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Story Archives: Indians along wilderness trail -- Natchez to Nashville - 1797
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Indians along wilderness trail -- Natchez to Nashville - 1797
 Not far from Natchez during the summer of 1797, an Englishman named Francis Baily and his 12 traveling companions came upon a party of more than three dozen Choctaw warriors who had just returned from a battle with the Caddo Indians along the Red River in Louisiana.
Before they crossed the Mississippi River in route to Caddo lands, this Choctaw band had held a tribal meeting to prepare for battle. Once the Caddo learned that the Choctaw were coming, they, too, prepared for battle with traditional ceremonies.
"All the Indian nations have a particular kind of war-whoop and war-dance," wrote J.F.H. Claiborne in his 19th Century book on Mississippi. "Whenever they get any news threatening war, or of a warlike character, the war-whoop is raised by those who hear it, hearing which, the people of the town assemble..."
"When a chief gets news that...war is at hand, he dispatches runners to the head chief and to the different towns to carry the news." Just before getting to the Choctaw village or settlement, Claiborne said the runner began the war-whoop, and continued it through the village.
Then, those hearing the runner's call to arms began the war-whoop themselves and other runners were designated to alert other villages. In this manner, said Claiborne, "the news spreads speedily through the nation -- swifter than it could be carried on horseback."
This Choctaw tradition had been carried out before the Choctaw warriors left their Mississippi homeland to do battle along the Red.
"As soon as they saw us," said Baily, the warriors rushed to greet the white men "holding in their hands the scalps they had taken from their enemies, and grinning with a degree of self-satisfaction at this mark of their prowess in the field of battle."
Before they left the battle field in Louisiana, however, the Choctaw did everything in their power to assure that the scalps of their brothers had not been taken by the Caddo. This was another Choctaw tradition, according to Claiborne.
"It was a point of honor not to permit their fallen braves to be scalped," wrote Claiborne. "They would risk their lives to carry or conceal their bodies. Anciently, when one was killed or died a long way from home, they buried him in a sitting posture, to indicate that he was only resting, and would return."For the full story, subscribe to the The Concordia Sentinel's NEW E-Edition! |
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