The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-12-17
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 It has ever seemed to me that the Great Creator never made land more suitable for the dwelling place of the savage than Florida. Food. shelter and warmth were there in abundance and easily obtained. The extensive sea coast. reaching from Fernandina on the north, to the islands of the ex- treme south; then to Pensacola on the west. with its numerous estuaries, rivers and lakes, afforded endless va- rieties and quantities of fish. oysters. clans. conchs and Eussels: while its savannahs, swamps, hammocks and extensive pine barrens, furnished food for deer. bears and other food animals in large numbers. The rich hammocks produced corn, pumpkins. peas and a great variety of esculent roots in abundance. with very little effort while the berries of the saw-palmetto, as well as other kinds of berries, cov- cred the face of the earth.
 Food was indeed plentiful. The hammocks afforded. also. protection from the chilling winds in winter. The palm leaves thatched the wigwam and sheltered from the rain. Verify if eternal things could calm the soul and make it happy. the Seminole In- dian should have been the happiest man on earth.
 The history of the Seminole wander CTS is long and I will not attempt that here; but, will say. simply, that the tribe living in Florida at the time of the Seminole War, Cor about 1S35) was a sort of tribal coat of many colors made up of remnants of other tribes. who attached themselves to the original Florida Indians, who were not very numerous. and were brought together under the chieftanship of King Paine and called Seminoles or "Runaways." The majority was turbulent set. driven by the United States troops from Georgia and Alabama on account of lawIess conduct. They sought ref uge in Florida, stopping mainly on the northern margin of the State, practice ing their nefarious traffic in negro slaves. murdering, robbing, burning and Kidnapping. While the white frontiersman-the man he had mainly to deal with, and who was not an ami able customer by any means--pushed his settlement across the border also Being a pretty good rascal himself, tto let the Indian tell it) he, ostensibly, to recover runaway and stolen slaves or fugitives from justice, raided the In- dian settlements and made himself very objectionable to them in various ways. '.
 Thus it was: Indians accusing white man, white man accusing Indian; while the Government, like a distract ed mother, had sought in vain for some way to adjust the troubles that exist cd between her ouarrelling children. There was no way of ascertaining who struck the first blow or who was in the wrong. The best men obtain able were sent by the Government for the purpose. of settling the disputes, but no progress was made in that di- rection. Col. Cad Humphreys, a gentleman of intelligence and much knowledge of the Indian character. thoroughly honest, just and merciful; if little out of plumb, leaning al- ways towords the weaker party, was Seminole agent at that time But his great energy and other qualities were blown like ashes before the storm raised between white and red contest ants.
 After many and various trials. the Government was persuaded that 1t was not possible for the two races, so dis similar, to dwell so near each other in amity; especially when each wanted what the other had.
 The determination of the Govern" ment then was to place them beyond the reach of each other, and, as civili- zation could not be arrested in it's march on account of some fancied right of the savage, the removal of the latter to the Arkansas Reservation was resolved upon.
 It Is hard for any man to be remov- ed from the home of his choice and much sympathy has been felt and ex- pressed for the Seminole, supposing tat he had the best right to the land; while 1t Is fact that many of them, if not large majority of them, were not original Florida Indians, but refugees from other States and had no better right to the land than the white man.
 About the year 179S a Scotchman named Powell, pushed his way Into the wilderness to a point on the border between southwest Georgia and Flor ida and there dwelt among the In- dians, as quite a number of Scotchmen did about that time. Nothing is known of the antecedents of this man or what his business was in the wilds of Florida among the savages, but probably he was trader. He had not