In 1817, during the

First Seminole War The Seminole Wars (also known as the Florida Wars) were a series of three military conflicts between the United States and the Seminoles that took place in Florida between about 1816 and 1858. The Seminoles are a Native American nation which co ...

, Fort Hughes was built on the south side of the

Flint River The Flint River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed April 15, 2011 river in the U.S. state of Georgia. The river drains of western Georgia, flowing south from th ...

in what is today

Bainbridge, Georgia Bainbridge is a city in Decatur County, Georgia, United States. The city is the county seat of Decatur County. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 14,468, up from 12,697 at the 2010 census. It is the principal city of the ...

. It was on a bluff at the west end of today's J. D. Chason Memorial Park. Sovereignty over the land between the Flint River and today's border with Florida was an issue; the battle of nearby Fowltown, November 21–23, 1817, had been over this question. According to the U.S. Government, these lands had been ceded by the Lower Creek Indians in the

Treaty of Fort Jackson The Treaty of Fort Jackson (also known as the Treaty with the Creeks, 1814) was signed on August 9, 1814 at Fort Jackson near Wetumpka, Alabama following the defeat of the Red Stick (Upper Creek) resistance by United States allied forces at ...

, whereas the Upper Creeks, also known as

Red Stick Red Sticks (also Redsticks, Batons Rouges, or Red Clubs)—the name deriving from the red-painted war clubs of some Native American Creek—refers to an early 19th century traditionalist faction of Muscogee Creek people in the Southeastern Uni ...

Creeks or

Mikasuki The Miccosukee Tribe of Indians ( /ˌmɪkəˈsuki/, MIH-kə-SOO-kee) is a federally recognized Native American tribe in the U.S. state of Florida. Together with the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma and the Seminole Tribe of Florida, it is one of ...

, had not been party to the treaty, did not feel bound by it, and said the land did not belong to the Lower Creeks in the first place. The fort was intended to prevent further conflict in this region. The Fort consisted of a

stockade A stockade is an enclosure of palisades and tall walls, made of logs placed side by side vertically, with the tops sharpened as a defensive wall. Etymology ''Stockade'' is derived from the French word ''estocade''. The French word was derived f ...

square, with two

blockhouses A blockhouse is a small fortification, usually consisting of one or more rooms with loopholes, allowing its defenders to fire in various directions. It is usually an isolated fort in the form of a single building, serving as a defensive stro ...

at opposite corners, each square. It was named for the only American killed at the Battle of Fowltown, the young fifer Aaron Hughes, whose grave, while unlocated, is believed to be somewhere at the site. The fort site was chosen by Lt. Col. Arbuckle, who supervised its building, which, using 300 men, took three days. 40 men were left stationed at Fort Hughes after its construction was finished about November 27. A group of at least 32 Red Stick Creeks was led against it by Peter Cook, clerk at Arbuthnot's store, and former Colonial Marines lieutenant

Robert Ambrister The Arbuthnot and Ambrister incident occurred in April 1818 during the First Seminole War when American General Andrew Jackson invaded Spanish Florida and his troops captured two British citizens, Alexander Arbuthnot and Robert Ambrister, separate ...

, and attacked it unsuccessfully sometime between December 7 and 15. The fort resisted the attack successfully. However, after the

Scott Massacre The Scott Massacre, coming after the Fort Mims massacre, was a major factor in convincing the United States government that the Red Stick Creeks and their Native American allies must be defeated, beginning the Seminole Wars. It took place at the end ...

of November 30, and the impossibility of resupplying the fort given the siege that began at the Battle of Ocheesee on December 15, Arbuckle ordered Fort Hughes evacuated and abandoned on December 18, 1817. It was never reoccupied.

References

{{coord, 30, 54, 29, N, 84, 34, 45, W, type:landmark_region:US-GA, display=title History of Georgia (U.S. state) Buildings and structures in Decatur County, Georgia Hughes Native American history of Georgia (U.S. state) Battles of the Seminole Wars Hughes Bainbridge, Georgia