, a British subject who resided among us, and still retained his commission and had not taken with us the oath of neutrality, we formed ourselves into a military body, and agreed to turn out as often as needed to protect ourselves and the settle- ments generally from such banditti. Their depradations, so con- trary to the declaration of Willing, had absolved us from the oath we had taken, and thus the sympathy with and friendship for the American cause, in these remote settlements, were smothered by these unprincipled buccaneers." The American influence at New Orleans was exerted after this event more strongly in favor of Spain taking possession of the territory held by the British. Willing went on to Mobile, in the hope of causing an uprising in favor of the United States, but was made a prisoner of war and vigorously treated, for which the United States retaliated upon General Hamilton, who was captured by Gen. George Rogers Clark. At the time of the Willing expedition, Clark was making his famous march on Kaskaskia.

"Shortly after the foregoing occurrences," says Wailes, "Gov- ernor Chester sent Colonel Magellan to raise four companies of militia, and with orders to fit up Fort Panmure. The command of these troops was given to Lyman, Blomart and McIntosh, who were soon ordered to Baton Rouge, in consequence of the prospect of war with Spain, and a Captain Foster, with a hundred men, was left in command of Natchez." According to the narrative of Mr. Claiborne, while Capts. Lyman, Blomart and McIntosh were in command at the fort with their volunteers, Capt. Michael Jack- son appeared to take charge under orders from Pensacola, with a company of royalist refugees. The officer is said to have been recognized as a refugee for other causes than allegiance to the king, and his men were described as no better than Willing's. So much discontent was aroused that there was a revolt of citizens and volunteers, headed by Anthony Hutchins, who arrested Jack- son and required him to promise to resign his commission and leave the country. Captain Lyman again took command. But Jackson collected a party of "deserters and brigands," seized some military stores and two pieces of artillery, sent out runners for Choctaw reinforcements, and posted himself under the bluff at the landing. The Choctaws came in, three hundred strong, but finding the British flag flying on the fort, declined to aid in sup- pression of the mutiny. The conflict was settled by permitting Jackson to return to the fort and submit to orders until the com-

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mandant at Pensacola could be heard from, but on the third night , he had Lyman under arrest. Some of the soldiers and volunteers then left the garrison, and when Lieutenants Pentacost and Holmes were sent to order them back, with loaded muskets, one of the volunteers, Felt, a Lyman settler, shot Pentacost, fatally wound- ing him, and forced the other officer to disarm. Lyman managed to gain control again, but finally was put under arrest and in close confinement by his irrepressible rival. Then Capt. Foster was sent up from Manchac by Col. Dickson, and Jackson secretly decamped, says Claiborne, "carrying with him all the portable property he could lay his hands on. The officers and men who had acted with Jackson, were sent under guard to Pensacola, where several were ordered to be shot." While the district was in this deplorable condition the Spanish took control. Fort Pan- mure and two small posts on the Amite and Thompson's Creek were included in the capitulation of Col. Dickson to Gen. Galvez, at Baton Rouge, September 22, 1779. The entire district of Nat- chez at once passed under the administration of the governor of Louisiana. When Galvez retired, Col. Carlos de Grand Pré was left in command at Baton Rouge, with subordinate officers and garrisons at Panmure and Bute.

Congress, meanwhile, had commissioned James Robinson, a friend and companion of Willing, to return to Natchez and again attempt to secure the allegiance of the inhabitants, and hold the district as territory of the United States. He arrived with 30 or 40 men, after the Spanish had made their occupation. "The expe- dition was broken up and dispersed, and the leader soon afterward died."

The settlers were not disposed to submit without a struggle to the easy conquest by the Spanish. To the Eastern colonists it was particularly intolerable to assume the role of heretics under the dominion of his Catholic Majesty. The remarkable ability of Galvez inspired respect, and it was well remembered how, ten years before, Lafreniere, Noyan, Caresse, Marquis and Milhet, distinguished citizens of New Orleans, had been put to death for resisting the power of Spain ; yet, the scattered people of this lit- tle settlement, hundreds of miles from any support, began to pre- pare for war, refusing to believe that Great Britain would permit them to be overwhelmed and sacrificed. The fall of Mobile in 1780 was discouraging, but when they learned that an expedition was on foot against Pensacola, they sent word to Governor Ches- ter and General Campbell, and proposed to drive the Spaniards out of Natchez if they could have assistance. (See Revolt of 1781.)

Natchez District, Spanish. On July 29, 1781, Don Carlos de Grand Pré, lieutenant-colonel of the Royal regiment of Louisiana, entered upon his duties as "civil and military commandant of the post and district of Natchez." His administration was mainly devoted to the arrest of "rebels" and the confiscation of their property, an account of which is given under the title, "Revolt of

