The Case of Oceola’s Missing Head
Osceola Disturbed
1950
Osceola was jailed at Fort Moultrie, died and was buried there. Local legend says he died of starvation while trying to lose enough weight to slip through his prison bars.
Florida has asked that the body be returned for burial in his native soil. A bill to return the remains is before the South Carolina legislature.
The Gaffney Ledger, January 5, 1950, p6
It seems things had been forgotten about Osceola and new things made up. The article tells the legend about Osceola starving himself so he could slip through his prison bars. This was the same story we were told in our fourth-grade field trip to Fort Marion in St. Augustin but here is told about Fort Moultrie. Neither is true. In fact, Osceola and the other Seminoles were free to wander about the grounds of Fort Moultrie so there would had been no need to starve himself to fit through prison bars.
Osceola remains had remain undisturbed at Fourt Moultrie until 1950 when there was an effort by Florida to have his remains returned to Florida. With this newfound interest his grave was disturbed.
The Columbia Record, Feb. 4, 1950, p8
They also stole, “a plaque designating the dungeon in which the great Seminole tribe Leader was imprisoned for a year at Fort Moultrie before he died.” Another false statement, while the plaque was taken, Osceola was at Fort Moultrie less than a month before he died. A few days later it was report that one of the markers “turned up yesterday in the corridor of a radio station”.
In March the state of Alabama entered into the bid, “Mrs. Marie Bankhead Owen, head of Alabama’s department of archives and history, has put My or William M. Wolfarth on notice that her state intends to bid [on Osceola’s remains].” Mrs. Owen said, “I am interested in Osceola because he was a great Indian and a native of Alabama.” Alabama claimed that Osceola was born near the Chattahoochee River, which is Georgia. L.N. Foy wrote in The Greenville News, “If Osceola’s ghost still walks he is probably puzzled at this belated popularity among the palefaces.”
The matter still was not resolved when in January of 1951 The Miami Hearld staff writer Jeanne Bellamy reported,
South Carolina has the body but the head may be somewhere in Florida.
The South Carolina legislature now in session will be asked soon to authorize the moving of the Seminole warrior’s body to Florida.
A quest for the Seminole chief’s skull is being started by Justin P. Havee, recording secretary of the Historical Association of Southern Florida.
Both Bellamy and Bill Baggs a few days later repeat the false story that Osceola’s remains were dug up by vandals who cut off his head.
So the white men were fighting over Osceola’s remains mainly for tourist purposes, so what did the Seminoles say? The Panama City News reported that the “Seminole Indians here are non-committal on the proposal to remove the bones. … One reason why the Indians may not be interested is that the remains are incomplete, The head is regarded by them as the most import part of the remains.” The article reported that the chairman of the Florida Board of Parks and Historical Monuments, John D. Pennekamp, said the board will submit a request of Osceola’s remains to the South Carolina Legislature.
In February it was reported by both The Daytona Beach News and The Miami Hearld that Dr. Weedon gave Osceola’s skull to some unknown person who took it to Paris where it was destroyed when the house in which the person was staying burned to the ground.
Later in February the South Carolina Senate voted in favor while the House of Representatives voted not to have Osceola’s remains given to Florida because Florida only wanted to make Osceola a “tourist attraction.”