The Song Behind Today’s Review Title

[For the past several reviews I’ve picked a song lyric as the title of my review post. It’s been fun looking for songs that reflect the book I’ve read, and I hope it gives you the reader a bit of fun too, and a catchy tune to take with you through your day.]

Today’s book tells the story of Abraham, a Black Seminole and his role in the Seminole Wars. Many Black Seminoles were originally enslaved to the Creek nation but escaped south to Florida where they were accepted by the indigenous people of the area.

Those people were a mix of Creek, Chickasaw, Tallahassee and Miccosukee tribe members, a number of whom were banished from their original tribes or had migrated south to Florida for their own reasons. All these people together, indigenous and Black came to be called Seminoles.

Abraham was a leader of the Black Seminoles fighting (and negotiating) with the US Army during the American government’s attempted removal of the Seminoles from Florida to Indian Territory.

Fight the Power, the rap song that today’s review title comes from, was created by Public Enemy in 1989 at the request of Spike Lee, for his film Do the Right Thing. Lee was looking for an anthemic song for his film about racial tension in a Brooklyn neighborhood. Inspired by the 1975 Isley Brothers song of the same name, Public Enemy’s rap tune contains numerous samples, typical of a Public Enemy tune.

The theme of the song - the need to fight the illegitimate use of power, and the fact that it’s sung by Black rappers, provides a fitting connection to Abraham from today’s book. You can hear the original release from the film soundtrack on this YouTube video.

The subtitle of today’s book makes reference to “America’s Forgotten War”, America’s attempt, beginning in 1835, to remove the Seminoles from the land they occupied in Florida to what was then called the Indian Territory, present-day Oklahoma. The war with the Seminoles is often seen as three separate wars, each of which happened for three different reasons.

The first war was an attempt by the US Army to recapture escaped slaves living among the Seminoles. While largely unsuccessful in capturing slaves this war did result in Spain ceding the territory of Florida to the US.

The second Seminole war focused on removal of the Seminoles in total - including their Black neighbors. The effort lasted seven years and cost the US government between 40 and $60 million (between $1.5 and $2 billion of today’s dollars). This war resulted in the negotiated removal of a significant number of Seminoles (over 3,500), but a band of mostly Miccosukee people did not agree and eluded US forces by hiding in the swamps of the Everglades.

The third Seminole war was a set of skirmishes between the US Army forces and the remnants of the Seminoles. It was the final attempt by the US to force those who remained to move west. In the end, all but about 200 indigenous people agreed to relocate.

Holmes’ book The Free and the Dead focuses mainly on the second Seminole War and the role of Abraham, a free Black American whose importance in the conflict has been overlooked by history, while the warrior Osceola’s role in the conflict was widely heralded at the time and has overshadowed Abraham.

Abraham was an interpreter and Sense Bearer (akin to prime minister) for Micanopy, the overall leader of the Seminoles. Abraham himself was also considered the chief of the Black Seminoles.

While the Black Seminoles were nominally slaves, especially to the outside world, the indigenous Seminoles treated them better than white Americans treated indentured servants. They were recognized as friends and neighbors. Children of Black Seminoles were not considered enslaved at birth but were recognized as free among their Seminole neighbors.

After months of fighting, in March of 1836, Micanopy and Abraham agreed that the Seminoles should lay down arms and go west. Others, including Osceola and the wily Miccosukee chief Abiaka were not so sure. While Abraham and Micanopy led the negotiations with the Army, Abiaka and his rebels, including Osceola, continued the fight as they hid deeper and deeper in the swamplands to thwart the attempts of the Army to take them.

Osceola was eventually captured and later died while imprisoned, but Abiaka continued to hold out. Skirmishes with the remaining Seminoles continued until 1842.

Holmes has clearly done a lot of research and gives a pretty thorough account of events on the ground in the second Seminole War. You get a strong sense of the frustration of the US Army, which lost 1,500 men, and the spirit of the Seminoles.

Frustratingly, I found the book lacking in context. Holmes doesn’t take those events and draw any larger meaning from them. It’s easy to get lost in the “this happened, then this happened” events. I would hazard a guess that the author got too close to the story and to his research materials and perhaps didn’t realize most of his readers would not be so in tune.

I do have to say though that he does clearly articulate, and document his case, that Osceola’s role was much less than it was portrayed in the press of the time, when many American civilians considered him a heroic Indian warrior. Abraham’s role on the other hand was larger and less appreciated at the time, at least outside of the Army people he dealt with, largely due to racism.

In the end I found this an interesting look at a chapter of American history that does not get much talked about today. It would be an excellent book for those with an interest in Florida or in the Indian Removal Act and how it was implemented by President Andrew Jackson. It is most interesting for its portrayal of the difference in treatment of Blacks by the US South and by the Seminoles, whose notions of slavery were very different.

RATING: Three Stars ⭐⭐⭐

RATING COMMENTS: A well-researched account of the second Seminole War and the role of the Black Seminole Abraham in it. The book is most interesting for its portrayal of the difference in treatment of Blacks by the US South and by the Seminoles, whose notions of slavery were very different.

WHERE I GOT MY COPY: I read an advanced reviewer’s ebook copy of this book provided through NetGalley by the publisher Atria Books. The Free and the Dead is available to the public today, February 3rd.