Mary Musgrove - Lower Creek People

Lower Creek People

Creek is an Anglican name that the British gave to the Muskogee people. Those living along the Tallapoosa and connecting rivers became known as the Upper Creeks, while those along the Chattahoochee River and to the east became known as the Lower Creeks. Mary Musgrove was a Lower Creek who stated she was born along the Oakmulgee (Ocmulgee) River.

Creek society was matrilineal; therefore a person’s status and identity were determined through their mother. Fathers were not considered blood relatives, but only related by marriage. Both males and females traced their ancestral lineage through their mother and social connections were based on matrilineal kinships. Several matrilineal kinship groups claimed the same mythical ancestor thus forming a clan, such as the Wind, Bear, or Turtle clans. The Creeks consisted of many clans and there were over thirty to forty different known clans to have existed within the Creek nation. The Creeks, like many kinship based societies, did not know how to behave or respond to people who were not connected by lines of kinship. Therefore Creeks created kinship ties by adoption or marriage, but also through rituals fashioned to signify simulated kinship relationships. Mary Musgrove’s first marriage was one such example of using marriage to create kinship ties with whites. Tomochichi’s initial encounters with James Oglethorpe were designed to create fictitious lines of kinship to facilitate reciprocity.

Creek women could own land and possessions separate from their husbands. Mothers had control over their children and supervised their upbringing. Benjamin Hawkins an Indian agent felt “that a white man by marrying an Indian woman of the Creek nation so far from bettering his condition becomes a slave of her family.” A more sympathetic onlooker was the naturalist William Bartram who noted that “the traders are fully sensible how greatly it is to their advantage to gain their affections and friendship in matters of trade and commerce.” White traders married Creek women to gain kinship ties and these mixed marriages produced children that technically spanned two cultures. Coosaponakeesa was one of these children.