These are two tribes that combined to live together, the Alabama tribe and the Coushatta tribe. Neither tribe is originally from Texas. Both are from the Southeast — Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia. The Alabama are one tribe from Alabama and the Coushatta are another. Both were forced to move to Texas. The Alabama are a subtribe of the Creek Indian tribe, so anything you can find on the Creeks will be useful to you. The Creeks were, and still are, a large and important tribe. The Creek tribe was formed from the survivors of the many mound building tribes who lived in the Southeast United States. The Creek Indians are one of the five “civilized tribes” from the Southeast who now live in Oklahoma. The record of the first contact with the Alabama comes from the De Soto expedition in 1641.
http://www.indigenouspeople.net/alabama.htm
Desoto found the “Alibamo” tribe in central Mississippi and attacked a killed many of them in a fierce battle. Later they moved east into present day Alabama where they lived at the junction of the Coosa and Tallapoosa rivers. DeSoto also found the Coushata living on the Tennessee river. By the 1780s the Americans wanted the land in Alabama and the Alabama were forced to move west across the Mississippi river into Louisiana around Opelousa. Around 1803 they moved west again into across the Sabine river into Northeast Texas. They were settled in the region of the Hasinais Caddo Indians where they still live today. In 1858 they were given 1280 acres of land where their reservation is today. In 1955 the Federal Government turned the administration of the reservation over to the State of Texas. So, this is not an official reservation like other Indians have.
Bear roamed through thick forests, eating sweet honey from bee hives, fishing in rushing streams, and sleeping through long winters in deep, warm caves. Strong and powerful, Bear owned Fire.
Bear carried Fire everywhere, but one day Bear grew distracted by an abundance of tasty acorns. Bear set Fire on the ground, then gobbled up acorns with no thought to Fire. Soon Fire burned low and grew afraid, for Bear moved farther away under ancient trees, tossing acorns into massive jaws. “Help me!” Fire tried to burn brighter but with no success. Bear didn’t hear, having spotted a beehive. Thoughts of a thick yellow comb dripping with sticky sweetness danced in Bear’s head. Jane Archer “Feed me!” Fire called desperately, almost extinguished from lack of fuel. The people gathered pecans under nearby trees. They heard Fire cry out, but they knew it was dangerous to go near Bear who owned Fire. Still they could not ignore the helpless cries. “What do you eat?” the people asked.
“Wood. I need wood.” The people quickly gathered a piece of wood from each direction, then returned. They laid a stick across Fire toward the north. They laid a stick across Fire toward the west. They laid a stick across Fire toward the south. They laid a stick across Fire toward the east. And finally Fire blazed up. “You saved me.” Fire burned brightly. A loud roar came from under the oak trees, and Bear rushed into the clearing. The people scattered in all directions, dropping their baskets of pecans. Bear reached down to take back Fire but jerked away, burned for the first time. “Go away,” Fire said. “You forgot me so I no longer know you.” Bear rose up high on two legs, growling and whining, but to no avail. Fire no longer knew Bear, so the mighty beast lumbered unhappily away with no interest in acorns or honey now. “Come get me,” Fire called to the people. “If you take care of me, I will take care of you.” And the People came for Fire.
In the beginning of the world, it was Bear who owned Fire. It warmed Bear and his people on cold nights and gave them light when it was dark. Bear and his people carried Fire with them wherever they went. One day, Bear and his people came to a great forest, where they found many acorns lying on the forest floor. Bear set Fire at the edge of the forest, and he and his people began eating acorns. The acorns were crunch and crisp and tasted better than any other acorns Bear and his people had ever eaten. They wandered further and further away from Fire, eating the delicious acorns and seeking out more when the acorn supply grew low. Fire blazed up merrily for awhile, until it had burned nearly all of its wood. It started to smoke and flicker, then it dwindled down and down. Fire was alarmed. It was nearly out. “Feed me! Feed me!” Fire shouted to Bear. But Bear and his people had wandered deep into the forest, and they did not hear Fire’s cries. At that moment, Man came walking through the forest and saw the small, flickering Fire. “Feed me! Feed me!” Fire cried in despair. “What should I feed you?” Man asked. He had never seen Fire before. “I eat sticks and logs and wood of all kinds,” Fire explained.
http://www.indigenouspeople.net/alabama.htm
ALABAMA LITERATURE
STORIES
Adventures of Rabbit and Big Man Eater
Alabama Flood Legend
Big Man-Eater
Celestial Canoe
Many eons ago, a magic canoe descended from the sky and touched earth near where the Alabama Indian nation had its camp. Several young women came out of the canoe, singing and laughing. They ran everywhere, enjoying their freedom and playing a game of bounce- ball and catch with each other.
