John Horse (1812–1882), also known as Juan Caballo, Juan Cavallo, John Cowaya (with spelling variations} and Gopher John,[1] was a Seminole-African American who acted as a military adviser to the chief Osceola and a leader of Black Seminole units against United States troops during the Seminole Wars in Florida. He led a number of Black Seminoles to Indian Territory (now Oklahoma) during Indian Removal. When they faced continuing threats from slave raiders there, he led a group to Mexico, where they achieved freedom in 1850, years before the American Civil War and . After the American Civil War, Horse and some of his followers were recruited by the United States Army to serve as scouts in the West. They and their families settled near
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John Horse, called Juan Caballo as a child, may have been born and raised as a slave in Micanopy, former Spanish Florida. John Horse assumed the surname of his owner, Charles Cavallo (who may also have been his father).[2] "Horse" is the meaning of Cavallo.[3][4] His mother may have been of mixed African-Indian parentage, and was possibly owned by Charles Cavallo, who was possibly of Indian-Spanish parentage.[5] They also had a daughter, Juana (spelled "Wannah" or "Warner" in some sources). Not much is known about Charles Cavallo. He did not appear to treat his two mixed-race children as slaves.
The year Juan Caballo was born, the War of 1812 broke out between the United States and the Great Britain. Horse was probably living with his mother in one of the black towns under the jurisdiction of the Alachua band of Oconee along the Suwanee River. When General Andrew Jackson invaded the area, he scattered the tribal peoples and their black allies/dependents.
The Seminole lived in a subsistence economy, in which they had enslaved people work along with them. They relied on small-scale farming, as well as hunting by men, and gathering of fruits, nuts and vegetables by women. Though nominally a slave while among the Seminole in Florida, Horse, like Black Seminole who lived independently, could come and go as he pleased, bear arms and fight alongside the Seminole. At the time, the Seminole treated their slaves more as vassals in a feudal tribal society.
The First Seminole War (1817–1818) occurred during Horse's childhood. Gene the Second Seminole War at the end of December 1837, against the army of General Zachary Taylor. The war dragged on until 1842.
In the spring of 1838, Horse surrendered to US troops. This may have been after the death of his first wife, a Seminole woman said to have been a daughter of Chief Holatoochee (a brother or nephew of Micanopy). With other Seminole, Horse was shipped from Tampa Bay to New Orleans and then to Indian Territory. There he settled with other Seminole and Black Seminole who had accepted removal. Once there, Horse rose as a leader of the Black Seminole.
After settling in Indian Territory, Horse accepted a job as an interpreter for the US Army. They asked him to help persuade remaining insurrectionists in Florida to surrender and relocate to Indian Territory. Horse returned to Florida in 1839. He returned to Indian Territory in 1842 along with some 120 Seminole who had been captured and deported.
Caballo was first given his freedom by General Worth for his service to the U.S. in the latter days of the Second Seminole War in Florida. He had taken advantage of General Thomas Sydney Jesup's promise of freedom to escaped slaves who would surrender and accept removal to Indian Territory west of the Mississippi. Caballo's wife and children, who also were removed to Indian Territory, did not gain freedom by his service. This put his family at risk from slave traders. .
In Indian Territory, the exiled Seminole leadership voted freedom for John Horse around 1843 for his services to them during the war. At the time, Chief Micanopy (Mico Nuppa) had nominal ownership over Horse.<-??-> He led the way in officially granting the warrior his freedom.
Conflict arose as the Creek people, a number of whom already owned slaves and were acquiring more, were already settled in the lands which the Army had promised to the Seminole. This led to tensions, as the Creek tried to kidnap several Black Seminole for enslavement. They succeeded in capturing Dembo Factor, a veteran of the Seminole War. Coacoochee, a Seminole traditionalist who opposed living with the Creek, protested against selling Factor as a slave. He was joined by Horse. The Army recovered Factor and returned him to the Seminole, but neither they nor the Creek filed charges against the suspected slavers.
Coacoochee and Horse traveled to Washington, D.C. in 1844 to seek a separate land grant for the Seminole. After failing to secure a treaty, they returned to Indian Territory. Horse traveled again to Washington and lobbied General Jesup, for separate land for Seminole settlement. Jesup granted the Fort Gibson area as a place of residence to the Seminole. During Horse's time in Washington, then-Attorney-General John Y. Mason ruled that as most of the Black Seminole were descendants of fugitive slaves and thus legally still considered born into slavery, he could not protect them against slave raiders. This meant that over 280 Black Seminoles, including members of Horse's family, were at risk of being captured for sale as chattel slaves.
Returning to the territory, John Horse and Coacoochee led a group of Seminole and Black Seminole from Fort Gibson to Wewoka, further from the Creek. During this time, Coacoochee and Horse thought of constructing an alliance of Plains Indians, eastern Indians and fugitive slaves in an uprising against the federal government.
The two waited until the ill-liked Indian agent, Marcellus Duval, finished his tenure and returned to Washington. They quickly led a migration of mostly Black Seminole across Texas and the Rio Grande into Coahuila, Mexico, as that nation had abolished slavery decades earlier. They presented themselves to the Mexican commander at Piedras Negras on July 12, 1850.
Horse secured land for the migrants in Mexico. Many of the veterans served Mexico as border guards. After the Civil War and emancipation of slaves in the US, Horse returned to Texas with a number of Black Seminole, who had been recruited in 1870 by the US Cavalry to work as scouts. The scouts and their families settled near the fort in Texas, in what is now Brackettville.
After a number of years, Horse returned to Mexico. He died en route to Mexico City, intending to try to gain more land rights for his people in northern Mexico. Descendants of Black Seminoles still reside in Coahuila.