"The term 'semanóle,' or 'isti Simanóle,' signifies 'separatish' or 'runaway,' and as a tribal name points to the Indians who left the Creek, especially the Lower Creek settlements, for Florida, to live, hunt, and fish there in independence. The term does not mean 'wild,' 'savage,' as frequently stated; if applied now in this sense to animals, it is because of its original meaning, 'what has become a runaway.' ... The Seminoles of modern times are a people compounded of the following elements: separatists from the Lower Creek and Hitchiti towns; remnants of tribes partly civilized by the Spaniards; Yamassi Indians, and some negroes. ... The Seminoles were always regarded as a sort of outcasts by the Creek tribes from which they had seceded, and no doubt there were reasons for this. ... These Indians showed, like the Creeks, hostile intentions towards the thirteen states during and after the Revolution, and conjointly with the Upper Creeks on Tallapoosa river concluded a treaty of friendship with the Spaniards at Pensacola in May, 1784. Although under Spanish control, the Seminoles entered into hostilities with the Americans in 1793 and 1812. In the latter year Payne míko ['King Payne'] was killed in a battle at Alachua, and his brother, the influential Bowlegs, died soon after. These unruly tribes surprised and massacred American settlers on the Satilla river, Georgia, in 1817, and another conflict began, which terminated in the destruction of the Mikasuki and Suwanee river towns of the Seminoles by General Jackson, in April, 1818. [See FLORIDA: A. D. 1816-1818.] After the cession of Florida, and its incorporation into the American Union (1819), the Seminoles gave up all their territory by the treaty of Fort Moultrie, Sept. 18th, 1823, receiving in exchange goods and annuities. When the government concluded to move these Indians west of the Mississippi river, a treaty of a conditional character was concluded with them at Payne's landing, in 1832. The larger portion were removed, but the more stubborn part dissented, and thus gave origin to one of the gravest conflicts which ever occurred between Indians and whites. The Seminole war began with the massacre of Major Dade's command near Wahoo swamp, December 28th, 1835, and continued with unabated fury for five years, entailing an immense expenditure of money and lives. [See FLORIDA: A. D. 1835-1843.] A number of Creek warriors joined the hostile Seminoles in 1836. A census of the Seminoles taken in 1822 gave a population of 3,899, with 800 negroes belonging to them. The population of the Seminoles in the Indian Territory amounted to 2,667 in 1881. ... There are some Seminoles now in Mexico, who went there with their negro slaves." _A. S. Gatschet, A Migration Legend of the Creek Indians, volume 1, part 1, section 2._ {102}