extensive scouting for another brief period. In reality, Furnas was endeavoring to hold the whole of the Indian country north of the Arkansas and south of the border.[385]

Meanwhile, Salomon had established himself in the neighborhood of Hudson's Crossing, at what he called, Camp Quapaw. The camp was on Quapaw land. His idea was, and he so communicated to Blunt, that he had selected "the most commanding point in this (the trans-Missouri) country not only from a military view as a key to the valleys of Spring River, Shoal Creek, Neosho, and Grand River, but also as the only point in this country now where an army could be sustained with a limited supply of forage and subsistence, offering ample grazing[386] and good water."[387] No regular investigation into his conduct touching the retrograde movement, such as justice to Weer would seem to have demanded, was made.[388] He submitted the facts to Blunt and Blunt, at first alarmed[389] lest a complete abandonment of Indian Territory would result, acquiesced[390] when, he found that the Indian regiments were holding their own there.[391] Salomon, indeed, so far strengthened Furnas's hand as to supply him with ten days rations and a section of Allen's battery.

[Footnote 385: For accounts of the movements of the Indian Expedition after the occurrence of Salomon's retrograde movement, see the Daily Conservative, August 16, 21, 26, 1862.]

[Footnote 386: On the subject of grazing, see Britton, Civil War on the Border, vol. i, 308.]

[Footnote 387: Salomon to Blunt, July 29, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 521.]

[Footnote 388: H.S. Lane called Stanton's attention to the matter, however, Ibid., 485.]

[Footnote 389: Blunt to Salomon, August 3, 1862, Ibid., 531-532.]

[Footnote 390: He acquiesced as, perforce, he had to do but he was very far from approving.]

[Footnote 391: In November, Dole reported to Smith that Salomon's retrograde movement had caused about fifteen hundred or two thousand additional refugees to flee into Kansas. Dole urged that the Indian Expedition should be reenforced and strengthened [Indian Office Report Book, no. 12, 503-504].]



VI. GENERAL PIKE IN CONTROVERSY WITH GENERAL HINDMAN

The retrograde movement of Colonel Salomon and the white auxiliary of the Indian Expedition was peculiarly unfortunate and ill-timed since, owing to circumstances now to be related in detail, the Confederates had really no forces at hand at all adequate to repel invasion. On the thirty-first of May, as earlier narrated in this work, General Hindman had written to General Pike instructing him to move his entire infantry force of whites and Woodruff's single six-gun battery to Little Rock without delay. In doing this, he admitted that, while it was regrettable that Pike's force in Indian Territory should be reduced, it was imperative that Arkansas should be protected, her danger being imminent. He further ordered, that Pike should supply the command to be sent forward with subsistence for thirty days, should have the ammunition transported in wagons, and should issue orders that not a single cartridge be used on the journey.[392]

To one of Pike's proud spirit, such orders could be nothing short of galling. He had collected his force and everything he possessed appertaining to it at the cost of much patience, much labor, much expense. Untiring vigilance had alone made possible the formation of his brigade and an unselfish willingness to advance his own funds had alone furnished it with quartermaster and commissary stores. McCulloch and Van

[Footnote 392: Official Records, vol. xiii, 934.]

Dorn[393] each in turn had diverted his supplies from their destined course, yet he had borne with it all, uncomplainingly. He had even broken faith with the Indian nations at Van Dorn's instance; for, contrary to the express terms of the treaties that he had negotiated, he had taken the red men across the border, without their express consent, to fight in the Pea Ridge campaign. And with what result? Base ingratitude on the part of Van Dorn, who, in his official report of the three day engagement, ignored the help rendered[394] and left Pike to bear the stigma[395] of Indian atrocities alone.

With the thought of that ingratitude still rankling in his breast, Pike noted additional features of Hindman's first instructions to him, which were, that he should advance his Indian force to the northern border of Indian Territory and hold it there to resist invasion from Kansas. He was expected to do this unsupported

[Footnote 393: Van Dorn would seem to have been a gross offender in this respect. Similar charges were made against him by other men and on other occasions [Official Records, vol. liii, supplement, 825].]

[Footnote 394: It was matter of common report that Van Dorn despised Pike's Indians [Ibid., vol. xiii, 814-816]. The entire Arkansas delegation in Congress, with the exception of A.H. Garland, testified to Van Dorn's aversion for the Indians [Ibid., 815].]

