Ocmulgee National Monument 9
While it cannot be considered evidence in identifying the site, two
additional bits of historic detail add interest to the part it may have
played in the important events of this period. In December 1703, Col.
James Moore set out upon a mission for the Carolina Assembly to destroy
the Apalachee Indian settlements in west Florida. These Indians lived in
agricultural communities, close to the missions where they received
their religious indoctrination from the Spanish. They supplied important
provisions for both St. Augustine and Havana; and their area served as a
base for Spanish efforts to win over the Creek Indians to the north and
so enlarge their dominion. Moore took with him 50 volunteers from
Charleston, and gathering 1,000 Creek warriors on the Ocmulgee, set off
southward for Florida. The raid proved highly successful and, with
others like it over the following 2 years, dealt a devastating blow to
Spanish colonial aims. By 1706, most of the Indian population of the
area had been killed, driven away, or captured. Carolina was secure from
inland attack, and Spain's efforts to enlarge her hold in the Southeast
were at an end for all time.
Returning now to Ocmulgee, we note that as late as 1828 a map of this
region shows "Moore's Trail" running down the west bank of the river
from a point about 2 miles below Macon. It is not hard, then, to imagine
the former governor of the colony setting off on that bold adventure. A
shouting horde of excited Creek warriors assembles near the trader's
store. Moore watches as they fall in behind his sturdy band of
Englishmen, and the line files past the high walls of the stockade.
Following the Lower Patch down the hill, they march in the very shadow
of that imposing relic of former days, the Great Temple Mound. Then a
little distance down the river they reach the fording place; and
crossing it, are lost to sight as they enter the woods and take up the
trail to the south.
This episode, however, was merely the beginning of the Indian's unhappy
involvement in the rivalries of European nations and of the destruction
of his own culture through his very eagerness to obtain the wonderful
products of those nations. More and more the trader's goods were to
become a necessity to him rather than a luxury. His life shifted from
that of a village farmer to that of a hunter who left his village for
months at a time in search of the deer skins on which the new barter
economy was based. The women folk, of course, stayed home and tended the
fields; but the old ways were steadily breaking down. Moundbuilding had
been given up even before the coming of the English. With the barter
economy, the religious festivals connected with the farming calendar
were also abandoned during the prolonged hunting season. Only the great
summer harvest festival, the "busk," or "poskita," remained as the
central element of Creek religion. Finally, after the deer had been
largely hunted out and the market for skins had almost dried up, the
Indian became at last a log cabin farmer, exploited, but otherwise much
like any other resident of the frontier.
[Illustration: Creek warriors join the Carolina volunteers at Ocmulgee
for the start of Moore's raid, 1703.]
Two scenes in the story of the Indians at Ocmulgee remain to be
described. All along the Atlantic seaboard the red man awakened at last
to his peril: the land hunger of the foreigners was insatiable, and in
it lay a threat to his very existence. If he could only have brought
himself to forget old rivalries and have joined his ancient enemies in
the common cause, perhaps they could have driven out the intruder before
it became too late. Sooner or later bloody uprisings took place in most
sections of the country, but the end was always the same. The old habits
were too strong; cooperation could not replace hostility overnight; the
Indian could not make the needed sacrifice though his life was at stake.
The Southeastern uprising was called the Yamassee War in which many of
the shattered tribes of Georgia and Alabama took part. There can be
little doubt that the Creeks, under the able command of their leader,
Brim, were the principal actors. Under his guidance, they had at first
helped the English against the better entrenched Spaniard, but now it
was the Englishman himself who posed the chief threat and who must be
driven out at any cost. The scheme was well planned--and came within a
hair's breadth of success. It depended on winning over the Cherokee, who
from the first had befriended the Charleston colonists; and to do this
Brim took the unprecedented step of sending emissaries to his old enemy.
If they had agreed to forget old hatreds, the Indians could easily have
massed the strength to drive the colonists into the sea. Instead, the
Cherokee council voted to stand by their old friends; and the
announcement of their decision was the slaughter of the Creek
emissaries.
Nevertheless, the others decided to carry on without them. Their first
act in 1715 was to kill off the traders scattered about the Creek Nation
and to attack outlying settlements. Here, we can be sure, the trader to
Ocmulgee lost his life, unless by good fortune he happened to have gone
to Charleston to lay in supplies. In any case, the existence of the
store must have terminated. Little more was accomplished, however; the
Creek design had failed, and in 1717 the war came to an end. Ocmulgee
and the other towns along the river were then too close to the English
settlements at Augusta, and the Indians moved their villages back to the
Chattahoochee.
