Butler County, Alabama - Chapter 25, 1885

In Georgia, Florida, Mississippi and Alabama, are found a number of mounds, which have excited much curiosity and speculation. These mounds were built in prehistoric times, and vary in size and shape in different localities. In Mississippi they have been measured sixty feet in height, and over a thousand feet in circumference. They are oval, elliptical, conical, and sometimes square. In Butler County, however, they are all oval in shape, and small, measuring from fifteen to thirty feet in diameter at the base, and from four to ten feet in height. They are more frequently found in swamps, on creeks, than on high table-lands. Some of them have been nearly leveled with the surrounding land by the process of cultivation ; others still, in the forest, are covered with large trees of natural growth.

A large number of these mounds have been excavated and carefully examined. Bones of persons, in a bad state of preservation, human teeth, Indian beads, arrow-heads, earthen pots, pipes of clay, and many other things indicative of savage life, have been found in them.

These mounds are supposed to be the burialplaces of the Indians, when that unfortunate race lived and flourished on the fruitful soil that now

Two of these mounds are found on the south bank of Cedar Creek - one below Sixteenth Bridge, and the other above Steen's Ford, near the old Creampot Springs. Both of these have been considerably disintegrated by the leveling action of the plow and the drenching rains of many years.

Two may be found on Long Creek, in the Bennett settlement. These were examined in 1878, and Walter Bennett has some of their contents in his possession as curiosities. Two are found near Pigeon Creek, on Lovet B. Wilson's plantation - one upon a hill near his residence, the other in the hollow of a ravine close by. Both of them have been plowed down, until they are nearly upon a level with the surrounding land, but the'.r exact position is determined by small particles of decayed bones, which can still be seen scattered around over the plowed soil.

Many stories of romantic interest are told by some of the superstitious persons living near these mounds. They tell of the death of a heroic chief at the head of his warriors, who sacrificed his noble life in defending the cause of his oppressed tribe. They mourned the loss of so brave a leader, and raised a mound in memory of his heroic life.

who died in the arms of her lover on returning to her native wigwam, after having been captured in battle and kept from the fond embrace of her lover for five long years.