The Creek, also sometimes called the Muscogee, are a confederacy of several different American Indian tribes, including the Alabama, Coosa, Hitchitee, and Tuskegee, among others. In the 18th century, the confederacy was estimated to contain twenty thousand people, all residing in modern-day Alabama and Georgia. The confederacy was geographically split into two regions or districts, one known as the Upper Creeks who lived along the Coosa, Alabama, and Tallapoosa Rivers, and another called the Lower Creeks, who settled along the Flint, Ocmulgee, and the Chattahoochee. As the Spanish, French, and English vied for control of the region, they each sought to recruit the support of the Creeks, whose strength in military might, diplomacy, and trade made them an ideal ally. 

At the beginning of the French and Indian War, the British again tried to win the Creeks' allegiance, but tensions heightened in 1760 when British officials learned that the Creeks had killed 20 English traders in their territory. In 1763, Creek leaders travelled to Augusta, Georgia, and joined four other American Indian groups in convening successful peace talks with Arthur Dobbs and several other colonial governors.

With American victory in the Revolutionary War, the Creek faced a new threat of encroachment on their territory, the resulting conflict culminating in the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. In its victory, the American government forced the Creek to surrender most of their lands—approximately twenty-three million acres—clearing the path for further colonization of the Mississippi Territory. Over the course of the next two decades, United States forces continued to push the Creek from their homelands until they forcibly removed them to present-day Oklahoma beginning in 1827.

Today, many descendants of the Creek Confederacy are part of the federally recognized Muscogee (Creek) Nation—a sovereign tribal government—and reside in central eastern Oklahoma.

For more information and links to resources, please see our editorial statement on American Indian terminology.