William McGillivray - Co-a-ho-mah
and Samuel Seeley (Isaac Albertson)
Co-a-ho-mah, Red Cat or Red Tiger, alias [William
McGillivray], and Samuel Seeley, alias Isaac Albertson, were conspicuous
among the Chickasaw chiefs. Seeley, alias Albertson, lived not far
from Holly Springs, Marshall county, Miss.
Mr. Walton says:
“McGillivray was a very old man, had served under Washington,
and was commissioned by him as captain in the United States army, and stationed
at Fort Pitt, now Pittsburg, Pa., in the old war. I have seen his
commission, and it is now in the possession of his son near Fort Towson,
Choctaw and Chickasaw Nation west.”
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Thomas Love
Thomas Love was very probably a white man and
a refugee Loyalist. The Indian nations were often asylums for refugee
Loyalists, or Tories, in the early days. He died in Mississippi,
and was the father of Isaac, Henry, Slone, Ben, Samuel, Bill, Robert, Sally,
and Delilie. The latter married John B. Moore, a white man, and owned
the land where Holly Springs now stands.
Isaac Love was a riotous, drinking man, yet
he was influential with his people. Henry was more enlightened than
Ben, Isaac or Slone. Slone partook, both in appearance and habits,
more of the nature of the Indian. His complexion was redder, and his tendency
more wayward—more Indian like.
Ben Love was educated in Washington City, was
a son-in-law of Simon Burney, owned a number of slaves and was wealthy.
At one time he lived on a creek a short distance below Buena Vista.
It is not known by the writer how many times Ben Love was married, but
Dr. T. J. Malone stated that Ben Love’s wife was a half-breed of the Choctaw
nation. She was taught to weave by a white man who made a loom and
sold it to her husband, getting fifty dollars for it. She became
an expert in the art of weaving, and could weave a piece of cloth thirty
yards long by a yard wide in a day.
The chief owned what was afterward Dr. Pointer’s
place in Marshall county to the south of Holly Springs, in the neighborhood
where Mr. John Jarratt lived in 1881. About two years after the treaty
he moved to Holly Springs where he was assassinated about two weeks afterward.
He had two daughters, the oldest named Narcissa. He had a sister, a Mrs.
Allen, a well-to-do slave-owner. She was about forty-five years of age
in 1836. A daughter of Mrs. Allen married Phillips, a white man.
The families of Henry, Ben, Isaac, and Slone
besides their unbounded influence in the tribe, were also, as a rule, very
rich, possessed much land and many negro slaves.
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Ish-te-ho-pa, the
king
Up to 1837, when the Chickasaws removed from
Mississippi to their western home, the Chickasaw Nation was divided in
four districts: Ish-te-ho-topa’s District, Tishomingo’s District, McGillivray’s
(Co-a-ho-mah’s) District, and Seeley’s (Albertson’s) District.
Tishomingo, McGillivray and Seeley with some
others were subordinates to Ish-te-ho-to-pa, the king. Tishomingo was the
chief next to the king in authority.
It is presumed that Ish-te-ho-to-pa became
king of the Chickasaws in 1820, for the Rev. David Humphries says:
“We [Humphries and Rev. t. C. Stuart] * * * * set our faces
for the distant west, and passing through the new settlements of Alabama,
by way of Fort Jackson, Falls of Cahawba, Tuscaloosa, and the little villages
of Columbus, Mississippi, and Cotton Gin Port, we crossed the Tombeckbee
river and entered the Chickasaw Nation, forty-one years ago this day (i.
e. they entered it on July 8, 1820), and found ourselves at the hospitable
mansion of old Levi Colbert, the great man of his tribe. This was Friday
evening. We soon learned that a great ball-play was to come off on the
following Monday, at George Colbert’s, some twenty-five miles distant,
and that a large company was going up the next day. * * * * * * * *
“There being a large collection of Indians from all parts of the nation,
we had no difficulty in securing the attendance of the chiefs in council
at an early day. Accordingly, we met them at the house of Major James Colbert,
the following Wednesday, being the 22nd of the month. You remember
their young king was conducted to the chair of state that day for the first
time as king of the Chickasaw Nation. He was an ordinary Indian,
and never opened his mouth during the council”
The writer of this article has several old deeds
which have the “X” mark of Ish-te-ho-to-pa, George Colbert, and Isaac Albertson,
which also show that James Colbert, Benj. Love, Henry Love, Slone Love,
and James Wolf were able to sign their names in a free, flowing hand, except
the two last who signed badly, after the manner of a boy just learning
to write.
Although of the blood royal, Ish-te-ho-to-pa
seemed to have been somewhat democratic in his tastes; for the old
chronicle tells us that “The old Chickasaw king, when he came to Pontotoc,
slept in the bar-room with me.”
His majesty seemed not above making an honest
penny, too; for James Alexander Hunt relates in his narrative that in 1835
he crossed the Tallahatchie river in a ferry boat belonging to the Chickasaw
king, paying fifty cents for his passage. Mr. Hunt also states that
the king about this time “was a middle-aged man, who had, when he left
here, some grown sons who dressed in grand Indian style.” The Chickasaws
and Choctaws, after arriving in their western home, became one nation,
and Ish-te-ho-to-pa ceased to be king.
Cyrus Harris to author:
“I saw the king of the Chickasaws several times presiding at
councils. Several councils were held at Fields’s store.”
Fields’s store was at Newberry’s—an Indian who lived in Lee county, north
of Tupelo, on N. W. 8-4, Sec. 19, Town. 7, Range 6.
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