Chickasaw - History

History

The origin of the Chickasaw is uncertain. 20th-century scholars, such as the archeologist Patricia Galloway, theorize that the Chickasaw and Choctaw coalesced as distinct peoples in the 17th century from the remains of Plaquemine culture and other groups whose ancestors had lived in the Lower Mississippi Valley for thousands of years. When Europeans first encountered them, the Chickasaw were living in villages in what is now northeastern Mississippi; some occupied areas of present-day South Carolina.

The Chickasaw may have been migrants to the area. Their oral history supports this, indicating they moved along with the Choctaw from west of the Mississippi River into present-day Mississippi in prehistoric times. This may be an extremely ancient account. The Mississippian culture and earlier moundbuilding cultures of the Woodland era had territory that ranged from the west side of the river, in Arkansas to sites in present-day Louisiana and Mississippi, so both accounts may be reconciled. For instance, earlier Native American cultures built monumental mound complexes in northern Louisiana as early as 3500 BCE. The Mississippian culture was building earthwork constructions by 950 CE in complex, dense villages supporting a stratified society, with centers throughout the Mississippi and Ohio valleys and their tributaries.

Another version of the Chickasaw creation story is that they arose at Nanih Waiya, a great earthwork mound built about 300 CE by Woodland peoples. It is also sacred to the Choctaw, who have a similar story about it. The mound was built about 1400 years before the coalescence of each of these peoples as ethnic groups.

The first European contact with the Chickasaw ancestors was in 1540, when the Spanish explorer Hernando De Soto encountered them and stayed in one of their towns, most likely near present-day Tupelo, Mississippi. After various disagreements, the American Indians attacked the De Soto expedition in a nighttime raid, nearly destroying it. The Spanish moved on quickly.

The Chickasaw began to trade with the British after the colony of Carolina was founded in 1670. With British-supplied guns, the Chickasaw raided their neighbors and enemies the Choctaw, capturing some members and selling them into Indian slavery to the British. When the Choctaw acquired guns from the French, power between the tribes became more equalized and the slave raids stopped.

Allied with the British, the Chickasaw were often at war with the French and the Choctaw in the 18th century, such as in the Battle of Ackia on May 26, 1736. Skirmishes continued until France ceded its claims to the region east of the Mississippi River after being defeated by the British in the Seven Years' War (called the French and Indian War in North America).

Following the American Revolutionary War, iIn 1793-94 Chickasaw fought as allies of the new United States under General Anthony Wayne against the Indians of the old Northwest Territory. The Shawnee and other Northwest Indians were defeated in the Battle of Fallen Timbers, on August 20, 1794.

The noted 19th-century historian Horatio Cushman thought the Chickasaw, along with the Choctaw, may have had origins in present-day Mexico and migrated north. That theory does not have consensus; archeological research, as noted above, has revealed the peoples had long histories in the Mississippi area and independently developed complex cultures.