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British Lieutenant Colonel Edward Nichols offered freedom to any slave who would join his fight against the United States. It is believed Abraham may have helped build the fort atop Prospect Bluff on the Apalachicola River. Many Africans found their way to the fort at Prospect point. The new fort had become a refuge for those fleeing bondage from Georgia and the Carolinas. This Negro Fort was eventually destroyed by the U.S. Military. Abraham may have been one of the survivors of that incredible night. (See The Florida Frontier Gazette, Fall 2004, Prospect Bluff, page 22)

Traveling with the Seminoles afforded him a little comfort. He heard of African towns to the east, not far from one of the main Seminole towns on the Suwanee River.

In early April of 1818 General Jackson's troops moved out from the country around St. Marks. To the south of where Tallahassee is located today, the Spanish fort at St. Marks was surrounded by salt marsh. Welcomed as a friend, Jackson commandeered the fort from the Spanish. Now Jackson's army was aiming at African settlements along the Suzanne River.

Jackson was joined by Chief McIntosh and his Creek warriors. Along the way they surprised a Red Stick town. The fighting was fierce. The Creeks captured many women and children and many head of cattle. Jackson's army liberated a white captive, Mrs. Stewart.

Next, the Creeks stumbled upon a Seminole family. They killed the man and wounded the woman and her children.

Weary of the U.S. attacks on their settlements, the blacks scouted the progress of Jackson's army. Jackson pushed his army on through swamps and wilderness. Horses collapsed from exhaustion and the soldiers slogged through mud and water up to their waists. Always hungry, the 3,000 soldiers were tired and worn by north Florida's dense vegetation.

The blacks gathered their women and children and headed toward the Seminoles at Bowlegs' town on the Suwanee River. In the lengthening evening shadows, Jackson's weary army, first stumbled into these abandoned towns. Because of this, his tactics began to falter. The evening shadows turned gray and then dark with growing night. Jackson's soldiers began to encounter serious resistance. Shooting from between the buildings, free African American soldiers were driven back against the river.

The African American soldiers fought a desperate rear-guard action, to slow down the U.S. Army while their women, children, and the Seminole Indians faded into the wilderness. The African American soldiers stubbornly held their position. Some of the troops had once trained under Colonel Nichols and now they showed their mettle. Finally, almost overwhelmed, they turned and splashed across the river. From the opposite bank, they turned and pinned the American army down again. Every time their pursuers began to close in, they withdrew a little further into the cover of the darkness of the forest. There, they turned and fired back at their assailants.

Abraham's Indian name, "Souanaffe Tustenukke," (Suwannee Warrior), may reflect that battle. A willing warrior, he became linked to the Seminole Principal Chief Micanopy. Described as a ward of Micanopy, he sought his protection. Abraham lived through these turbulent times and saw firsthand the plight of Africans on the Florida frontier.

By 1819 the U.S. began serious negotiations with Spain for the transfer of Florida. Seminoles and African Americans made a desperate, last-ditch effort to stop the acquisition. They traveled to the Bahamas to plead for English intervention. Because of their experience in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, the British were in no mood to intervene. Florida became a territory of the United States in 1821.

By early summer of 1821, a war party of Coweta Indians surprised the Angola settlement of African-Americans on the Manatee River. The Cowetas captured 300 people and returned them to slavery. The Cowetas then raided the Spanish fishing ranchos to the south and then other African and Seminole communities on their return northward.

In 1826, Micanopy, Abraham and a group of Seminole leaders traveled to Washington, DC. Upon his return, the Principal chief Bowlegs Cow Keeper appointed Abraham "sense-bearer" (wise man), and granted him freedom. Cow Keeper died soon after the Washington trip. The other tribal leaders gave Hagar, Bowlegs Cow Keeper's widow, to Abraham. Hagar may have been African-American or of mixed blood. Abraham was considered an honored man among the Seminole people.

Abraham collected his African-American and Seminole companions and traveled southward. Driving a herd of cattle, they drifted through the dark forests along the Withlacoochee River and the hill country. They turned away from marshy ground toward the beautifully rolling green pastures to the southeast. The 1837 map shows a place named Negro Town in that area. He lingered there for a while, but something drew him on.

Abraham and his companions moved southeast to another African American settlement on a knoll just west of the modern community of Bushnell. Most of the people there had fled the oppressive slavery of Georgia. This town was called Pilaklikaha (Pee-lak-la-kay-ha) by the Seminoles. The early history of Pilaklikaha is still a mystery. The name appears on a 1823 map of Florida. Later, it became known by whites as Old Abraham's Town.

The houses here were made of "wattle and daub." First, a wooden frame was built. Vines and supple sticks were woven through the frame to make a wall. Then clay and grass were mashed together worked into the wall of vines and sticks and allowed to dry. The whole house was topped by palm thatch roof.

Some of the homes had a brick foundation. Because there were no roads in those early days, bricks had to be imported from distant markets. St. Marks would have been the closest port. Then the bricks had to be packed in to Pilaklikaha by horses on small carts. It would have been expensive to transport the bricks this way which may attest to the wealth of this early African-American community.

As the community grew, Seminoles, Black Seminoles, and African-American's from the nearby Negro Town, stopped by. Gardens were planted and the town began to prosper.

But a threatening storm drifted south. Rumors flew like fallen leaves before the storm. The numbers of soldiers at Fort Brook (Tampa) and Fort King (Ocala) grew in strength. Slave hunters roamed the countryside. The presence of the U.S. Military was becoming very apparent.

