At one time what is now Attala County was considered the property
of the Choctaw nation. With the signing of the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit
Creek about 1830 the land was transferred to the US government and the
process of Indian removal began. Not all Indians left the area and many of
the so-called Mississippi Band of Choctaws came to live on reservation lands
in several central MS counties.
Many of the signatories to the treaty--who were ostensibly signing as Choctaws--actually had European names, (e.g., Frazier, Farve, Fisher, etc.) and were, in most cases, the sons of European traders, soldiers, etc., and Choctaw women. Like most tribes the Choctaws were matrilineal and so the
children of Choctaw women were considered Choctaws. (As birth is more likely to be witnessed than conception, this practice is a very logical one.)
By the 1830s there were so many Choctaws of mixed ancestry that a special section was added to the removal treaty. Many of these sons of European men had cultural and familial ties to the land and simply didn't want to leave. Therefore, the treaty provided that those Choctaws who wished to remain would
be given large amounts of land conditioned only upon clearing a certain amount of land, erecting a home, and remaining on the site for five years.
The federal government sent an army officer named Armstrong to perform a census of the area, thereby making it possible to later determine who had, in fact, remained the requisite number of years. This old census, though it is far from being detailed and complete--there are references, for example, to people living "where the pigeons roost," and other equally obscure notations--does have some limited value to
genealogists and historians.
Unfortunately, the Indian Agent assigned the task of certifying the status of those who remained had a long-standing and well-documented antipathy to the Indians and he disallowed the petitions of most land applicants. As a result, several law suits have been brought on behalf of the Choctaws. The last suit ended about 1950 when a lawyer named Weir from the Carthage, Mississipppi area was unsuccessful. He supposedly gathered many records of a genealogical nature from residents of Attala and other central Mississippi counties during the 1930s and 40s in an effort to document the claims of the descendants of these earlier Choctaw families. Attempts have been made to contact Mr. Weir's descendants in hopes that they might share this data but all attempts have been unavailing.
In reading through the old legal papers--many of which can be found in the State Archives--one particularly telling comment from a judge can be found. He stated that in all of the many sordid dealings between the White Man and the Indian he had found no worse examples of dishonesty and deceit than that found in the relationship between the government and the Choctaws. Nevertheless, the court award was overturned on appeal and it will likely require an act of Congress for the Choctaw descendants to receive their due. There is precedent for just such a payment of reparations but, of course, the practice is quite uncommon.
There can be no doubt that many early settlers of Attala County--those moving in at about the time the county was formed in 1833--had Indian ancestry. Some of the western Attala families believed to have a large such component to their ancestry are the Ivys, Fraziers, Fosters, Cobbs, and Fishers.
It should be noted that the Scotch-Irish--the primary group settling the American south--were hardly the aristocrats of Europe. In fact, they had no reason to feel socially superior to the Choctaws or any other group and as a consequence of this openness and, of course, their geographic proximity to
the Indians, it was hardly rare for an interracial marriage to occur. Typically, people at the frontier tended to marry whomever was nearby. Considering that farm workers labored six days a week and attended religious services on Sunday morning, the opportunity to "court" was limited to those
who could be reached by a walk or horse ride of no more than an hour or two on Sunday afternoon with a return before dark. If you eliminate those known to be close relatives, and those of a different age, it can be seen that the pool of eligible mates was quite limited. This was particularly the case
given the relatively low population density and high male-to-female ratio typical of frontier regions. Not surprisingly, interracial marriages were commonplace and, therefore, "acceptable."
The noted civil rights activist, James Meredith, has written a series of books detailing his own Attala County genealogical heritage. His European, African, and Choctaw ancestry is unusual only in the sense that he has taken the trouble to detail it so fully. Incidentally, in his articles Mr. Meredith makes it clear that the parents of O. J. Simpson and Oprah Winfrey share not only his origin in the Buffalo Community--just east of Kosciusko--but his Choctaw ancestry. It is amazing that three well known "African-Americans" of our modern day have strong ties to the Choctaws and to this tiny area of Attala County. Anyone wishing to better understand the relationships between the Choctaws and others migrating into their homeland would be advised to search out Mr. Meredith's articles.
Unfortunately, we recently lost a wonderful resource for those interested in the history of the Choctaws. Bob Ferguson, until his death last year, served as the tribal historian for the Choctaws. He was a well known song writer in Nashville--you have almost certainly heard his most famous song, "On the Wings of A Dove"--but retired very early to Neshoba County where he spent many years compiling and preserving the history of the Choctaws. It is not clear as yet what steps the tribe has taken to continue his work but those with specific requests for information should consider a call or visit to his former office at the reservation in Philadelphia, Mississippi.