About 1773 we have a vivid description of the mounds and of extensive
old fields along the river, but there is no mention of Indians living
anywhere near the site. It is then, however, that we first learn of the
high regard of the Creeks for this spot; for here it was, according to
tradition, that the confederacy was first established. In 1805 the
Creeks ceded to the United States most of the lands bordering the
Ocmulgee River on the cast; but in this treaty they specifically
reserved for themselves about 15 square miles encompassing the site of
Ocmulgee Old Fields, though allowing the Government the right to erect a
military post or trading house thereon. In 1806, Fort Hawkins was built
a short way to the north of the Plateau on high ground commanding the
river. It was designed as a frontier outpost and factory, or trading
house; and it served this end until 1817, when it was moved west to Fort
Mitchell in Alabama Territory to keep up with the movement of the
frontier. Once more the Indians gathered here in 1819 to receive the
annual payment for their lands east of the Ocmulgee; but the city of
Macon was founded only 4 years later, and in 1828 Ocmulgee Old Fields
was sold to the public.
Guide to the Area
The points of interest in the area are numbered on the map (pages 26-27)
as follows:
1. MUSEUM AND ADMINISTRATION BUILDING. The museum exhibits tell the
story of Ocmulgee Old Fields by the use of pictures and models, with a
minimum of explanatory text, to supplement the archeological materials
themselves. In addition to the administrative offices of the monument,
it also houses the enormous collection obtained during the excavations,
and a small archeological and ethnological library. The design for the
colored frieze around the outer wall of the building's rotunda is copied
from the incised decoration on a Lamar Bold Incised pottery vessel.
[Illustration: The "husk" or green corn ceremony, still practiced today,
may be as old as the Indian's use of corn. Here the priest offers the
new fire to the Master of Breath. Museum diorama.]
2. CEREMONIAL EARTHLODGE. Situated some 200 yards southwest of the
museum building, this feature is a reconstruction of the winter temple
which lay at the northeast edge of the Master Farmer village. It shows
the original clay floor and lower parts of the building as they appeared
in use about A. D. 1000. Because the building was burned, pieces of the
original timbers were preserved on the old floor just as they had fallen
from the roof; and for this reason the reconstruction is thought to
present a very accurate picture of the original building. Because of the
need to protect these irreplaceable remains the earthlodge is kept
locked at all times, and is opened only to visitors accompanied by a
guide.
3. CORNFIELD MOUND. A short distance northwest of the earthlodge, this
mound was probably a center for religious festivals during the summer.
It was built in successive stages over the rows of a cultivated field
and thereby served to protect this evidence of early agriculture well
into modern times. In use the mound served as the base or platform for
one or more religious buildings which we might well call summer temples
of the Master Farmers.
4. PREHISTORIC TRENCHES. At the north edge of the Cornfield Mound lies a
portion of one of the two ditches or concentric series of linked pits
which seem to have surrounded the Master Farmer village. Their principal
use appears to have been defensive; but they may well have served as
borrow pits connected with mound construction.
5. GREAT AND LESSER TEMPLE MOUNDS. The Great Temple Mound was the
principal religious structure of the Master Farmers at Ocmulgee. As in
the case of the Cornfield Mound, the buildings for which it served as a
platform were doubtless used in connection with the major religious
festivals of the year, those leading up to and including the great
summer harvest ceremony. No clear indication of the appearance of these
buildings was preserved here, but we find some evidence of a rectangular
framework of small posts set at intervals. These were very likely
intertwined with cane, and the whole building plastered with clay and
roofed with sod or thatch. Like almost all temple mounds, this one
achieved its great size through successive additions to an original
structure of rather modest size.
The relation of the Lesser Temple Mound to the Great Temple Mound is not
known. Its closeness to the latter suggests either that it was an
auxiliary structure; or that the two were built at different periods as
the demands of the religious cycle for periodic renewal of the temples
and enlargement of their bases caused changes in the original plan of
the area. The base of the mound lies at the level of the top of the bank
above the parking area. This is the old plateau level, while the present
park road at this point occupies the bed of an old railroad cut.
6. TRADING POST. The area around the Trading Post stockade and generally
west of it was the site of a Creek village situated here from about 1690
to 1717. The burials are those of Creek Indians interred in the village
area; and the ornaments and other articles placed with the body indicate
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