Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Bad blood and sporadic violence between Americans and Seminoles eventually gave the
US the excuse it needed to make a bid for Florida, which was finally bought from Spain in
1821. Before and after that the US military embarked on several campaigns against the
Seminoles and their allies, who took to the swamps, fought three guerrilla wars, and
scored a respectable amount of victories against an enemy several times their size. In fact,
the Second Seminole War (1835-42) was the longest in American history between the
American Revolution and the Vietnam War.
Indeed, operationally the Seminole wars were a 19th-century version of Vietnam, a
never-ending parade of long, pointless patrols into impenetrable swamps, always searching
for an ever-invisible enemy. By 1830 Congress came up with the shocking Removal Act, a
law that told Native Americans to pack up their things and move across the country to Ok-
lahoma. Seminole Chief Osceola and his band (never exceeding more than 100 warriors)
refused to sign the treaty and fled into the Everglades. After keeping thousands of soldiers
jumping at the barest hint of his presence for years, Osceola was captured under a false
flag of truce in 1837. Yet resistance continued, and while the Seminoles gave up fighting,
the government gave up on moving them west.
By 1842 the warring had ended, but no peace treaty was ever signed, which is why the
Seminoles to this day call themselves 'the unconquered people'. Those Seminoles who re-
mained in Florida are now organized under a tribal government and run the Ah-Tah-Thi-Ki
Museum and the Hard Rock Cafe. Not one Hard Rock Cafe: the entire chain, bought for
$965 million in 2007 with money made from gambling revenue. The Seminoles were the
first Native American tribe to cash in on gambling, starting with a bingo hall in 1979 that
has since expanded to a multibillion-dollar empire. Not bad for a Seminole population of a
little over 3000.
