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Creeks fought over Tomochichi’s gifts from England; Cussita Migration Legend

Source: Invention of the Creek Nation #95

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The political battles over the gifts finally came to a head in June 1735 when the Upper and Lower Creeks descended upon Savannah for the distribution ceremony. Predictably, the event did not go according to Tomochichi’s plans. Tomochichi, it was learned, had intended for half the presents to go to the Lower Creeks and half to go to the upper nation. Georgia officials, however, diverted a disproportionate share to the Upper Creeks, most likely as a reward for granting Mackey permission to build a smalland, as it turned out, inconsequentialfort at Oakfuskee the previous April. Thomas Causton later reported that the Georgians had frustrated Tomochichi’s self-serving plans. “Tomochichi,” Causton wrote, “was again uneasy believing Mr. Mackay had again disappointed his intentions... Indeed,” Causton added, “I found that though Tomochichi had invited some of the upper Nation he did not intend to have so many of them [here].”
Tomochichi’s problems did not end with the Upper Creeks. Chigelly of Coweta challenged in a more direct way Tomochichi’s presumed authority to distribute presents as he saw fit. Sensing that the time was right to inform the Georgians of the “real” vectors of power within the Creek nation, Chigelly seized the opportunity to stake his own claim as the Creeks’ preeminent voice and to assert Coweta’s historic role as the Creek nation’s head town. Chigelly traced the Creeks’ history, delivering a speech lasting two days that Thomas Causton recorded in English on a buffalo robe using black and red ink. Though the original has not survived, Chigelly’s account is now known to scholars as the Cussita Migration Legend.
Briefly, the Cussita Migration Legend explains the origins of the Cussita peoples’ sacred ritual practices and relates their migration from a mystical point of origin in the west to the Chattahoochee River. Because of its rich ethnographic detail, the Cussita Migration Legend has long attracted the attention of anthropologists, historians, and archaeologists alike. In the process of becoming an object of scholarly fetish, though, it now exists as an ossified cultural artifact far removed from the historical and political context in which it was composed. By inserting it back into that context we find that the Cussita Migration Legend was not a Creek “Book of Genesis” but a ritualized performance intended to demonstrate Cussita’sand, by association, Coweta’ssupremacy over other Creek towns and especially over the person of Tomochichi. 
The migration legend itself was first brought to the attention of the British in Savannah on June 11, 1735, when Chigelly and Antiche, a Coweta warrior, proceeded to explain how the Cussitas came into being by emerging from a hole in the ground somewhere in the west. After discussing the origins of their sacred war tomahawk and busk medicines, the speakers related how they migrated eastward and established their preeminence over the Chickasaws, Alabamas, and Abikas. A brief discussion of the metaphorical significance of the eagle segued into a discussion of the Cussitas’ more recent migration from Coosa River to the Chattahoochee, where they first met the people of Apalachicola.
After resolving a brief dispute, the Apalachicola and Cussita peoples decided to “be all one.” “Ever since,” Chigelly continued, “they have lived together and shall always live together, and bear it in remembrance.” Chigelly made it known that the alliance was not between two equals, infusing his historical narrative with political rhetoric favorable to him and the Cowetas. The Cussitas and Cowetas, he asserted, were one people that were “[recognized] to be the head towns of the upper [and] lower Creeks.” Chigelly demanded recognition as the leader of the Creek nation, arguing that “I am from the eldest town and was chosen to rule after the death of the Emperor [Brims].”
The question that arises is, why did Chigelly choose to deliver such a politically motivated speech on that particular occasion? Given Tomochichi’s cozy alliance with Oglethorpe, it is evident that Chigelly sought to counter the Apalachicola man’s rising influence. Chigelly did not fail to note, for example, that Tomochichi came from Apalachicola which, unlike Coweta, was not one of the two specified head town. Chigelly took the time to explain that they looked upon Tomochichi as the father of the Yamacraws, revealing Chigelly’s belief that Tomochichi’s right to rule depended upon the consent of the rest of the Lower Creek nation. Furthermore, it was well known that Georgia officials wished to distribute the trustees’ presents to the most influential and friendly chiefs, which perhaps may explain why Chigelly promised to serve the British king and why he declared his own town to be the eldest and his own mouth to be the strongest, presumably among the whole nation.
A second question that arises is the degree to which Chigelly’s migration legend accurately represented the historical canon of the Creek nation. According to many anthropologists and linguists, Chigelly’s method of storytelling was a common way for nonliterate peoples to communicate historical knowledge. Historical accounts similarly produced can vary over time and according to the context in which they are told. As such, oral traditions can be manipulated easily to reflect the views of the individual telling the tale, the audience, or the current political climate. Not everyone who heard Chigelly’s speech, then, was likely to agree upon its accuracy. There may have been as many migration legends as there were storytellers. Just days after the event, for example, Thomas Causton related that the “Hetchitaws and [A]palachicolas” promised him a further account of the migration legend, an indication that Chigelly’s was somehow inaccurate. The new account, Causton added, “they say will be an improvement on this,” suggesting that Coweta’s status as the eldest town or Chigelly’s role as the strongest mouth were points of contention on the Chattahoochee and beyond.