[Footnote 395: How great was that stigma can be best understood from the following: "The horde of Indians scampered off to the mountains from whence they had come, having murdered and scalped many of the Union wounded. General Pike, their leader, led a feeble band to the heights of Big Mountain, near Elk Horn, where he was of no use to the battle of the succeeding day, and whence he fled, between roads, through the woods, disliked by the Confederates and detested by the Union men; to be known in history as a son of New Hampshire—a poet who sang of flowers and the beauties of the sunset skies, the joys of love and the hopes of the soul—and yet one who, in the middle of the 19th century, led a merciless, scalping, murdering, uncontrollable horde of half-tame savages in the defense of slavery—themselves slave-holders—against that Union his own native State was then supporting, and against the flag of liberty. He scarcely struck a blow in open fight.... His service was servile and corrupt; his flight was abject, and his reward disgrace."—War Papers and Personal Recollections of the Missouri Commandery, 232.]

by white troops, the need of which, for moral as well as for physical strength, he had always insisted upon.

It is quite believable that Van Dorn was the person most responsible for Hindman's interference with Pike, although, of course, the very seriousness and desperateness of Hindman's situation would have impelled him to turn to the only place where ready help was to be had. Three days prior to the time that Hindman had been assigned to the Trans-Mississippi Department, Roane, an old antagonist of Pike[396] and the commander to whose immediate care Van Dorn had confided Arkansas,[397] had asked of Pike at Van Dorn's suggestion[398] all the white forces he could spare, Roane having practically none of his own. Pike had refused the request, if request it was, and in refusing it, had represented how insufficient his forces actually were for purposes of his own department and how exceedingly difficult had been the task, which was his and his alone, of getting them together. At the time of writing he had not a single dollar of public money for his army and only a very limited amount of ammunition and other supplies.[399]

Pike received Hindman's communication of May 31 late in the afternoon of June 8 and he replied to it that same evening immediately after he had made arrangements[400] for complying in part with its requirements.

The reply[401] as it stands in the records today is a strong indictment of the Confederate management of Indian

[Footnote 396: Pike had fought a duel with Roane, Roane having challenged him because he had dared to criticize his conduct in the Mexican War [Hallura, Biographical and Pictorial History of Arkansas, vol. i, 229; Confederate Military History, vol. x, 99].]

[Footnote 397: Maury to Roane, May 11, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 827.]

[Footnote 398: Maury to Pike, May 19, 1862, Ibid.]

[Footnote 399: Pike to Roane, June 1, 1862, Ibid., 935-936.]

[Footnote 400: General Orders, June 8, 1862, Ibid., 943.]

[Footnote 401: Pike to Hindman, June 8, 1862, Ibid., 936-943.]

affairs in the West and should be dealt with analytically, yet also as a whole; since no paraphrase, no mere synopsis of contents could ever do the subject justice. From the facts presented, it is only too evident that very little had been attempted or done by the Richmond authorities for the Indian regiments. Neither officers nor men had been regularly or fully paid. And not all the good intentions, few as they were, of the central government had been allowed realization. They had been checkmated by the men in control west of the Mississippi. In fact, the army men in Arkansas had virtually exploited Pike's command, had appropriated for their own use his money, his supplies, and had never permitted anything to pass on to Indian Territory, notwithstanding that it had been bought with Indian funds, "that was fit to be sent anywhere else." The Indian's portion was the "refuse," as Pike so truly, bitterly, and emphatically put it, or, in other words of his, the "crumbs" that fell from the white man's table.

Pike's compliance with Hindman's orders was only partial and he offered not the vestige of an apology that it was so. What he did send was Dawson's[402] infantry regiment and Woodruff's battery which went duly on to Little Rock with the requisite thirty days' subsistence and the caution that not a single cartridge was to be fired along the way. The caution Pike must have repeated in almost ironical vein; for the way to Little Rock lay through Indian Territory and cartridges like everything else under Pike's control had been collected solely for its defense.

