Perceiving the Enemy: Indians, Africans, and American Policy during the Second Seminole War, 1835-1842

• Other Authors: Kite, Jared (authoraut)
• Format: Others
• Language: English; English
• Published: Florida State University
• Subjects: History
• Online Access: http://purl.flvc.org/fsu/fd/FSU_migr_etd-4636

The Second Seminole War (1835-1842) has confounded recent scholars who have struggled to connect this history with the emerging recognition that the Seminole Indians had a complex relationship with African communities within Florida. This thesis addresses this issue by demonstrating how United States political and military leaders' strategies toward Indians and African maroons changed in accordance with their understanding of the African-Indian relationship. The thesis first argues that in the decades leading up to the war, the United States Government believed that it could convince the Florida Indians to remove peacefully. It also shows how the African populace in Florida (also referred to as Black Seminoles or "Indian Negroes") complicated and shaped the Government's desire and ability to remove the Seminoles west of the Mississippi River. Second, the thesis shows how American military and political leaders' attitudes evolved. Government leaders perceived the Seminoles and their African counterparts as one thing before the war, and as the war drew nearer, perceptions changed. Perceptions shaped government strategy and military tactics toward the two groups. Africans' importance to the Seminoles, and their dominant influence over the native Indians caused American leaders' perceptions to change. New attitudes resulted in a new strategy toward the Indians and Africans, one where the government put less emphasis on trying to convince Indians to remove and more on coercion. Indians, American officials proclaimed, needed to go west of the Mississippi River and Africans needed to be returned to their plantations. Third, this thesis explores the connections between American policy and the changing understanding of the Indian-African relationship during the war. Tensions that the Seminole-African relationship caused, and both groups' adamant desire to resist efforts to move them west or re-enslave them, ultimately caused the initiation of hostilities in Florida in December 1835. Seminoles and Africans maintained a relationship before and during the war that United States leaders could only break apart by continual war and negotiations that would favor each group individually. Although Africans and Seminoles worked together on and off the battlefield, they did not do so out of purely mutual reasons. This thesis shows how Indian and African participants based their actions on their own community's needs and desires, and it argues that the wartime cooperation fulfilled their own separate needs. American officials recognized these distinctions prior to the war, but they became more apparent when the war began as they shaped how they fought and negotiated during the war. This recognition led American leaders in 1837 to negotiate separately with influential African leaders, who, on a large scale, severed their ties with the Seminoles. === A Thesis submitted to the Department of History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts. === Fall Semester, 2010. === November 1, 2010. === African, Seminole, American Policy === Includes bibliographical references. === Andrew K. Frank, Professor Directing Thesis; Michael Creswell, Committee Member; Ronald E. Doel, Committee Member.