ROCK VILLAGE. Rock Village (Talòola, meaning "rock town" in the Alabama Indian language) was the last village established by the Alabama Indians before they moved to the present Alabama-Coushatta Indian Reservation in Polk County, Texas. The Alabamas moved to Rock Village after leaving Jim Barclay Village in western Tyler County in the early 1850s. Rock Village was near Woods Creek in eastern Polk County at the junction of County Line Road (County Road 318) and Buddy Lloyd Road (County Road 105), four miles northeast of the Big Sandy School in Dallardsville. While the Alabamas were living in Rock Village, Principal Chief Antone, Second Chief Colabe Cillistine, and other tribal leaders sent a petition dated October 29, 1853, to the Texas Legislature requesting land for a permanent reservation. This petition was approved, and the state of Texas purchased 1,110.7 acres in Polk County for a reservation in 1854. This reservation was expanded in 1928, when the federal government purchased an additional 3,071 acres of land adjoining the original reservation.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: A Pictorial History of Polk County, Texas, 1846–1910 (Livingston, Texas: Polk County Bicentennial Commission, 1976; rev. ed. 1978). John R. Swanton, Early History of the Creek Indians and Their Neighbors, Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 73 (Washington: GPO, 1922). Cora Sylestine et al., Dictionary of the Alabama Language (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1991).