Respecting the forward movement of the Indian troops, Pike made not the slightest observation in his

[Footnote 402: C.L. Dawson of the Nineteenth Regiment of Arkansas Volunteers had joined Pike at Fort McCulloch in April [Fort Smith Papers].]

reply. His silence was ominous. Perhaps it was intended as a warning to Hindman not to encroach too far upon his department; but that is mere conjecture; inasmuch as Pike had not yet seen fit to question outright Hindman's authority over himself. As if anticipating an echo from Little Rock of criticisms that were rife elsewhere, he ventured an explanation of his conduct in establishing himself in the extreme southern part of Indian Territory and towards the west and in fortifying on an open prairie, far from any recognized base.[403] He had gone down into the Red River country, he asserted, in order to be near Texas where supplies might be had in abundance and where, since he had no means of defence, he would be safe from attack. He deplored the seeming necessity of merging his department in another and larger one. His reasons were probably many but the one reason he stressed was, for present purposes, the best he could have offered. It was, that the Indians could not be expected to render to him as a subordinate the same obedience they had rendered to him as the chief officer in command. Were his authority to be superseded in any degree, the Indians would naturally infer that his influence at Richmond had declined, likewise his power to protect them and their interests.

During the night Pike must have pondered deeply

[Footnote 403: His enemies were particularly scornful of his work in this regard. They poked fun at him on every possible occasion. Edwards, in Shelby and His Men, 63, but echoed the general criticism,

"Pike, also a Brigadier, had retreated with his Indian contingent out of North West Arkansas, unpursued, through the Cherokee country, the Chickasaw country, and the country of the Choctaws, two hundred and fifty miles to the southward, only halting on the 'Little Blue', an unknown thread of a stream, twenty miles from Red river, where he constructed fortifications on the open prairie, erected a saw-mill remote from any timber, and devoted himself to gastronomy and poetic meditation, with elegant accompaniments..."]

over things omitted from his reply to Hindman and over all that was wanting to make his compliance with Hindman's instructions full and satisfactory. On the ninth, his assistant-adjutant, O.F. Russell, prepared a fairly comprehensive report[404] of the conditions in and surrounding his command. Pike's force,[405] so the report stated, was anything but complete. With Dawson gone, there would be in camp, of Arkansas troops, one company of cavalry and one of artillery and, of Texas, two companies of cavalry. When men, furloughed for the wheat harvest, should return, there would be "in addition two regiments and one company of cavalry, and one company of artillery, about 80 strong."[406] The withdrawal of white troops from the Territory would be interpreted by the Indians to mean its abandonment.

Of the Indian contingent, Russell had this to say:

The two Cherokee regiments are near the Kansas line, operating on that frontier. Col. Stand Watie has recently had a skirmish there, in which, as always, he and his men fought gallantly, and were successful. Col. D.N. McIntosh's Creek Regiment is under orders to advance up the Verdigris, toward the Santa Fe road. Lieut. Col. Chilly McIntosh's Creek Battalion, Lieut. Col. John Jumper's Seminole Battalion, and Lieut. Col. J.D. Harris' Chickasaw Battalion are under orders, and part of them now in motion toward the Salt Plains, to take Fort Larned, the post at Walnut Creek, and perhaps Fort Wise, and intercept trains going to New Mexico. The First Choctaw (new)[407] Regiment, of Col. Sampson Folsom, and the Choctaw Battalion (three companies), of Maj. Simpson (N.) Folsom, are at Middle Boggy, 23 miles northeast of this point. They were under orders to march northward to

[Footnote 404: Official Records, vol. xiii, 943-945.]

[Footnote 405: For tabulated showing of Pike's brigade, see Ibid., 831.]

[Footnote 406: Compare Russell's statement with Hindman's [Ibid., 30]. See also Maury to Price, March 22, 1862 [Ibid., vol. viii, 798].]

[Footnote 407: The parentheses appear here as in the original.]

the Salt Plains and Santa Fe road; but the withdrawal of Colonel Dawson's regiment prevents that, and the regiment is now ordered to take position here, and the battalion to march to and take position at Camp McIntosh, 17 miles this side of Fort Cobb, where, with Hart's Spies, 40 in number, it will send out parties to the Wichita Mountains and up the False Wichita, and prevent, if possible, depredations on the frontier of Texas.

The First Choctaw and Chickasaw Regiment, of Col. Douglas H. Cooper, goes out of service on the 25th and 26th of July. It is now encamped 11 miles east of here.... The country to the westward is quiet, all the Comanches this side of the Staked Plains being friendly, and the Kiowas[408] having made peace, and selected a home to live at on Elk Creek, not far from the site of Camp Radziwintski, south of the Wichita Mountains.

