The Leflore Family of Mississippi, Part 3

Greenwood Leflore was born June 3, 1800, the son of Louis LeFlore, a trader, and Rebecca Cravat, was a mixed blood Choctaw, who was educated for six years in Nashville, Tennessee. His education outside the state was apparently influenced and facilitated by his confidant, close personal friend, and mentor, Major Donley. The holder of mail contracts for the Natchez Trace area, including French Camp, Major Donley became acquainted with Louis Leflore and his young son, Greenwood. Apparently, Major Donley saw Greenwood Leflore's potential for leadership, and with the permission of his father, Greenwood traveled to Nashville to live with the Donley family and attend school there.

His early association with Major Donley would have a dramatic impact on the remainder of Leflore's life, beginning with his education and later with his choice of a marriage partner. When Greenwood completed his education in Nashville around age 22, he returned to Mississippi with Priscilla Donley, a daughter of Major Donley, as his wife. In 1826, Greenwood Leflore became Chief of the Choctaw Nation, Western District, and was later elected Chief of the Choctaw Nation. After his conversion to Christianity in 1829, Greenwood Leflore, along with his followers, often challenged tribal traditionalists led by Mushalatubbee and Nitakechi over religious, economic, and political issues. Leflore advocated education of tribal members and supported the Choctaw Academy founded in Kentucky in 1825, and he opposed additional land cessions.

Most importantly, Greenwood Leflore advocated removal, a policy of Andrew Jackson, believing it would save the Choctaw Nation. It was this policy and Mississippi's state law threatening Choctaw sovereignty that ultimately caused the three district chiefs, including Lefore, to agree to removal as it was outlined in the Treaty of Dancing Greenwood Leflore was ultimately deposed as the last Great Chief of the Choctaws east of the Mississippi River.

Next: Greenwood Leflore, Mississippi Planter and Statesman

Reference Source:
Cushman, Horatio Bardwell, History of the Choctaw, Chickasaw and Natchez Indians, published by Headlight Printing House, 1899. Original from Harvard University Library, digitized August 15, 2006. Available via GoogleBooks, and accessed on February 26, 2009.

The Leflore Family of Mississippi, Part 1

During the next few weeks, I will be posting several accounts of the Leflore family in Mississippi, beginning with Jean Baptiste Leflau, the family's French-born patriarch who settled near Mobile, Alabama.

On June 19, 1735, Jean Baptiste Leflau married Jeanne Boissinot, a native of Mobile, Alabama. Church records of this marriage show that Jean was the son of Jacques Leflau and Magdeliene Vichet of Versailles, Saint Croisse Parish. The exact date that Jean Baptiste Leflau arrived in Mobile is unknown, but he was already there on January 9, 1735, when his godson, born to Jacques Claude Dupont and his Paris-born wife, was baptized.

On June 29, 1762, also in Mobile, Jean Baptiste Leflau and his second wife, Marie Jeanne Girard, daughter of Jean Girard and Marie Ann Daniau, became parents of a son named Louis. By all accounts, several other children were born to Jean and Marie Leflau, including a son, Michael, who was baptized on November 19, 1767. Later, as the result of The Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, Michael would become the owner of two sections of land that would become the site of the community of Bowling Green, in Holmes County, Mississippi.

Operating out of Natchez, Louis began trading with the Choctaw Nation around 1780. About 1790, he married Nancy and Rebecca Cravat, the wards of Chief Pushmataha of the Choctaw Nation, a group that allowed plural marriages at the time. Nancy and Rebecca were the daughters of John Cravat and a woman of the Chocchuma tribe. Cravat had given the two girls to Pushmataha, their uncle, before returning to trade among the Chickasaw.

After his marriage, Louis Leflore moved up the Pearl River, establishing a trading post at LeFleurs Bluff. His son, Greenwood Leflore, who would later become the last Chief of the Choctaw Nation, was born there on June 2, 1800.

Louis Leflore's legacy includes the founding of the settlement known as LeFleur's Bluff that would later be known as Jackson, Mississippi, the town of French Camp on the Natchez Trace, and the community of Rankin in Holmes County. Also, Louis Leflore is credited, along with Durant, Mississippi's namesake, Louis Durant, with introducing cattle raising to Attala and Holmes Counties.

Tomorrow: Greenwood Leflore, the last great Chief of the Choctaw Nation

Source:

Cushman, Horatio Bardwell, History of the Choctaw, Chickasaw and Natchez Indians, Headlight Printing House, 1899, Oiginal copy from Harvard University Library, digitized August 15, 2006. Accessed on April 18, 2009.