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1781." In September, 1782, Col. Estevan Miro, a Spaniard who had acted as governor-general at New Orleans in the absence of . General Galvez, was in command at Natchez, and was succeeded in November by Don Pedro Piernas, who was promoted to col- onel when Miro was made brigadier-general. The successor of Piernas, ad interim (June to August 3, 1783) was Capt. Francisco Collel, who gave way to Lieut .- Col. Phelipe Trevino, both of the regiment of Louisiana. Natchez was honored in the assignment of commandants from the famous Creole regiment. In 1785, Don Francis Bouligny became "lieutenant-governor" and commandant, and in March, 1786, Colonel Grand Pré was again assigned. In July, 1792, Lieut .- Col. Manuel Gayoso de Lemos was put in com- mand. He, a thorough Spaniard, of English education, remained until July 26, 1797, when he left to take the office of governor-gen- eral, August 1, 1797, and after that Capt. Stephen Minor, Gayoso's post major, acted as commandant until the evacuation, the re- appointment of Colonel Grand Pré, in 1797, being protested by the inhabitants. These commandants or "governors" had the gen- eral duties of a civil administrative officer and military commander, under the orders of the governor-general of Louisiana. They ap- pointed alcaldes, or justices, in the various districts of the Natchez, of which there were nine or ten in 1797, and themselves heard appeals from these justices. They performed the duties of gov- ernor, legislature, mayor, court of appeals, magistrate, chief of police, town marshals, etc. There could be no auction without their permission in writing. They granted permission to go to New Orleans, and sometimes refused it to individuals who had debts, unless they gave security. Divorces were also within their jurisdiction. The records show traces of some domestic upheavals that must have agitated society. Mrs. Rachael Robards came down from Nashville in 1790, and obtained a Spanish divorce, pre- liminary to her marriage to Andrew Jackson. There was no law- making body. The law at New Orleans was the code of O'Reilly, and the edicts of the governor-general, the council of the Indies and his Catholic Majesty. At Natchez law proceeded from the commandant. Francis Baily (q. v.) in 1797, sought justice from Gayoso, when Vidal had offered him depreciated post certificates at face value in payment for a purchase, and asked Gayoso to show him the law for such an imposition. "I shall never forget the looks of the man at this (what he called impertinent) question ; for, wondering at my assurance, and threatening me with the hor- rors of the Callibouse if I any longer disputed his authority, he laid his hand upon his breast, and told me that he was the law; and that as he said the case was to be determined." The essential difference, under the forms, of two civilizations, is shown in Baily's comment: "I could not help laughing at the insulting ef- frontery of the man when he made this speech, at which he seemed more than ever enraged." (Baily's Journal, London, 1856, p. 289.)

Yet there is evidence that the inhabitants had some initiative re- garding local laws. Governor Gayoso proclaimed a set of laws

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February 1, 1793, saying that "the inhabitants in a full meeting of the principal planters" had represented to him the need of pens and pounds for cattle; their fears of the ravages of "wild beasts of prey, particularly the tiger and wolf," and their desire to guard against the natural inconveniences that attend the making of in- digo. He instructed that "pens or pounds" should be constructed by Isaac Galliard and Abram Ellis, Samuel Hutchins and J. H. White, D. Williams and I. Lintot, R. Bacon and N. Tomlinson, R. Swayze and P. Shiltin, D. Grafton and I. Bernard, C. Board- man and W. Pipes, James Bonner and T. Jordan, A. Bealt and J. Girault, J. Lum and N. Joy, A. and J. Henderson, J. Calvit and B. Belk, Jeremiah Coleman and J. Foster, R. King and B. Curtis, I. Johnson and R. Ford, S. Keady and J. Oglesby, J. Armstreet and F. Mory, J. Minor and S. Holmes, A. Scanlin and C. King, P. Presler and J. Carter. (The I's and J's are indistinguishable.) This was for the region about Natchez. William Murray and John Smith were ordered to point out the places for pens in the district of Villa Gayoso; Col. Peter Bruin and William Brocas on Bayou Pierre ; Garrett Rapalje and Tobias Brashear on Big Black; James Nicholson and Ruffin Gray on the south side of Homochitto; Charles Percy at Buffalo; Francis Poussett and H. Hunter on Bayou Sara. The estray law announced in the same proclamation required stray cattle to be put in these pounds and notice given. A lawful fence was also defined as staked and ridered and five English feet high. A reward of five dollars was offered for wolf and tiger scalps. Makers of indigo were required to burn the weed as soon as possible after it came out of the steeper, and forbidden to drain the vats into any creeks used by the inhabitants as a source of water.

To remedy the nuisance of vagrants who lived in the woods under the pretense of hunting, by which the good and industrious inhabitants suffered much in regard to stock, it was forbidden to fire-hunt or set guns, under any pretense, or upon any occasion, and people were forbidden to hunt on their own lands without per- mission in writing from an alcalde. Ezekiel Freeman was ap- pointed treasurer to receive the proceeds of the sale of stray ani- mals and pay rewards for scalps.

The provincial government entirely ignored the boundary of the United States as recognized by Great Britain in the treaty of 1783. This matter was taken up between the United States and Spain, and the negotiations continued for twelve years. The inhab- itants of the district, meanwhile, submitted with such grace as they could to the transfer from vassalage to the king of England to vassalage to the king of Spain. A few had been American citizens to the extent that citizenship had been imparted by Captain Wil- ling, but that had been promptly renounced for what they consid- ered good reasons. There was, however, a readiness to welcome the authority of the United States as soon as the terms of the treaty with Britain became known, and before it was made ap- parent that Spain would ignore the definition of limits.

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Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. II, Part 36

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed Publication date: 1907 Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association Number of Pages: 1032

Author: Rowland, Dunbar, 1864-1937, ed
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: Atlanta, Southern Historical Publishing Association
Number of Pages: 1032