265 militia, including:[3] The Fort Mims massacre took place on August 30, 1813, at a fortified homestead site 35-40 miles north of Mobile, Alabama, during the Creek War.

A large force of Creek Indians belonging to the Red Sticks faction, under the command of Peter McQueen and William Weatherford, stormed the fort and defeated the militia garrison.

The Red Sticks conducted the massacre, killing almost all the remaining mixed Creek, white settlers, and militia at Fort Mims.

In the Upper Towns, they began a systematic slaughter of domestic livestock, most of which belonged to men who had gained power by adopting aspects of European culture.

[8] The newly arrived Spanish governor, Mateo González Manrique, authorized giving the Creek 45 barrels of corn and flour, blankets, ribbons, scissors, razors, a few steers, and 1000 pounds of gunpowder and an equivalent supply of lead musket balls and bird shot.

[9] When reports of the Creek pack train reached Colonel Caller, he and Major Daniel Beasley of the Mississippi Volunteers led a mounted force of 6 companies, 150 white militia riflemen, and 30 Tensaw under Captain Dixon Bailey to intercept them.

James Caller (Call/Cole) ambushed the Red Sticks in the Battle of Burnt Corn in July 1813[10] as the Creek were having their mid-day meal.

[2] Fort Mims was located about 35 to 45 miles (50–70 km) directly north of Mobile on the eastern side of the Alabama River.

[citation needed] The Red Sticks attacked during the mid-day meal, attempting to take the fort in a coup de main by charging the open gate en masse.

[19] The Creek, with their initial impetus blunted inside the fort and casualties rising, held an impromptu council to debate whether to continue the fight.

[20] By 3 o'clock, they decided that the Tensaw Native Americans led by Dixon Bailey would have to be killed to avenge their treachery at Burnt Corn.

In the weeks following the battle, several thousand persons, about half the population of the Tensaw and Tombigbee districts, fled their settlements for Mobile.

[26] Because Federal troops were largely occupied with the northern front of the War of 1812, Tennessee, Georgia, and the Mississippi Territory mobilized their militias to move against the Upper Creek towns that had supported the Red Sticks' cause.

In the book, a minor character, Grandma Fontaine, shares her memories of seeing her entire family murdered in the Creek uprising following the massacre as a lesson to the protagonist, Scarlett.