'In the footprints of your ancestors': Muscogee (Creek) Nation returns to Tallahassee area

The Muscogees of Oklahoma have always been told to "never go back" to their homelands in the southeastern United States.

Tallahassee included.

"We didn't leave anything there, meaning, we took our culture, we took our language, we took our ceremonial grounds, we took the sacred fire that burned here with us," said RaeLynn Butler, secretary of culture and humanities with the Muscogee (Creek) Nation.

"We would never be able to progress or move forward as a people if we keep looking behind us."

But to move forward, they say, the Muscogees must come back to their ancestral homelands. Not to relive the pain of forced removal 200 years ago, but to ensure we know their history, who they are, and that they're still here.

"Can we just send a letter, make a phone call? But when you show up in person, that's the real deal." she said. "I've read and heard about these sites and these places, but when you see it with your own eyes, and you're in the footprints of your ancestors, it's a very emotional, powerful, feeling."

As chronicled in a Tallahassee Democrat story commemorating the city's bicentennial, The Muscogee (Creek) Nation were some of the last remaining Indigenous people to live in Tallahassee until the federal government pushed them out west to make room for white settlers and cotton plantations.

A long journey to Tallahassee and Blountstown

Last week, a delegation from the Muscogee (Creek) Nation visited Tallahassee and Blountstown to begin to repair the relationship between the past and future.

A group of nine people, including Principal Chief David Hill, Second Chief Del Beaver, representatives from the national council and other tribe officials met with Tallahassee Mayor John Dailey and then drove to Blountstown to commemorate a memorial placed in front of the Calhoun County courthouse that recognizes a former Muscogee (Creek) Nation reservation.

When Indigenous Americans were expelled from the Panhandle of Florida by the United States and were forced to walk Oklahoma to Indian Territory, many did not make it that far. About 3,500 Creeks died on their way out west. By 1840, most of the Muscogee-speaking Creeks had left to make room for cotton plantations.

More: Before the Bicentennial: Muscogees from Tallahassee area forced into the 'unknown land'

On a memorial in front of the Calhoun County courthouse, "The Muscogee (Creek) Nation was forcefully removed from Florida on the Trail of Tears in March of 1834, from present day Blountstown Calhoun County, Florida," is etched on granite.

"The Muscogee (Creek) Nation honors the sacred, historical significance of these lands in Florida and remembers the Mvskokvle (Muscogee people) who lived and died for the perseverance of future Muscogee people."

A Blountstown monument built on 'mutual respect'

Blountstown was a Muscogee town named after John Blount, who was its chief for a short time in history after the Red Stick War in the early 1800s.

Blount, the leader of the Apalachicola Band, is a controversial figure in Native American history. He and an army of 1,000 Muscogees fought alongside General Andrew Jackson against other Indigenous groups in the Red Stick War and the first Seminole War and was the first to agree to move west after the Indian Removal Act in 1830.

Blount and Davy Elliott, another leader of the tribe, were paid a $13,000 bribe to move hundreds of other Muscogees to what is now Oklahoma.

"Of that number some have died, some have fled to the Creek and Seminole nations, while there are some, I fear, who will give us some trouble before we get them off," wrote Wiley Thompson, Agent for Florida Indians, to U.S. Secretary of War Lewis Cass on Jan. 20, 1834.

In the letter, Thompson asks Cass for advice: Should the U.S. government agree to pay the original $13,000, even though some members of Blount's group have died or run away?

"...as death has more effectually relieved the United States from the incumbrance of those who died than the commencement of their emigration were they living could possibly do, it seems to be that no deduction should be made for them," Thompson wrote.

In the hot May sun, Hill thanked Blountstown officials for welcoming the Muscogee (Creek) Nation back to their homelands.

"The southeast was our home. Florida was our home. But we endured the long walk, we endured assimilation, and today we're over 100,000 citizens," Hill said.

Hill, who was first elected in 2019, said his administration has made it a priority to reestablish a presence, to preserve and to protect their ancestral lands "through collaboration, but built on mutual respect and understanding."

"It's been said to me times before, 'Why did y'all leave such a beautiful place?'" he said.

"We were never asked."

'Tallahassee is your friend': Mayor says 'sky's the limit' in relationship building with tribe

In Tallahassee, Dailey and city manager Reese Goad validated and welcomed the Muscogee (Creek) Nation's request to form a relationship with Okmulgee, Oklahoma, the nation's capital.

"Tallahassee is your friend, and we love you," Dailey said.

Both Dailey and Goad were still in the thick of emergency response from the tornadoes that swept Tallahassee the week prior. On that Wednesday morning, five days later, there were a few thousand without electricity, and trees and debris were still being cut and hauled away from the roofs of houses and the middle of streets.

"If there is anything we can do as a nation for you, this is pretty common for us," Hill told Dailey. "I know we are a thousand miles away, but we're just a phone call away."

Hill and Dailey discussed ways the nation and Tallahassee could reconnect and honor the Indigenous history that was lost during the removal of native people from the southeast. Whether by a historical marker, a flag or by becoming sister cities, Dailey, Goad, Hill and the rest of the delegation left the meeting vowing to keep in touch throughout the year.

The Muscogee (Creek) Nation has been reconnecting with other cities with historical significance throughout the south, including Macon, Georgia, and St. Augustine. Part of the effort is to spread awareness and educate others on the history of the nation, the other is to repatriate artifacts and ancestral remains that sit behind glass in museums or in drawers at universities.

"Now that we know these things are here, we have a responsibility to take care of them, to set the record straight, to tell our history," Butler said. "It's unbelievable that not only can you be forced and removed from the land, but then after we leave, archaeologists and other people come and remove us twice by removing our ancestors."

The Tallahassee meeting, which was at the request of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, was just the beginning of the relationship between the nation and the City of Tallahassee, and "the sky's the limit," Dailey said.

"This is our history, and we will celebrate all aspects of it and make sure that even the young children that are coming up, that they know our history, and they know all of the people that lived in this area for thousands and thousands of years," he said.

Mayor Dailey says city will look at correcting Indianhead street names

Dailey also acknowledged the need to correct some of the street names in Indianhead Acres. In the neighborhood, the street names are Muscogee words, but some are wrong and backward, according to the Eli Rowland-Chang, the language revitalization project manager for the Muscogee(Creek) Nation.

"That is definitely something that needs to be done," he told the Democrat.

Professor Andrew Frank, director of the Native American and Indigenous Studies Center at Florida State University, said the new relationship between the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and their homelands, including Tallahassee, is "remarkably good, and remarkably late."

"Here we are, 200 years later, there's still scars," Frank said. "But 100,000 strong, there's a pretty remarkable reminder that people persevere.

This story is part of TLH 200: the Gerald Ensley Bicentennial Memorial Project. Throughout our city's 200th birthday, we'll be drawing on the Tallahassee Democrat columnist and historian's research as we re-examine Tallahassee history. Read more at tallahassee.com/tlh200. Ana Goñi-Lessan can be reached at agonilessan@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: After 200 years, Muscogee (Creek) Nation returns to Tallahassee