198 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 73 
pul-gee), is well watered, with much canebrake, a very desirable country. On th<> 
west or right side, the good land extends about five miles, and on all the creeks below 
At-tau-gee, it is good; some of the trees are large poplar, red oak, and hickory, walnut 
on the margins of the creeks, and pea- vine in the valleys 
These four villages have, in all, about eighty gunmen; they do not conform to the 
customs of the Creeks, and the Creek law for the punishment of adultery is not known 
to them. 1 
At an earlier period the Alabama had a town still farther down- 
stream which appears in many maps under the name Nitahauritz, 
interpreted by Mr. H. S. Halbert to mean "Bear Fort." 
Hawkins mentions the fact that already a body of Koasati had 
gone beyond the Mississippi. 2 He does not say the same of the 
Alabama, yet we know that that tribe had also begun to split up. In 
describing the Koasati an account of one of these migrations will 
be given. From the papers of the British Indian agent, John Stuart, 
we learn that as early as 1778 bands of Kan-tcati and Tawasa had 
moved into northern Florida, 3 and after the Creek-American war 
their numbers were swollen very considerably. They did not, how- 
ever, long maintain a distinct existence. The movement toward the 
west was of much more importance. It appears that the long asso- 
ciation of these Indians with the French, due to the presence of a 
French post among them, had bred an attachment to that nation 
among the Alabama equally with the tribes about Mobile Bay, and 
part of them also decided to move across into Louisiana after the 
peace of 1763. A further inducement was the almost virgin hunting 
ground to be found in parts of that colony. That the first emigra- 
tion occurred about the date indicated (1763) 4 is proved by Sibley, 
writing in 1806, who has the following to say of the Alabama in the 
State of Louisiana in his time : 
Allibamis, are likewise from West Florida, off Allibami River, and came to Red River 
about the same time of the Boluxas and Appalaches. Part of them have lived on 
Red River, about sixteen miles above the Bayau Rapide, till last year, when most 
of this party, of about thirty men, went up Red River, and have settled themselves 
near the Caddoques, where, I am informed, they last year made a good crop of corn. 
The Caddos are friendly to them, and have no objection to their settling there. They 
speak the Creek and Chactaw languages, and Mobilian; most of them French, and 
some of them English. 
There is another party of them, whose village is on a small creek, in Appelousa 
district, about thirty miles northwest from the church of Appelousa. They consist 
of about forty men. They have hived at the same place ever since they came from 
Florida; are said to be increasing a little in numbers, for a few years past. They 
raise corn, have horses, hogs, and cattle, and are harmless, quiet people. 5 
1 Ga. Hist. Soc. Colls., m, pp. 36-37. Bossu's account shows clearly that the last statement is erroneous. 
2 See p. 204. 
3 Copy of MS., Lib. Cong. 
* It may have been a few years later, for John Stuart, the British Indian agent, writes, December 2, 1766, 
that some of these Indians had expressed adesire to settle on the banksof the Mississippi.— English tran- 
scriptions, Lib. Cong. 
Sibley in Annals of Congress, 9th Cong., 2d sess., 1085 (1806-7). 
