Fort Benjamin Hawkins - History

History

Fort Hawkins was built by the United States in 1806 and through 1821, it was a place of "relatively great economic, military, and political importance." For the Creek Nation, it was a center of the deerskin trade with European Americans, who had a trading post or factory there, but for them it was most important as related to their sacred grounds at Ocmulgee Old Fields. This continued to be a significant social and ceremonial center.

The US government used the fort as a military command headquarters on the southeastern frontier, "a major troop garrison and bivouac point for regular troops and state militia in several important campaigns, and a major trade factory for regulating the Creek economy." President Thomas Jefferson had forced the Creek Nation to cede its lands east of the Ocmulgee River, except for the sacred Ocmulgee Old Fields. The fort was built at the fall line of the river, about a mile uphill, at the end of navigable water from the Low Country to the Piedmont. It was to be a point for the government's "civilization" of the Creek through introduction of European-American farming and cultural practices. To the north of the fort passed the Lower Creek Pathway, which was improved as part of the Federal Road to connect Washington, DC with the ports of Mobile, Alabama and New Orleans, Louisiana. This change encouraged the travel of many more troops, settlers and tourists to the area and encroached on the Creek Nation territory.

The fort was named for Benjamin Hawkins, who was still serving as the General Superintendent of Indian Affairs (1796–1816) south of the Ohio River, as well as principal US Indian agent to the Creek. A former US Senator from North Carolina, Hawkins had been appointed by President George Washington to deal with the Choctaw, Cherokee and Chickasaw in the larger territory, and helped gain years of peace between the Creek and European-American settlers. He married Lavinia Downs, a high-ranking Creek woman, and learned the language well. Their several children were born into her clan. He wrote about the Creek and related societies.

The fort was used during US military campaigns of the War of 1812 against Great Britain. General Andrew Jackson visited the Fort and used it successfully as a staging area for the War of 1812's Battle of New Orleans, as well as the following Creek and Seminole wars. After the frontier moved further westward, the military threat in inland Georgia essentially ceased. Through the treaties of 1825 and 1826 signed with the US, the Creek were forced to remove west of the Chattahoochee River the following year. The city of Macon was founded in 1823, and the Fort was decommissioned in 1828.

During the active years, Georgia used the fort as a state militia headquarters and muster ground. It was a point of interaction with "the US Army, the Creek Nation, the Georgia militia and the Georgia government." The fort helped reinforce Georgia's western frontier until the state took control by getting the Creek removed to the west, and filling lands with European-American settlers.

Ancient cultures of indigenous peoples had long settled near the river. Evidence of 17,000 years of continuous human habitation has been found at Ocmulgee National Monument. Historically, American Indian peoples from the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Muskogee, Choctaw and Seminole nations; ethnic European Americans from England, Germany, Ireland, Scotland, and Spain; and African-descended peoples originally speaking numerous languages from a variety of ethnic cultures of West Africa, are all represented at the fort. Nearly 40,000 artifacts from trading and residence have been found in 21st-century archeological excavations at the fort site.