Native protesters shine light on complicated history

[mfcorey1]

ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. -

Thousands of tourists flocked to St. Augustine this week to celebrate the founding of America’s oldest city. But one group at the ceremonies was calling for an end to the revelry. Indigenous protesters say the anniversary is a painful memory that’s too often forgotten by the masses.
.
Against a backdrop of canon fire, Bobby C. Billie’s walking stick clicked against the historic stones of the Castillo de San Marcos as he approached the entrance Sunday morning. He was having a conversation with Ceco Osceola in their native tongue.

The two Native American activists were among about 30 protesters in St. Augustine that morning.

“We’re asking the government to tear down the fort and then invite indigenous people to build and structure what was there before. And then we can celebrate," Billie said. "Otherwise there’s no celebration.”

They unfurled a flag of the Original Miccosukee Simanolee Nation, a federally unrecognized tribe for which Billie serves as spiritual leader.

Billie said the arrival of St. Augustine founder Pedro Menendez marked the death of his people’s way of life.

http://www.news4jax.com/news/native-protesters-shine-light-on-complicated-history/35228710

[Omaha Steve]

1. Please x post in First Americans!

K&R

[hfojvt]

2. I am curious about the name of the tribe

Why is it not Timucua? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timucua

And they appear to have been wiped out.

Osceola, of course, is a famous Seminole. Except the Seminoles seem to NOT be 'indigenous' to Florida. At least not according to what I have read.

"As the years passed an amalgamated society was formed by all these elements, a loose confederacy of many groups speaking many languages but with dialects of Muskhogean, the great language family of the Southeast, gradually becoming the basis of the common tongue. This new-made tribe spread on southward down the penninsula of Florida and came to be known as the Seminole (originally pronounced Seminolee), from a Creek word meaning something like 'outlanders'." (Indians p. 216)

As such, their "homelands" appear to be fairly recent historically. "The ancestors of Seminole Indians migrated to Florida during the 18th century." (Florida's Negro War p. 21)

[Zorra]

4. That's just one more twisted euro-christian imperialist distortion of reality.

Here's reality:

About The Seminole Nation of Oklahoma

The history of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma began when Spain first occupied the peninsula known as Florida. When Pedro Menéndez de Avilés founded St. Augustine in 1565, the first permanent settlement in Florida after at least 60 years of sporadic Spanish visitation, he discovered complex cultures sustained by hunting, fishing, farming and raising stock. Tribes from three different basic language groups, the Timuquan, Calusan and Muskhogean occupied Florida and lived in small and well-organized villages.

Although today the term Seminole is used, this name originated due to a European misnomer, which categorized a diverse group of autonomous tribes together under the name Seminole. The Spanish first recognized the indomitable self-preservation of the speakers of the "core language” Mvskoke, and called them cimarrones, or "free people" (Seminole). Translated through several languages to English, this term came to apply to all of Florida’s initial inhabitants, and their neighbors who later fled to join them when deprived of their own homelands. The Seminoles absorbed remnants of other Florida tribes into their own. The Oconee were the original "Seminole," and later included the Hecete, Eufaula, Mikasuki, Horrewahle, Talahassee, Chiaha, and Appalachicola. Additionally, through intermarriage, traditional cultural adoption practices and treaty obligations, runaway and “freed” slaves were absorbed also. The term “cimarrones” spoken by the Spanish was initially transliterated by the Creek as “semvlonÄ“.” “ SemvlonÄ“” eventually morphed into “Semvnole” (pronounced sem-uh-no-lee by native speakers even today) and thus we have the term that would describe the various Indian tribes in the State of Florida.

Although a relatively large contingency of Seminole were able to hold out in the Florida Everglades during the Indian Removal Era and Seminole Wars, the majority were relocated to Indian Territory along with the other “Five Tribes” of the southeast

http://sno-nsn.gov/culture/aboutsno

[hfojvt]

6. those darned capitalist running dogs

interesting though, that they do claim earlier origins there.