The Indian troops have been instructed, if the enemy[409] invades the country, to harass him, and impede his progress by every possible means, and, falling back here as he advances, to assist in holding this position against him.

Included in Russell's report there might well have been much interesting data respecting the condition of the troops that Pike was parting with; for it can scarcely be said that he manifested any generosity in sending them forth. He obeyed the letter of his order and ignored its spirit. He permitted no guns to be taken out of the Territory that had been paid for with money that he had furnished. Dawson's regiment had not its full quota of men, but that was scarcely Pike's fault. Neither was it his fault that its equipment was so sadly below par that it could make but very slow progress on the nine hundred mile march between Fort McCulloch and Little Rock. Moreover, the health of the

[Footnote 408: Pike had just received assurances of the friendly disposition of the Kiowas [Bickel to Pike, June 1, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 936].]

[Footnote 409: The enemy in mind was the Indian Expedition. Pike had heard that Sturgis had been removed "on account of his tardiness in not invading the Indian country...." [Ibid., 944].]

men was impaired, their duties, especially the "fort duties, throwing up intrenchments, etc.,"[410] had been very fatiguing. Pike had no wagons to spare them for the trip eastward. So many of his men had obtained furloughs for the harvest season and every company, in departing, had taken with it a wagon,[411] no one having any thought that there would come a call decreasing Pike's command.

So slowly and laboriously did Dawson's regiment progress that Hindman, not hearing either of it or of Woodruff's battery, which was slightly in advance, began to have misgivings as to the fate of his orders of May 31. He, therefore, repeated them in substance, on June 17, with the additional specific direction that Pike should "move at once to Fort Gibson." That order Pike received June 24, the day following his issuance of instructions to his next in command, Colonel D.H. Cooper, that he should hasten to the country north of the Canadian and there take command of all forces except Chief Jumper's.

The receipt of Hindman's order of June 17 was the signal for Pike to pen another lengthy letter[412] of description and protest. Interspersed through it were his grievances, the same that were recited in the letter of June 8, but now more elaborately dwelt upon. Pike was getting irritable. He declared that he had done all he could to expedite the movement of his troops. The odds were unquestionably against him. His Indians were doing duty in different places. Most of the men of his white cavalry force were off on furlough. Their furloughs would not expire until the

[Footnote 410: Dawson to Hindman, June 20, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 945-946.]

[Footnote 411: Dawson had allowed his wagons to go "of his own motion" [Pike to Hindman, June 24, 1862, Ibid., 947].]

[Footnote 412:—Ibid., 947-950.]

twenty-fifth and not until the twenty-seventh could they be proceeded against as deserters. Not until that date, too, would the reorganization, preliminary to marching, be possible. He was short of transportation and half of what he had was unserviceable.

Of his available Indian force, he had made what disposition to him seemed best. He had ordered the newly-organized First Choctaw Regiment, under Colonel Sampson Folsom, to Fort Gibson and had assigned Cooper to the command north of the Canadian, which meant, of course, the Cherokee country. Cooper's own regiment was the First Choctaw and Chickasaw, of which, two companies, proceeding from Scullyville, had already posted themselves in the upper part of the Indian Territory, where also were the two Cherokee regiments, Watie's and Drew's. The remaining eight companies of the First Choctaw and Chickasaw were encamped near Fort McCulloch and would have, before moving elsewhere, to await the reorganization of their regiment, now near at hand. However, Cooper was not without hope that he could effect reorganization promptly and take at least four companies to join those that had just come from Scullyville. There were six companies in the Chickasaw Battalion, two at Fort Cobb and four on the march to Fort McCulloch; but they would all have to be left within their own country for they were averse to moving out of it and were in no condition to move. The three companies of the Choctaw Battalion would also have to be left behind in the south for they had no transportation with which to effect a removal. The Creek commands, D.N. McIntosh's Creek Regiment, Chilly McIntosh's Creek Battalion, and John Jumper's Seminole Battalion, were operating in the west, along

the Santa Fe Trail and towards Forts Larned and Wise.

