The Treaty of Moultrie Creek, September 1823

On the frontier, treaties between Natives and various governments, including the federal government, were made and scrapped almost at will.  An example of this was the Treaty of Moultrie Creek, between the United States, the Seminoles and various other Florida tribes in 1823.

During Colonial times and throughout the first decades of the Republic, the line between Georgia and Spanish Florida was a porous border.  Tribes such as the Creek/Muscogee, Seminole, Yamassee and Yuchi moved back and forth as living conditions or hunting needs changed.  Black slaves also used this border, to escape from plantations in Georgia and South Carolina.  The area was essentially a no man's land, with almost no law enforcement, so smuggling and cattle rustling was a problem.  With Spanish Florida finally ceded to the United States by Spain in 1821, more and more settlers looked to the panhandle area of Florida as ranching and cotton farming country.  They began to demand that the federal government do something about the Native people already living there, as well as clamp down on the escaped slaves, and trade with Cuba, which was still a Spanish possession. 

The Seminoles and other Native people had already born the brunt of a loss against the US army during the First Semiole War (1816-1818), and many people, such as Abiaka and Osceola, had vivid memories of the Creek War (1813-1814).  They had no wish to repeat the experience.  There were varied motivations for signing a treaty, but many Natives hoped that, with the boundaries clearly identified, they would be left in peace.  There were two problems.  The proposed treaty land was in Central Florida and much of it was unsuited for agriculture.  The government had carefully selected the best land for Settlers, leaving the Natives (who depended on farming for part of their food supply, too), with the leftovers.  Further, the Natives would be restricted to hunting within the bounds of reservation, with lashings, imprisonment and confiscation of weapons as punishment for being caught off the reservation.  This severely limited the hunting range for them. 

Representatives of the United States, the Seminoles and other Native groups concerned met on the bank of Moultrie Creek in what is now St. John's County to hammer out the details.  The US promised monetary compensation for loss of land, rations to supplement the food supply, a school, blacksmith and farming implements.  The Seminoles promised to return any escaped slaves, confine themselves to their land, cease trading with Cuba and allow roads to be built across their land as needed.  The Treaty was signed and, almost immediately, problems arose.  The rations supplied were never enough, forcing desperate Native men to go off the Reservation to hunt and risk arrest.  Although most of the Blacks living with the Seminoles at this time were either free, or mixed race, not run away slaves.  Whenever any cattle turned up missing, or slaves escaped from nearby plantations, though, the Natives were blamed.  Measures to enforce the Treaty became more harsh and punitive.

The ultimate solution, and for many a Final Solution, came with the Indian Removal Act of 1830, which would remove all Natives east of the Mississippi to Kansas and Oklahoma.  The Treaty of Payne's Landing in 1832, and Fort Gibson in 1836, essentially scrapped the Treaty of Moultrie Creek, leaving most Seminoles with no other choice than to remove to Oklahoma.  Today, the oak under which the treaty was supposedly signed is preserved in a park in St. John's County.