Florida's Territorial government demanded the removal of Seminoles. The fate of Florida's African Americans and Black Seminoles was woven into that issue. For the African Americans, to surrender meant returning to slavery. Abraham listened and watched. Osceola frequently visited Abraham. One of Osceola's wives lived in Pilaklikaha. Osceola and Abraham shared a deep understanding and an urgent desire to protect their people, but the two men had very different means of achieving their goals.

Then in the early 1830s the peace at Old Abraham Town was shattered. Bvt. Major Francis Langhorne Dade, a U. S. Army officer lead a raid on the town. The menfolk were out hunting when the raid occurred. It is suggested that Abraham lost his wife in the raid. When the men returned they faced grim scenes of the fallen bodies of their loved-ones, their homes in ruin, and their provisions gone.

The Seminole Indian fortunes were also taking a turn for the worse. By the end of 1835, the Seminoles were told they would have to make arrangements to leave the Florida Territory for the Oklahoma Territory. One of the Seminole leaders, Chalo Emathla sold his cattle in preparation for the move west. Along with Osceola and his warriors, Abraham rode out to meet Chalo. When he discovered that Osceola's plan was to kill Chalo, Abraham tried to stop him and his warriors. He argued with Osceola to spare Chalo's life. Osceola refused to listen and they killed Chalo Emathla.

Many of the soldiers in the U.S. Army of the early 1830s were immigrants enlisted as they arrived in port cities. Predominately Irish and German, these new immigrants arrived with little prospects for finding work in America. The country was going through tough economic times and jobs were difficult to come by. Immigrants joined the Army as a temporary alternative until a better opportunity came along.
In Fort King, (Ocala) many of the troops were nearing the end of their enlistment. Once their enlistment ended, most returned to civilian life. Pressure for war in Florida was building and the officers at Fort Brooke (Tampa) worried that Fort King would be attacked. It was decided that a relief force should head toward the fort.

On Wednesday, December 23, 1835, 108 men marched out of Fort Brooke to proceed along the Fort King Road, Major Dade in command. An African American man, Louis Pacheco, acted as their interpreter and guide. Wary of an attack, soldiers, "flankers," drifted through the forest to either side of the column. To their relief, the bridge crossing the Hillsborough River was still standing. They marched across. Farmsteads along the road stood deserted in anticipation of a Seminole attack. At the next crossing, the bridge had been burned. Christmas day came and went in the cheerless, seemingly endless Florida wilderness.

On December 28 the soldiers awoke to a gray, dreary day. The men slung their muskets over their shoulders, upside down under their great coats to keep the powder dry from the cold drizzle, as they marched along the narrow path that took them through palmetto carpeted pinelands. They knew they would arrive at Fort King in a couple of days. The soldiers relaxed their guard a little.

Major Dade rode his horse along the column cheering his men along with, "Have a good heart; our difficulties and dangers are over now, and as soon as we arrive at Fort King you'll have three days rest and keep Christmas gaily."

Little did he know that at that moment, behind the pines, laying on the damp ground beneath the palmettos were 160 Seminole and 50 African-American warriors. Silently, they watched the army march past. Seminole leaders Micanopy and Ote Emathla (E-math-la), also known as Jumper, watched them.

At the sight of Major Dade, fear and anger must have swirled through Abraham's mind. It is said that he jumped to his feet and shouted, "Dade! Dade!" In his saddle, Major Dade turned to look. Too late.

With a whisper from Jumper, Micanopy pressed his finger against the steel trigger of his musket. A sharp crack smashed through the tension and with a moan, Major Dade slipped from his saddle to the ground, a thumb-size hole piercing his heart.

In those paralyzing seconds before the soldiers could realize what was happening, the Seminole and African American warriors rose up and fired point-blank into their column of sky-blue uniforms. Gunfire exploded like a thunder clap. In those briefest of seconds, before they realized what was happening and manage to pull their muskets from under their great coats, a hail of bullets tore through their ranks, killing half of them. Smoke rolled over the surprised troops in a cloud. Meanwhile the Seminoles and Africans-Americans hurriedly reloaded.

Only three U.S. Soldiers to survived the battle. One of those three was killed on his way back to Fort Brooke. Another, Ransom Clark, riddled with bullets, lived to tell the tale. Thus, the Second Seminole War had begun.

Throughout the Second Seminole War, Abraham acted as interpreter for both the Seminoles and U.S. Army. During the next four years Abraham fought hard and spent every effort to protect his people. By 1837 he saw the Seminole cause was hopeless. Abraham's Old Town had been razed by Federal soldiers, their cattle driven off into the wilderness. Like the Seminoles, Abraham's people were reduced to a few rag-tag fugitives hiding out in the wilderness and swamps, desperate to stay alive.

Abraham continued to fight for the freedom of his people. His struggle was punctuated with loss and difficulty. Yet, he followed his vision. Finally he agreed to resettle with his family at Fort Gibson, Oklahoma. There was only one condition—that the free African Americans should be secure in their persons and their property. On February 25th, 1839, Abraham and his family watched Tampa Bay slip over the horizon from a ship headed for the Mississippi River. In his possession, was a document which spelled out freedom for those remaining African-Americans with him.

Abraham visited Florida for one last time in 1852. The U.S. Government brought him back to negotiate the end of the Third Seminole War, more widely known as the "Billy Bowlegs War." A newspaper of the period wrote, "have made a wreck of Abraham. Yet he is straight, and active, and looks more intelligence out of his one eye than many people look out of two. He is in full costume of the Seminoles Turban, á la Turk, and hunting shirt, leggins, etc. Abraham must be 70 or 80 years old."

Abraham is thought to have died not long after in 1857. He is buried in Oklahoma, at Brunnertown, west of the Little River settlement, near Hazel.