June 17 might be said to mark the beginning of the real controversy between Pike and Hindman; for, on that day, not only did Hindman reiterate the order to hurry that aroused Pike's ire but he encroached upon Pike's prerogative in a financial particular that was bound, considering Pike's experiences in the past, to make for trouble. Interference with his commissary Pike was determined not to brook, yet, on June 17, Hindman put N. Bart Pearce in supreme control at Fort Smith as commissary, acting quartermaster, and acting ordnance officer.[413] His jurisdiction was to extend over northwestern Arkansas and over the Indian Territory. Now Pike had had dealings already with Pearce and thought that he knew too well the limits of his probity. Exactly when Pike heard of Pearce's promotion is not quite clear; but, on the twenty-third, Hindman sent him a conciliatory note explaining that his intention was "to stop the operations of the commissaries of wandering companies in the Cherokee Nation, who" were "destroying the credit of the Confederacy by the floods of certificates they" issued and not "to restrict officers acting under" Pike's orders.[414] All very well, but Pearce had other ideas as to the functions of his office and lost no time in apprising various people of them. His notes[415] to Pike's officers were most impertinently prompt. They were sent out on the twenty-fourth of June and on the twenty-sixth Pike reported[416] the whole history of his economic embarrassments to the Secretary of War.[417]

[Footnote 413: Official Records, vol. xiii, 967.]

[Footnote 414:—Ibid., 946.]

[Footnote 415:—Ibid., 968, 968-969, 969.]

[Footnote 416:—Ibid., 841-844.]

[Footnote 417: George W. Randolph.]

His indignation must have been immense; but whether righteously so or not, it was for others higher up to decide. That Pike had some sort of a case against the men in Arkansas there can be no question. The tale he told Secretary Randolph was a revelation such as would have put ordinary men, if involved at all, to deepest shame. Hindman, perforce, was the victim of accumulated resentment; for he, personally, had done only a small part of that of which Pike complained. In the main, Pike's report simply furnished particulars in matters, such as the despoiling him of his hard-won supplies, of which mention has already been made; and his chief accusation was little more than hinted at, the gist of it being suggested in some of his concluding sentences:

... I struggled for a good while before I got rid of the curse of dependence for subsistence, transportation, and forage on officers at Fort Smith. I cannot even get from that place the supplies I provide myself and hardly my own private stores. My department quartermaster and commissary are fully competent to purchase what we need, and I mean they shall do it. I have set my face against all rascality and swindling and keep contractors in wholesome fear, and have made it publicly known by advertisement that I prefer to purchase of the farmer and producer and do not want any contractors interposed between me and them. My own officers will continue to purchase subsistence, transportation, forage, and whatever else I need until I am ordered to the contrary by you, and when that order comes it will be answered by my resignation. Mr. White's[418] contract will not be acted under here. I have beef enough on hand and engaged, and do not want any from him. I have had to buy bacon at 20 to 26 cents, and he ought to be made to pay every cent of the difference between that price and fifteen cents. I also strenuously object to receiving mules or anything else purchased at Fort Smith.

[Footnote 418: "George E. White, formerly a partner, I believe, of Senator Oldham of Texas..."—Official Records, vol. xiii, 842.]

I could get up a mule factory now with the skeletons I have, and there are a few miles from here 600 or 800 sent up by Major Clark[419] in even a worse plight.

I know nothing about Major Pearce as a quartermaster nor of any right Major-General Hindman has to make him one. He is an assistant commissary of subsistence, with the rank of major, and Major Quesenbury, my brigade or department quartermaster, is major by an older commission....

While I am here there will be no fine contracts for mules, hay, keeping of mules, beef on the hoof at long figures, or anything of the kind. Fort Smith is very indignant at this, and out of this grief grows the anxious desire of many patriots to see me resign the command of this country or be removed....[420]

Subsequent communications[421] from Pike to Randolph reported the continued despoiling of his command and the persistent infringement of Pearce upon his authority, in consequence of which, the Indians were suffering from lack of forage, medicines, clothing, and food.[422] Pearce, in his turn, reported[423] to Hindman Pike's obstinacy and intractability and he even cast insinuations against his honesty. Pike was openly defying the man who claimed to be his superior officer, Hindman. He was resisting his authority at every turn and had already boldly declared,[424] with special reference to Clarkson, of course, that

No officer of the Missouri State Guard, whatever his rank, unless he has a command adequate to his rank, can ever exercise or assume any military authority in the Indian country, and much less assume command of any Confederate troops or

[Footnote 419: George W. Clark, Official Records, vol. xiii.]

[Footnote 420: For an equally vigorous statement on this score, see Pike to Randolph, June 30, 1862 [Ibid., 849].]

