The Story I Grew Up Hearing

When I asked my Mother where her family came from she told me that her Mother’s family came from Louisiana and their ancestors families were Eades, Glover, Watson, Baquie, and Bergamini.  Now the most interesting was the story of her Great Great Grandfather Daniel Eades.  When Daniel was a child he had fallen from a tree and had a terrible gash on his leg, which left a remarkable scar.  One day their Plantation in Georgia was attacked by a band of Indians who carried off the child Daniel. 

Daniel was adopted by the Medicine man of the tribe who had lost a son about Daniel’s age.  He grew up as the adopted brother of the son of the Chief of the tribe, (not sure how that worked).  Some years later, when the two boys had become men, the son of the Chief told Daniel that he knew where Daniel’s family was, and asked if he wanted to return to them, and if he did, he would take him there. Daniel decided that he did want to leave his adopted family and return and see his parents.  When he returned his Mother recognized him by the unusual scar on his leg.  They had a big party and welcomed their lost son home.

That’s the story I grew up hearing.  I accepted the story and that it could probably never be proven.

Then I became interested in Genealogy and wanted to know my Family’s real history.  I posted countless queries about Daniel Eades and his Father John. Then someone who was a descendant of Daniel’s brother John send me a copy of Margaret Eades Story.  There it was, written in the early 1800's by a girl who was there; probably written as a school assignment and preserved in her family, my family.

Then I found a reference in The Journal of Southern History, Volume 73, Number 2, May 2007

Snyder, C. Conquered enemies, adopted kin, and owned people: the Creek Indians and their captives

During the American Revolution, a clan from Hilabi adopted nine-year-old captive Daniel Eades. By 1793 he answered to the name "Sausey Jack" and sported "a remarkable scar on the inside of his left thigh above the Knee," likely the result of his warring and hunting. (66)

(66) Affidavit of John Eades, October 30, 1793, in "Creek Indian Letters, Talks, and Treaties," part 1, p. 349.

I found a similar reference in Claudio Saunt’s “Black, White, and Indian” published in 2005 by Oxford Press. On page 14 I found this.

John Eades’s son Daniel was born in Wilkes County Georgia, in 1770. Daniel was kidnapped at the impressionable age of nine by a party of Creeks.  Fourteen years after this traumatic event, John hopefully reported that his son was held captive in Hilabi. Yet Daniel, then twnty three, was scarcely a prisoner. He had adopted a new identity and now answered to the name Saucy Jack.