THE YOWANNE, OR HIOWANNI, INDIANS.  (cont.)
Page 409
 

Reservation, the surveyors ran a line due south five miles, then a line due west about eight miles, crossing the Chickasahay river, thence a line due north terminating at the point where the original line would have struck had they been permitted to continue. At the northeast and southeast corners they placed boundary stones. The turn south at the northeast corner was in a small prairie about 150 yards east of a small creek called Dry Creek. About 90 feet a little northeast of the turning point stood a large red oak, a noted one, as it was fully three feet six inches in diameter. About 10 feet from the ground there was a large growth of fungus or punk, which extended all around and projected outward about 18 inches. It was under this tree, so says tradition, that Haiowanni and the surveyors held their colloquy when he ordered them to turn south.7

The site of Yowanne is now marked only by some mounds and the usual arrow heads and other remains. No American town has grown up in its place. Railroads have left “high and dry” so many modern settlements that it is no wonder civilization has forgotten the existence of Yowanne. In some sense Shubuta may be said to be its successor, but as a deep chasm separates the

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7 Mr. Evans adds that “in the organization of Clarke county the Choctaw boundary line was designated as the south boundary of the county, which, of course, included the Haiowanni Reservation. Wayne county, however, claimed the Reservation, and there was a long wrangle between the .two counties over the matter, until finally Clarke yielded the point. A survey was ordered that a direct line might be run from the northwest corner to the northeast corner of the Reservation. A. J. Graham, of Clarke, and John West, of Wayne, were appointed for this work, which, from some cause, they failed to do. At last, in 1881 the Legislature ordered the resurvey of the Choctaw boundary line from the northwest corner of Wayne county to the boundary line of Mississippi and Alabama, and that a direct line be run from the northwest to the northeast corner of the Haiowanni Reservation. J. W. Boykin, of Wayne and myself of Clarke were the respective surveyors. In our work, we found two mounds, one at the northwest and one at the northeast corner of the Reservation. I have heard that these mounds were made by the surveyors. From the northeast corner we continued our line until it struck the large post oak on the State line in section 29, township I, range 18, east above mentioned. It stands exactly on the boundary line of Mississippi and Alabama, and it was the original northwest corner of Washington county, Alabama, before the formation of Choctaw county. This oak is marked on the map of Alabama, to be found in the Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology. As an historical land mark, the common property of Mississippi and Alabama, is to be hoped that (his noted tree will still continue to be protected by the people of the vicinity so that it may stand and flourish for many generations to come.”
 

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