When they tired, they climbed back into their magic canoe, still signing and laughing, and sailed back up to the sky. Another day, they came again the same way as before, singing and dancing, and playing ball. They repeated this performance many times, and always the canoe returned to the same place on earth.
One day, an Alabama Indian youth watched from behind some bushes as the magic canoe descended. During a game, the ball was thrown toward him. A young woman came running after it. When she was near enough, the youth grabbed her hand. The others were frightened and took off in their magic canoe and disappeared into the sky.
The captured woman from the sky became the wife of that same Alabama Indian, and in time they had several children. The father made a large canoe for his family and a smaller canoe for himself.
“Father, we would like to have some fresh meat,” the children said one day. “Will you please hunt a deer for us?” The father started through the woods to hunt deer. But in a short time he returned without any game.
The mother said to her children, “Ask your father to go farther away and hunt for a big fat deer this time.” Again the children asked their father, and again he went hunting.
While he was away, the mother put the children in the larger canoe with herself, singing the magic song. They rose toward the sky. But the father came running back just in time to pull the canoe down to the ground.
Another time when the father was away, the mother put the children in the large canoe and herself in the small canoe, singing as they rose. At that moment the father came running home, pulling down the large canoe with his children. The mother, singing continuously, disappeared into the sky.
After many weeks, the father missed his wife and the children became lonesome for their mother. Finally, all of them climbed into the large canoe and sang the magic flight song. They sailed upward and away to the sky and through the clouds.
When they arrived in the sky, they came to an old grandmother sitting beside her lodge. The father said to her, “Grandmother, we have come because my children want to see their mother.”
“She is yonder, dancing and singing all the time,” answered the old grandmother. “If you will please sit down in my lodge, I will cook you some squashes.”
When she placed the food before them, they thought to themselves, “This will not be enough.” But when they ate one little squash, a larger one magically took its place! They were very hungry and ate for a long time. When they finished, more food was left than when they started to eat. The old grandmother broke an ear of corn and gave the pieces to the children.
The father took his children to another person’s house and inquired of their mother. “She stays here, dancing all the time,” was the reply. Suddenly the mother danced by, but she did not recognize her family. The next time she danced by, the children threw pieces of corn to attract her attention.
“I smell something earthy,” she said. But she danced by on the run again. When she returned, dancing, to the same spot, a small piece of corn hit her feet and she exclaimed, “My children must be here!”
She ran back to them, hugging her entire family. The father then loaded all of them into his canoe and brought his entire family back to earth.
When the family was nicely settled, the father again went hunting. This time the mother took all of her children back to the sky in the magic canoe, singing her song that carried them away. The father never saw his family again, because they became sky people forever.
The father returned to the camp of his Alabama tribe, where he chose another wife, an Indian maiden, whom he felt assured would remain with him on earth.
Celestial Skiff
How Fire Came
Men Who Went To The Sky
Origin of Fire
Origin of the Alabama Indians
Rabbit and Big Man-Eater
Rabbit and the Orphan
Rabbit and the Turkeys
Rabbit Kills Big Man-Eater
Rabbit Rescues the Sun
Terrapin and the Wolves
The Alabama nation was recognized as early as the 1500s in the chronicles of the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto, and their relationship with the French dates as far back as the establishment of Fort Toulouse in Alabama in 1717. Their long history was recognized when the state of Alabama took it’s name and called its principle river the Alabama. The Alabama or Alibamu (Albaamaha in the Alabama language) are a Southeastern culture people of Native Americans, originally from Alabama. They were members of the Muscogee Creek Confederacy, a loose trade and military organization of autonomous towns; their home lands were on the upper Alabama River.
The Alabama and closely allied Coushatta people migrated from Alabama and Mississippi to the area of Texas in the late 18th century and early 19th century, under pressure from European-American settlers to th
e east. They essentially merged and shared reservation land. Although the tribe was terminated in the 1950s, it achieved federal recognition in 1987 as the Alabama/Coushatta Tribe of Texas.
Indigenous Peoples Literature 
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