[Footnote 421:—Ibid., 846-847, 848-849, 850-851, 852.]

[Footnote 422: Chilly McIntosh to Pike, June 9, 1862, Ibid., 853; Pike to Chilly McIntosh, July 6, 1862, Ibid., 853-854.]

[Footnote 423: July 5, 1862 [Ibid., 963-965]; July 8, 1862 [Ibid., 965-967].]

[Footnote 424:—Ibid., 844-845.]

compare rank with any officer in the Confederate service. The commissioned colonels of Indian regiments rank precisely as if they commanded regiments of white men, and will be respected and obeyed accordingly.

With the same confidence in the justness of his own cause, he called[425] Pearce's attention to an act of Congress which seemed "to have escaped his observation," and which Pike considered conclusively proved that the whole course of action of his enemies was absolutely illegal.

In some of his contentions, General Pike was most certainly on strong ground and never on stronger than when he argued that the Indians were organized, in a military way, for their own protection and for the defence of their own country. Since first they entered the Confederate service, many had been the times that that truth had been brought home to the authorities and not by Pike[426] alone but by several of his subordinates and most often by Colonel Cooper.[427] The Indians had many causes of dissatisfaction and sometimes they murmured pretty loudly. Not even Pike's arrangements satisfied them all and his inexplicable conduct in establishing his headquarters at Fort McCulloch was exasperating beyond measure to the Cherokees.[428] Why, if he were really sincere in saying that his supreme duty was the defence of Indian Territory, did he not place himself where he could do something, where, for instance, he could take precautions against invasions from

[Footnote 425: Pike to Pearce, July 1, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 967.]

[Footnote 426: One of the best statements of the case by Pike is to be found in a letter from him to Stand Watie, June 27, 1862 [Ibid., 952].]

[Footnote 427: For some of Cooper's statements, illustrative of his position, see his letter to Pike, February 10, 1862 [Ibid., 896] and that to Van Dorn, May 6, 1862 [ibid., 824].]

[Footnote 428: It was at the express wish of Stand Watie and Drew that Hindman placed Clarkson in the Cherokee country [Carroll to Pike, June 27, 1862, ibid., 952].]

Kansas? And why, when the unionist Indian Expedition was threatening Fort Gibson, Tahlequah, and Cherokee integrity generally, did he not hasten northward to resist it? Chief Ross, greatly aggrieved because of Pike's delinquency in this respect, addressed[429] himself to Hindman and he did so in the fatal days of June.

In addressing General Hindman as Pike's superior officer, John Ross did something more than make representations as to the claims, which his nation in virtue of treaty guaranties had upon the South. He urged the advisability of allowing the Indians to fight strictly on the defensive and of placing them under the command of someone who would "enjoy their confidence." These two things he would like to have done if the protective force, which the Confederacy had promised, were not forthcoming. The present was an opportune time for the preferring of such a request. At least it was opportune from the standpoint of Pike's enemies and traducers.[430] It fitted into Hindman's scheme of things exactly; for he had quite lost patience, granting he had ever had any, with the Arkansas poet. It was not, however, within his province to remove him; but it was within his power so to tantalize him that he could render his position as brigade and department commander, intolerable. That he proceeded to do. Pike's quick sensibilities were not proof against such treatment and he soon lost his temper.

His provocations were very great. As was perfectly

[Footnote 429: Ross to Hindman, June 25, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 950-951. A little while before, Ross had complained, in a similar manner, to President Davis [Ibid., 824-825].]

[Footnote 430: Pike had his traducers. The Texans and Arkansans circulated infamous stories about him. See his reference to the same in a letter to Hindman, July 3, 1862 [Ibid., 955].]

natural, the Confederate defeat at Locust Grove counted heavily against him.[431] On the seventh of July, Hindman began a new attack upon him by making requisition for his ten Parrott guns.[432] They were needed in Arkansas. On the eighth of July came another attack in the shape of peremptory orders, two sets of them, the very tone of which was both accusatory and condemnatory. What was apparently the first[433] set of orders reached Pike by wire on the eleventh of July and commanded him to hurry to Fort Smith, travelling night and day, there to take command of all troops in the Indian Territory and in Carroll's district.[434] Almost no organization, charged Hindman, was in evidence among the Confederate forces in the upper Indian country and a collision between the two Cherokee regiments was impending. Had he been better informed he might have said that there was only one of them now in existence.

