Seminole Smoke - A Young Adult Adventure of the Second Seminole War

Excerpt from the working draft:

The hair stood up on the back Ned’s neck when the Seminole warrior, all fancied up in a red shirt and big turban, took a step closer. Ned took a step back. He couldn’t help but stare at the scar across the savage’s face, menacing in the shadows between the log cabins. He spun around, ready to bolt clear, and ran slap into a rough cabin wall, flinging the armload of pine lighter knots he had gathered tumbled to the sandy ground. Ned scrambled to his feet and tried to slither back around the Indian. He stepped left. So did the Indian. He stepped right. He stifled a yelp when the sharp prick of a splinter stung his shoulder.

The lean Seminole towered over Ned. The purple scar ran from one side of his face to the other. One hand rested on a heavy knife stuck in his sash. But the mean squint to the Seminole's eyes was what had backed Ned into the tight narrow gap between two log houses.

The Seminole leaned over Ned, breath sour in the crisp December air. “Where is Keller?” he asked. "You find him. Tell him Alligator Foot want see him." He shook a cluster of dried rattlesnake rattles in Ned's face. “Good trade.” When Ned didn't answer the Indian shook the rattles again. “I got this snake's daddy hid cross the river.” The savage bared a broken tooth in an evil grin “Him got big teeth like me. Long, skinny, hungry. You want me go get daddy snake?”

 “Swear, I don’t know where Mister Keller’s at,” Ned blurted. He nodded toward the sutler’s shed across on the far side of the sprawling fort. “He works over yonder, for Mister Sanders.” Ned screwed up his courage. “Now move and let me get on my way, Mister Alligator Foot.”

Alligator Foot jammed the rattles under Ned's nose. Ned back-stepped until he stumbled over the pile of lighter knots. He reached down and picked up a sap-sticky knot shaped like a tiny club and waved it in Alligator Foot’s face. The Seminole brushed the knot aside, shook the rattles again and hissed at him like a big snake.

The Seminole grabbed Ned’s arm with a hand as callused as a gator's hide and pulled him closer until the cold rattlers brushed his cheek. Ned flinched, balled up his fist, hauled back and plonked Alligator Foot smack on the nose.

Alligator Foot dropped Ned's arm and blinked, like he couldn’t believe a kid dared smack him. The scar disappeared into a mass of wrinkles as he snarled and reached for the knife.

Ned pushed off the wall and plowed into the Seminole’s chest. The two of them tumbled out of the dark alley into the late afternoon sun. Ned scrambled to his knees to see the Seminole leap back in front of him, again blocking his escape.

The Indian slid the wicked-looking knife clear of his sash and waved the tip in Ned’s face. Ned scuttled back on his hands and knees, again trapped between the log walls. Alligator Foot took another step toward Ned. Suddenly a long black arm swung into view. A heavy fist connected with the back of Alligator Foot's head. Alligator Foot toppled toward Ned and fell with a thud, face down. The knife quivered where it stabbed in the packed sand between Ned’s hands.

Alligator Foot rolled against the logs, squinting back into the bright sun. “I get you, too, Looci.” He shook his head for a moment, scrambled out from between the buildings, ran across the parade square. He was out of sight by the time Ned could climb back to his knees. Ned snatched up the knife and held it out in front of him as a towering dark body came around the corner of the cabin.

“Now don’t you cut me with that rusty old blade.”

Ned took a deep breath and lowered the point. Jim, a head taller than Ned, black hair cut so short he always reminded Ned of a bald kid, reached down and helped him up. Ned staggered to his feet, legs shaking; gratefully glad to see Jim with his strong arms and wide grin.

"Lordy, you’re a welcome sight." Ned could finally grin himself. “Thanks for thumping that heathen. Paw said letting them wild Indians come and go inside the walls was going to cause trouble, especially when they come looking to old man Keller to buy his rot gut whiskey."

Jim shook his head. “Them Indians going to take some scalps before this is done.” His grin faded. “But looks like I’m going to be long gone ‘fore it happens.”

Ned turned his back to Jim. “Have I got something stuck in my shoulder? And what do you mean, long gone. Surely Mister Saunders ain’t going to sell your paw off. Is he?” Ned winced as Jim plucked the splinter.