But I am thinking that the record of slave raids is pretty accurate.

According to Florida's Negro War "Both Creeks and Americans still viewed the Seminoles as part of the Creek Nation."

Are Creeks included in the Euro-Christian imperialists?

What about black people? (like the author of "Florida's Negro War&quot

[Zorra]

7. Kidnapped Africans you mean? Here:

Another habit many of the other tribes acquired from the whites was that of slavery. Though some of the tribes actually owned African slaves, the Seminoles never did. Indeed, many black Africans escaping from slavery in the Carolinas and Georgia came to Florida and built settlements near the Seminoles. They formed a union with the Seminoles based upon both their mutual fear of slavery. This union was a strong one which surpassed attempts by the U.S. to break them apart. Intermarriages and friendships were common. In fact, they were so closely allied that the blacks became known as the Black Seminoles.
snip--- (and more fun with eurochristian imperialists)
The Seminole Wars

The prosperity of the Seminoles disturbed former slaveholders in the U.S. In 1812, Seminoles learned that a group of Georgians who called themselves "Patriots" were plotting to attack Seminole settlements. The Seminoles got the jump on these potential invaders by attacking them on their plantations. This action infuriated the government and as a result, American troops led by Andrew Jackson crossed into Florida and destroyed towns in northern Alachua County.

In 1816, American forces commanded by General Edmund Gaines attacked Fort Negro, an old British enclave on the Apalachicola River now occupied by mostly Black Seminoles. Led by Commander Garcia, the Seminoles refused to surrender. However, a cannonball fired by a U.S. ship landed right in the middle of the fort's munitions storage, causing a devastating explosion. Of the 337 men, women and children in the fort, only 31 survived. They were dragged back into the horrors of slavery.
snip---
Around 500 Seminoles remained in Florida, managing to hide in the Everglades, moving ever southward into areas where white men dared not venture. Though leaders such as Wild Cat, John Horse and others met with President Polk for peace talks in the nation's capital, the Seminoles' resistance did not fade.

http://www.abfla.com/1tocf/seminole/semhistory.html

In Florida, Andrew Jackson hunted the Seminoles and escaped slaves like he was some kind of psychopathic veterinarian hunting lions for sport in Africa.

[Enthusiast]

8. Thank you for the clarification.

[hfojvt]

3. here's another part of the complicated history

"During the next generation (after 1680) many Creeks, together with some neighbors known as the Yuchi, who spoke a language unrelated to any other and seemed to be absolutely devoted to fighting, happily joined English slavers in raid after raid on the Spanish missions." (Indians p. 215)

"In 1704 the sadly tamed descendants of the Apalachee were rounded up like cattle in a crushing English-Creek (50 English; 1,000 Creeks) attack on the northern Florida missions...In Florida the Spanish were attempting an experiment: a Christian Indian state. No colonies of Europeans were permitted. The tiny garrisons were only for protection of the missionaries and could not be used for conquest. firearms were not allowed among the mission Indians. This last oversight made the Florida mission Indians sitting ducks for the English slavers and their Creek, Yuchi, and occasionally Cherokee auxiliaries whom they not only armed but trained.

By 1745 the flourishing missions of northern Florida were in ruins, their thousands of converts widely scattered, and immigrant bands of Yuchi and various peoples from the Lower Creek towns were moving into the country just left vacant." (Indians p. 215-16)

Yep, the ancestors of the Seminoles wiped out, or captured, or forced them to flee - the original indigenous tribes which were in Florida, and then happily took the lebensraum they had thus created. At least if this author is to be believed. "Indians" by William Brandon 1961 American Heritage.

Yet their descendants have the nerve to compare the founder of St. Augustine to Hitler?

[Zorra]

5. Yeah, well, Hitler invaded countries and committed genocide just like the eurochristian

imperialist colonists did when they came to this continent.

It's a just comparison.

It's a darn shame that the native folks couldn't keep the eurochristian sociopaths out permanently after they burned them out and drove them off.