The second[435] set of orders, dated July 8, was of a tenor much the same, just as insulting, just as peremptory. The only difference of note was the substitution of the upper Indian country for Fort Smith as a point for headquarters. In the sequel, however, the second set proved superfluous; for the first so aroused Pike's ire that, immediately upon its receipt, he prepared his resignation and sent it to Hindman for transmission to Richmond.[436]

Hindman's position throughout this affair was not

[Footnote 431: July 3.]

[Footnote 432: Official Records, vol. xiii, 854.]

[Footnote 433: First, probably only in the sense that it was the first to be received.]

[Footnote 434: Official Records, vol. xiii, 857.]

[Footnote 435:—Ibid., 856-857.]

[Footnote 436: Pike to Hindman, July 15, 1862 [Ibid., 858]; Pike to Secretary of War, July 20, 1862 [Ibid., 856].]

destitute of justification.[437] One has only to read his general reports to appreciate how heavy was the responsibility that rested upon him. It was no wonder that he resorted to questionable expedients to accomplish his purposes, no wonder that he instituted martial law[438] in a seemingly refractory country, no wonder that he took desperate measures to force Pike to activity. Pike's leisurely way of attending to business was in itself an annoyance and his leisurely way of moving over the country was a positive offence. He had been ordered to proceed with dispatch to Fort Gibson. The expiration of a month and a half found him still at Fort McCulloch. He really did not move from thence until, having sent in his resignation, he made preparations for handing over his command to Colonel Cooper. That he intended to do at some point on the Canadian and thither he wended his way.[439] By the twenty-first of July, "he had succeeded in getting as far as Boggy Depot, a distance of 25 miles;[440] but then he had not left Fort McCulloch until that very morning.[441]

Pike's definite break with Hindman was, perhaps, more truly a consummation of Hindman's wishes than of Pike's own. On the third of July, as if regretting his previous show of temper, he wrote to Hindman a long letter,[442] conciliatory in tone throughout. He discussed the issues between them in a calm and temperate spirit,

[Footnote 437: In September, Hindman declared he had never had any knowledge of the order creating Pike's department [Official Records, vol. xiii, 978].]

[Footnote 438: He instituted martial law, June 30, 1862 and, although he believed he had precedent in Pike's own procedure, Pike criticized him severely. See Pike to J.S. Murrow, Seminole Agent, October 25, 1862, Ibid., 900-902. Hindman had authorized Pearce, June 17, 1862, to exercise martial law in the cities of Fort Smith and Van Buren and their environs [Ibid., 835].]

[Footnote 439: Pike to Hindman, July 15, 1862.]

[Footnote 440: Hindman's Report [Official Records, vol. xiii, 40].]

[Footnote 441: Pike to the Secretary of War, July 20, 1862 [Ibid., 859].]

[Footnote 442:—Ibid., 954-962.]

changing nothing as regarded the facts but showing a willingness to let bygones be bygones. Considering how great had been his chagrin, his indignation, and his poignant sense of ingratitude and wrong, he rose to heights really noble. He seemed desirous, even anxious, that the great cause in which they were both so vitally interested should be uppermost in both their minds always and that their differences, which, after all, were, comparatively speaking, so very petty, should be forgotten forever. It was in the spirit of genuine helpfulness that he wrote and also in the spirit of great magnanimity. Pike was a man who studied the art of war zealously, who knew the rules of European warfare, and a man, who, even in war times, could read Napier's Peninsular War and succumb to its charm. He was a classicist and a student very much more than a man of action. Could those around him, far meaner souls many of them than he, have only known and remembered that and, remembering it, have made due allowances for his vagaries, all might have been well. His generous letter of the third of July failed utterly of its mission; but not so much, perhaps, because of Hindman's inability to appreciate it or unwillingness to meet its writer half-way, as because of the very seriousness of Hindman's own military situation, which made all compromises impossible. The things he felt it incumbent upon him to do must be done his way or not at all. The letter of July 3 could scarcely have been received before the objectionable orders of July 8 had been planned.

