Larry E. Ivers. This Torrent of Indians: War on the Southern Frontier, 1715-1728. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2016. 292 pp. $24.95, paper, ISBN 978-1-61117-606-3.
Reviewed by Michael Morris
Published on H-SC (September, 2016)
Commissioned by David W. Dangerfeld (University of South Carolina - Salkehatchie)
If South Carolina’s Yamasee War is ever given tribes and forgotten forts. His secondary works a subtitle, it could rightly be called the Great Indi‐ run the gamut from Verner Crane's 1959 classic, an Trade War. Larry Ivers, a lawyer by training The Southern Frontier to William Ramsey's 2008 with a military background, notes in his preface work, The Yamasee War. that his intent was to fll a void in the history of The frst three chapters set the stage for con‐ the Yamasee War and to provide a more detailed fict by discussing the Indian agents and traders analysis of the military operations of the war. To who caused the crisis by enslavement of debtor that end, he clearly succeeds in recreating the sto‐ Indians, and one of its strengths is naming people ry of a colony at war aggravated by professional who are otherwise shadowy fgures in backcoun‐ Indian traders who trafcked in Indian slaves to try history. The Yamasee leadership clearly pay their debts. Ivers reveals an incredibly de‐ warned traders Samuel Warner and William Bray tailed account of the debacle and this detailed of a planned murder of all traders and an attack analysis is both a major strength and a minor on the colony if the South Carolina government weakness of the work. did not intervene to stop Indian enslavement and The book is divided into seventeen chapters trader abuse (p. 2). The work’s second chapter is a and a conclusion covering the war from its causes detailed analysis of South Carolina culture at the to the highpoint of military confict and lingering time of confict. The material might have been on its impact on everyday lives. Ivers uses a sig‐ better placed as a frst chapter to provide neces‐ nifcant number of solid primary and secondary sary background information. It is a comprehen‐ sources to tell the story, including the Colonial sive look at the culture, climate, and population of Records of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida as the colony and eventually explains the Indian well as period diaries and journals. Ivers refer‐ ences some four pages of maps used to locate both H-Net Reviews trade as an integral part of the economy, carried tivities and reactions of clergy during the confict out by some two hundred traders. and gives further examples in chapter 11 with the Similarly, the third chapter provides a de‐ mention of a Reverend Gideon Johnston opening tailed background of the tribes found both within his home to some 105 refugees displaced by the the borders of South Carolina and nearby. Ivers war. Although the later summer harvest of August not only covers the tribes whose names are only 1715 provided bountiful crops, Carolinians could remembered in the names of rivers, but locates only attempt to harvest it by using armed parties them geographically for the reader, paying special because of Indian raids. attention to the Yamasees and Guale (pronounced The author highlights in chapter 11 an inter‐ Wally). Chapter 4 sets up the confict by focusing esting power play between Carolina ofcials and on trader abuse of Indians, a topic most historians the Board of Trade during the war. The former be‐ ignore when covering colonial history. The author sieged the Board of Trade for military aid and ba‐ does a good job of placing the traders intimately sic supplies while the Board of Trade encouraged in village life as power brokers, with native wives the proprietors to cede the colony to King George I and biracial children (p. 38). He highlights trader during the crisis. The British government, it mistreatment of native women, ranging from seems, was already measuring the confict in rape to murder, with enslavement for a husband’s pounds and pence and looking for opportunity. debt falling in the middle. Some traders in early The middle chapters (12-16) analyze the slow en‐ 1715, pressured by their own creditors, began try of the Cherokee nation into the war as allies of telling Yamasee customers that a slave ship was South Carolina, noting that an Indian trader was anchored at Port Royal Island, ready to take them the envoy sent to the Cherokees to begin such dis‐ away. Native peoples would have no reason to cussions. The Cherokees entered the war by invit‐ doubt such an ominous threat. ing a Lower Creek delegation to the town of Tuga‐ Chapters 5 and 6 cover the initial murder of loo ostensibly to talk peace, but then executing Indian agents and traders by Yamasees who then them for the beneft of Carolina. Whatever other raided surrounding homes via canoe, killing ev‐ motivations the Cherokees may have had, they erything English as Governor Charles Craven acti‐ certainly wanted to replace the Yamasees as Car‐ vated the militia. Chapter 7 examines the re‐ olina’s ofcial trader partner, an issue not given sponse of other Indians to the Yamasee attack, much attention by the author. noting that other tribes also had killed their The fnal chapters (17-conclusion) focus on traders but not all of them were committed to aid‐ the relocation of Yamasee survivors and the Low‐ ing the Yamasees in war. Ivers focuses on the re‐ er Creek towns away from Charles Town . Ivers action of Muskogee Creek leader, Brims. He specu‐ notes that South Carolina was truly unprepared lates, since there is no way to know for sure, that for the confict, but its soldiers eventually rallied Brims believed the Yamasee strike to be a reckless and the Yamasees did not get the help for which and ill-considered act. As mentioned, Ivers pro‐ they had hoped from other tribes. The author vides some social history of the war in chapters 8 rightly blames the war on the colony Indian and 11. One story includes the origin of his title, traders for their “bigotry, cruelty and greed,” linked to a statement by Reverend Francis Le Jau while blaming the South Carolina government for of Goose Creek, South Carolina, who wrote during failure to control these men. Ivers concludes by the confict that Carolina could not resist the “tor‐ noting that Yamasee survivors, like seeds in the rent of Indians” falling upon it (pp. 88-89). More wind, scattered to the Okefenokee swamps of than once, the author mentions the charitable ac‐
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South Georgia as well as to the island of Cuba and dians: War on the Southern Frontier 1715-1728 to Veracruz, Mexico. joins earlier important works on this confict like An initial reviewer quoted on the book cover William Ramsey’s The Yamasee War. Enthusiasts claims that the Yamasee War was the most conse‐ of South Carolina history, Native American histo‐ quential war in American colonial history. It is ry and military history will be satisfed with this probably more accurate to say it was the most in‐ detailed study. They will certainly discoversome fuential Indian trade war in the South before the fact or incident, previously unknown to them, American Revolution. Larry Ivers does provide a that surprises them in this work. highly detailed military analysis of the war that is bound to please military historians, who will en‐ joy reading the accurate locations of long-forgot‐ ten forts and militia movements as these are the strengths of Mr. Ivers’s work. The author ofers the names and positions of many elusive back‐ country participants which will delight backcoun‐ try enthusiasts. Further, the work validates cur‐ rent research trends that explore how infuential and dangerous backcountry Indian traders could be . The book’s weakness is also tied to that atten‐ tion to detail. Because the author devotes some time and attention to virtually every backcountry player or event in the Yamasee War, readers can fnd themselves distracted from the main theme of a chapter. For example, Ivers discusses not only backcountry fortifcations, but their construction materials at length. This attempt to cover all things interesting happens enough to occasionally throw the reader’s focus away from the very im‐ portant material being discussed. The author does make the occasional mistake in language, as well. While he thankfully avoids calling native soldiers “braves,” he does speak of them as being “on the warpath” (p. 86), implying a culture whose only focus was to make war, rather than fghting for their land and way of life. Ivers clearly demonstrates the Yamasees tried to do this with their confict. To his credit, Ivers includes the names of many small tribes caught in this confict, a brief description of their cultures, and a location for them. On a grammatical note, the author writes using a heavy passive voice construction. Despite these minor problems, This Torrent of In‐
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Citation: Michael Morris. Review of Ivers, Larry E. This Torrent of Indians: War on the Southern Frontier, 1715-1728. H-SC, H-Net Reviews. September, 2016.
URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=47799
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