Knight Ridder Newspapers

MIAMI – It is not often that a priceless document is sold at a bargain price, but that is what happened to Willard Steele, a Seminole Tribe historian who had an amazing stroke of luck a few months ago.

A stamp dealer was auctioning off a stamp from 1774, which just happened to be attached to a well-preserved envelope and letter addressed to “The Cowkeeper, the founder of the Seminole Tribe of Florida,” from a British government official, requesting peace between the British and the tribe.

The Seminole Tribe’s Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum had long wanted any document addressed or belonging to the legendary warrior leader.

“There is only one we know of in existence, and it belongs to another museum,” Steele said.

But there it was in all of its 232-year glory – an authentic letter addressed to the leader of the tribe, who at the time was named The Cowkeeper.

The letter was eventually sold to the museum for about $3,000.

“I almost fell out of my seat,” said Steele, the museum’s tribal historic preservation officer, who remembers running to tell other executives when he made the discovery.

The letter, considered one of the most important documents pertaining to the history of the Seminole Tribe of Florida, is now on exhibition through August at the Seminole Okalee Museum at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, near Hollywood, Fla.

Written on Feb. 9, 1774 – two years before the American Revolutionary War – it was from British official John Moultrie, the lieutenant governor of what was then known as British East Florida.

The letter was mailed to The Cowkeeper’s home just south of Gainesville, the area that is considered the birthplace of the Seminole Tribe of Florida.

In it, Moultrie asked The Cowkeeper, whose tribe was still part of the Creek Nation, for peace. The British had occupied lands in Georgia belonging to the Creek Nation, and the Creeks had fought back, killing scores of British settlers.

Tina Osceola, executive director of the Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum at the Big Cypress Reservation in the Everglades, said the letter is also significant because it is the earliest document in which a British official recognizes the sovereignty of what would soon become the Seminole Tribe.

And it also acknowledges – by virtue of the mailing address – what Seminole historians have said all along: that the area south of Gainesville, where The Cowkeeper lived, is where the Seminole Tribe was based.

“The Cowkeeper is considered the George Washington of the Seminole Tribe of Florida,” Steele said.

Although the letter is almost 2½ centuries old, it is amazingly well preserved, due in part to the quality of the rag paper, which had little acid content, Steele said.

“Thank goodness it was not made out of pulp paper,” he said.

After August, the letter will be placed in the vault of the Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki Museum, preserved at a temperature of between 68 and 72 degrees and 40 percent humidity, Steele said.

“To understand the magnitude of this letter, it would be akin to a U.S. historian discovering a letter addressed to George Washington from King George III requesting peace,” Steele said. “It is that significant.”

Copy the Story Link