Place:Conecuh, Alabama, United States

source: Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names

source: Family History Library Catalog

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

Conecuh County^[p] is a county of the U.S. state of Alabama. Its name is believed to be derived from a Creek Indian term meaning "land of cane." As of the 2010 census the population was 13,228. The census estimate in 2011 was 13,105. In the 1930s and 40's, the county had a population of more than 25,000, when there were more people in farming. Its county seat is Evergreen, Alabama.

History

the text in this section is copied from an article in Wikipedia

The areas along the rivers had been used by varying cultures of indigenous peoples for thousands of years. French and Spanish explorers encountered the historic Creek Indians. Later, British colonial traders developed relationships with the Creek, and several married high-status Creek women. As the tribe has a matrilineal system, their children gained status in the tribe because of their mother's clan.

During the American Revolutionary War, the Upper Creek chief Alexander McGillvray (whose father was Scots) allied with the British, as he hoped to stop colonial American encroachment. Commissioned a colonel, he used Jean-Antoine Le Clerc, a French adventurer who lived with the Creek for 20 years, as his war chief to lead Creek warriors.

Origin of Murder Creek

1788: About this time, a bloody transaction occurred in the territory of the present county of Conecuh County, Alabama. During the revolutionary war, Colonel McGillivray formed an acquaintance with many conspicuous royalists, and, among others, with Colonel Joseph Kirkland^[1], of South Carolina. That person was at McGillivray's house, upon the Coosa, in 1788, with his son, his nephew, and several other gentlemen. They were on their way to Pensacola, where they intended to procure passports, and settle in the Spanish province of Louisiana. When they determined to leave his hospitable abode, McGillivray sent his servant [slave] to guide them to Pensacola. The presence of this servant would assure the Indians that they were friends, for it was dangerous to travel without the Chieftain’s protection. Colonel Kirkland and his party had much silver in their saddle-bags. Arriving within a mile of a a tributary of the Conecuh River, which flows into the Conecuh, they met a pack-horse party, about sunset, going up to the nation. They had been to Pensacola, on a trading expedition. This party consisted of a Hillabee Indian, who had murdered so many men, that he was called Istillicha, the Man-slayer--a desperate white man, who had fled from the States for the crime of murder, and whom, on account of his activity and ferocity, the Indians called the Cat--and a blood-thirsty negro, named Bob, the property of Sullivan, a Creek trader of the Hillabees. As soon as Colonel Kirkland and his party were out of sight, these scoundrels formed an encampment. The former went on, crossed the creek, and encamped a short distance from the ford, by the side of the trading path. Placing their saddle bags under their heads, and reclining their guns against a tree, Kirkland and his party fell asleep. At midnight, the bloody wretches from the other side, cautiously came over, and, seizing the guns of Kirkland and his men, killed every one of them, except three Negroes, one of whom was the servant of the great Chieftain, as before stated. Dividing the booty, the murderers proceeded to the Creek nation, and, when the horrid affair became known, Colonel McGillivray sent persons in pursuit of them. Cat was arrested; but the others escaped. Milfort was directed to convey the scoundrel to the spot where he had shed the blood of these men, and there to hang him, until he was dead. Upon the journey to that point, Milfort kept him well pinioned, and, every night, secured his legs in temporary stocks, made by cutting notches in pine logs, and clamping them together. Reaching the creek where poor Kirkland and his men were murdered, Cat was suspended to the limb of a tree, the roots of which were still stained with the blood of the unfortunate colonel and his companions. While he was dangling in the air, and kicking in the last agonies, the Frenchman stopped his motions with a pistol ball. Such is the origin of the name "Murder Creek."

Conecuh County was established by European Americans on February 13, 1818. Some of its territory was taken in 1868 by the state legislature during the Reconstruction era (United States) to establish the new county Escambia. In the coastal plain, it was an area of plantations and cotton cultivation in the nineteenth century. It is still quite rural. Thousands of blacks left after 1940 in the Second Great Migration, especially for jobs in industry on the West Coast.

The county was declared a disaster area in September 1979, due to damage from Hurricane Frederic.

The county is mentioned as the birthplace of Theodore Bagwell in the hit television series Prison Break.

Timeline

Population History

source: Source:Population of States and Counties of the United States: 1790-1990

Research Tips