The Largely Unknown Story of How Georgia and Alabama Creeks were Shafted

When William “Billy” Winn, Columbus historian and former journalist,  finished his presentation to Columbus Unitarian Universalists about his history about Creek Indian Removal from Georgia and Alabama, I asked him about the fact that very few people know anything about what really happened to Native Americans during that period. I told him I was taught almost nothing back in the 1930s and 1940s about Native American history in elementary and high  school.

He said, in effect,  that’s because those who profited most from Indian Removal didn’t want it taught or even talked about. It was a shameful episode. To make a long story short, Indians were forced off their tribal lands in order for white settlers to operate cotton plantations, which led to importation of  African American slaves to do the work. I won’t get into the details because there are many. However, you can get the whole story by reading Billy’s impressive history The Triumph of the Ecunnau-Nuxulgee: Land Speculators, George M. Troup, States Rights, and the Removal of the Creek Indians from Georgia and Alabama, 1825 – 38.