The Southern Jewish Weekly

Old Mordecai: The Jew of Montgomery, Alabama

By Harry Simonhoff

Montgomery was the old Indian town of Acochanta, meaning red earth. While not strictly its founder, Abram Mordecai was the first white settler of the area that is now Alabama's third city. Col. Albert James Pickett, the official historian of Alabama, paid a visit to the 92-year-old Mordecai living alone in an Indian hut near two others. Strongly impressed, Pickett wrote a full account of the interview, which on Oct. 5, 1847 was published in the Montgomery Flag and Advertiser. This article is the source material of the picturesque and Jewish adventurer and Indian trader, the first pioneer to plant cotton and set up a gin in Alabama.

Born 1755 in Pennsylvania of a Jewish father and German mother, Abram Mordecai served the Revolutionary cause for three years in the minor campaigns of New Jersey and Delaware. In 1783 he settled in Georgia among the Cassuto Indians and traded merchandise for skins, furs, snakeroot, pinkroot, and other medicinal barks. Oil brewed by Indian women from cracked hickory nuts was considered a delicacy by the Spanish, who used it with condiments. He sent as much as 30 gallons to Gov. Miro of New Orleans; then under the rule of Spain.

After French and Spanish occupation ended, Mordecai moved to Alabama in 1789. Other newcomers were several Tories who found life uncomfortable and even unsafe among the victorious patriots. A horse-thieving Dutchman came, as well as an English infantryman who had deserted and brought along his wife. When he died Milly became a favorite among the braves and ended up owning a house on the creek with many horses and cattle.

Pioneer Abram Mordecai got along quite well. His mules and ponies strapped with bundles on the sides and tops of their saddles carried merchandise to and from Pensacola and Augusta. Boats and canoes he used for the trade to Mobile and New Orleans. In five years he was able to hire some Spanish deserters to build for him a house of mortar in the Spanish style. Like most traders he married a squaw, either for convenience or perhaps out of policy to gain favor with the hostile savages. She bore him children, and he became expert in the language, manners, and customs of the Indians.

This knowledge enabled him to render great service to many white captives carried away by the Creek Indians from the new settlements, later known as Kentucky. James Seagrave, the government agent for Indian Affairs, employed Mordecai to negotiate with the distant Indian chiefs, becoming more and more embittered as the white settlers were pressing upon them. With his agreeable manner, remarkable adroitness and knowledge of the language, he was able to ransom the wretched women and children who had ceased to hope. His name appears often in government reports and correspondence.