Benjamin Hawkins and the Creek Indians

Benjamin Hawkins and the Creek Indians, ca. 1805, artist unknown ...

Oil on canvas, 357⁄8 x 497⁄8 inches

In this painting, federal Indian agent Benjamin Hawkins directs two Creek men in the use of a plow, with scenes of traditional European agriculture incorporated into the background. A man at right carries corn in a basket, with other row crops at his feet. Three of the men are dressed in European clothing, whereas the nursing woman at left, the man at center left, and the two men with shaved heads in the back at left still wear traditional Creek garb.

Courtesy of the Greenville County Museum of Art, Greenville, South Carolina