John Sibley’s 1806 report provided the United States government with questionable data, which dismissed most Louisiana tribes as insignificant remnants.Suffering the fate of other southern tribes, the Tunica, in small numbers on small tracts of land, were of no concern to the federal government and posed little obstacle to the expanding frontier. Once afforded respect and protection by Spain as a sovereign nation, the Tunica lost their land to French settlers who registered the land as “unoccupied” so that they could make fraudulent claims to it. Following the battles, Galvez invited the Tunica and their Biloxi and Ofo allies to settle on the Avoyelles Prairie, the area surrounding present-day Marksville, Louisiana.Īfter the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the United States committed itself to a policy of protecting Indian land and rights, but, in reality, it disregarded the smaller Louisiana tribes in order to appease discontent among former French and Spanish colonists. When Spain sided with the colonists in the American Revolution in the fall of 1779, Tunica warriors fought side by side with Spanish Governor Bernardo de Galvez, attacking British posts at Manchac and Baton Rouge. The Tunica favored the Spanish for their promise to honor previous agreements established between France and the Indian nations. ![]() As participants in the Pontiac rebellion, the Tunica concluded their alliance with France by attacking an English settlement party in 1764, shortly after France had lost its North American colonies.Retaliation by Britain against the Tunica and allied tribes made the transfer of loyalty from France to Spain a convenient one. The Grand Tunica Village provided a buffer between the French and the Natchez and served later as French headquarters during the long Natchez wars. This evidence indicates that the Spanish most likely encountered Biloxis about 130 years before the well-documented French encounter with them along the Gulf Coast in 1699.īy establishing themselves opposite the juncture of the Red and Mississippi rivers, the Tunica afforded their community a commanding position on trade routes between the two river valleys and New Orleans. It thus appears that the Pardo expedition encountered a Biloxi ruler, King Atuki, among those indigenous leaders who congregated with Pardo in Joara. One of these rulers was identified by the Pardo expedition as “Atuqui,” which appears to be the Biloxi word atuki, meaning ‘raccoon’. ![]() Before this time, there is no definitive written record of Biloxis, at least not under the name “Biloxi.” However, documents from the Juan Pardo expedition into the Appalachian Highlands from 1566-1568 mention meeting with 18 indigenous rulers in the town called Xuala by the earlier de Soto expedition (1539-43) and Joara by the Pardo expedition. Biloxis inhabited the Pascagoula River region of the Gulf Coast of Mississippi when French explorers first encountered them in 1699.
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