“No, it ain’t my paw getting sold. Mister Saunders done told Paw that he’s going to sell me to that new Major O’Quinn come ashore yesterday. I’ll be a manservant, Mister Saunders tells Paw, for when the Major goes on down to Key West.”

For a boy who was almost a man, Jim looked to Ned like he was about to cry. And Ned felt that way. “That can’t happen, Jim. They can’t make you leave your paw. And who’d watch my back if you left.” Ned didn’t know whether to be indignant or just plain mad. “Dadgum the slave business, anyhow!”

That brought a grin back to Jim’s face. “Let your maw hear you cuss and she’ll sell you off with me.”

The bugle sounded the plaintive notes for retreat, marking the end of the day. “I got to head home Jim. But this ain’t a done thing. You got my word.”

And so Seminole Smoke begins, a  novel by John M. Taylor, set in the Tampa Bay area at the time of the Second Seminole War.

In the story, Ned and his partners set out on their adventures just days before the beginning of the Second Seminole War and the famous march by Major Francis Dade and his men.

In reality, on December 28, 1835 a small band of Seminole warriors led by Chief Micanopy ambushed Dade's column of US Army troops in the Florida swamps. The soldiers included a detachment of Company "B", 4th Infantry , Company "C" and detachments from Companies "B" and "H" of the Second Regiment of Artillery and Company "B" of the 3rd Regiment of Artillery, along with a Negro guide and translator named Louis Pacheco, a surgeon, and teamsters. The well-armed relief column was sent from Fort Brooke on the shore of Tampa Bay to relieve the Seminole threat to Fort King, close to the present location of Ocala.

Command of the column fell to Brevet Major (Captain) Francis Langhorne Dade, a highly professional officer. One official report states: "The theatre of operations was a wilderness and every hammock and swamp a citadel for the enemy." An inexplicable lapse in security at Wahoo Swamp, and all but Louis Pacheco and two privates, Joseph Sprague and Ransom Clarke, were killed, some at the hands of the Seminoles and the rest finished off by a band of run-away slaves. This event is now known as the Dade Massacre.

Photos are from the re-enactment at the Dade Battlefield Historic State Park in Dade City, Florida, held the first weekend after Christmas each year. The re-enactor in the blue shirt is Swamp Owl Morrison. Jim Sawgrass wears the red feather.

The Second Seminole War began just before the battle at the Alamo (1836), and so rested, and continues to rest, in the dust bin of history. 

For a detailed account of the events surrounding the battle and the ambush itself, read Frank Laumer's Dade's Last Command.

This was a time when European immigrants were pouring into the North. Many of these people had faced discrimination and hardship in their native countries. But in America they found their rights expanding rapidly. They had entered a country in which they were part of a privileged category called "white." Classism and ethnic prejudices did exist among white Americans and had a tremendous impact on people's lives. But the bottom line was that for white people in America, no matter how poor or degraded they were, they believed there was a class of people below them. In their own eyes, poor whites were considered superior to blacks, and to Indians as well, simply by virtue of being white. Because of this, many identified with the privileged of the white race and defended the institution of slavery. Working class whites did this even though slavery did not benefit them directly and was in many ways against their best interests. In Seminole Smoke, I have tried to show that friendship, even then, overcame the prejudices of the time.

Sometimes it was hard for a boy to find a friend and a little fun. Ned and his gang try.

So Seminole Smoke, a novel for adults of all ages, tells of hardships and the friendships that overcame these hardships: some for the European soldiers and settlers trying to carve out a living in a harsh wilderness, but also the heartbreaks suffered by the Seminoles as the Army tried to herd them up and exile them to the Indian Lands far out west. Underlying all this misery, the slaves brought over from Africa endured the suffering of bondage. The dialog and customs exhibited by the characters in the book are as true to the time as I can make them, as distasteful and disturbing as they are to us now.

The Second Seminole War also forms the backdrop for "Will's Grave," an award winning short story that may someday grow into a full length adult novel.

Watch for more to come!

If You like historical fiction and the intricacies of genealogical puzzles, check out the research progress for the  Lumberton Guards, a Civil War novel in progress.