The last ten days of July were days of constant scouting on the part of both the Federal and Confederate Indians but nothing of much account resulted. Colonel W.A. Phillips of the Third Indian Home Guard,

whose command had been left by Furnas to scout around Tahlequah and Fort Gibson, came into collision with Stand Watie's force on the twenty-seventh at Bayou Bernard, seven miles, approximately, from the latter place. The Confederate Cherokees lost considerably in dead and prisoners.[443] Phillips would have followed up his victory by pursuing the foe even to the Verdigris had not Cooper, fearing that his forces might be destroyed in detail, ordered them all south of the Arkansas and thereby circumvented his enemy's designs. Phillips then moved northward in the direction of Furnas's main camp on Wolf Creek.[444]

Pike had his own opinion of Cooper and Watie's daring methods of fighting and most decidedly disapproved of their attempting to meet the enemy in the neighborhood of Fort Gibson. That part of the Indian Territory, according to his view of things, was not capable of supporting an army. He discounted the ability of his men to conquer, their equipment being so meagre. He, therefore, persisted in advising that they should fight only on the defensive. He advised that, notwithstanding he had a depreciatory[445] regard for the Indian Expedition, and, both before and after the retrograde movement of Colonel Salomon, underestimated its size and strength. He Was confident that Cooper would have inevitably to fall back to the Canadian, where, as he said, "the defensible country commences." Pike objected strenuously to the courting of an open battle and, could he have followed the bent of his own inclinations, "would have sent only

[Footnote 443: Phillips to Furnas, July 27, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 181-182.]

[Footnote 444: Same to same, August 6, 1862, Ibid., 183-184.]

[Footnote 445: Cooper reported that Pike regarded the Indian Expedition as only a "jayhawking party," and "no credit due" "for arresting its career" [Cooper to Davis, August 8, 1862, Ibid., vol liii, supplement, 821].]

small bodies of mounted Indians and white troops to the Arkansas."[446]

No doubt it was in repudiation of all responsibility for what Cooper and Watie might eventually do that he chose soon to bring himself, through a mistaken notion of justice and honor, into very disagreeable prominence. Discretion was evidently not Pike's cardinal virtue. At any rate, he was quite devoid of it when he issued, July 31, his remarkable circular address[447] "to the Chiefs and People of the Cherokees, Creeks, Seminoles, Chickasaws, and Choctaws." In that address, he notified them that he had resigned his post as department commander and dilated upon the causes that had moved him to action. He shifted all blame for failure to keep faith with the Indian nations from himself and from the Confederate government to the men upon whom he steadfastly believed it ought to rest. He deprecated the plundering that would bring its own retribution and begged the red men to be patient and to keep themselves true to the noble cause they had espoused.

Remain true, I earnestly advise you, to the Confederate States and yourselves. Do not listen to any men who tell you that the Southern States will abandon you. They will not do it. If the enemy has been able to come into the Cherokee country it has not been the fault of the President; and it is but the fortune of war, and what has happened in Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, and even Arkansas. We have not been able to keep the enemy from our frontier anywhere; but in the interior of our country we can defeat them always.

Be not discouraged, and remember, above all things, that you can have nothing to expect from the enemy. They will have no mercy on you, for they are more merciless than wolves and more rapacious. Defend your country with what help you

[Footnote 446: Pike to the Secretary of War, July 20, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 859-860.]

[Footnote 447:—Ibid., 869-871.]

can get until the President can send you troops. If the enemy ever comes to the Canadian he cannot go far beyond that river. The war must soon end since the recent victories near Richmond, and no treaty of peace will be made that will give up any part of your country to the Northern States. If I am not again placed in command of your country some other officer will be in whom you can confide. And whatever may be told you about me, you will soon learn that if I have not defended the whole country it was because I had not the troops with which to do it; that I have cared for your interest alone; that I have never made you a promise that I did not expect, and had not a right to expect, to be able to keep, and that I have never broken one intentionally nor except by the fault of others.

The only fair way to judge Pike's farewell address to his Indian charges is to consider it in the light of its effect upon them, intended and accomplished.[448] So little reason has the red man had, in the course of his long experience with his white brother, to trust him that his faith in that white brother rests upon a very slender foundation. Pike knew the Indian character amazingly well and knew that he must retain for the Confederacy the Indian's confidence at all cost. Were he to fail in that, his entire diplomatic work would have been done in vain. To stay the Cherokees in their desertion to the North was of prime necessity. They had already gone over in dangerously large numbers and must be checked before other tribes followed in their wake. Very possibly Pike had been made aware

[Footnote 448: Pike gives this as the effect of his proclamation:

"... it effected what I desired. The Choctaw force was immediately increased to two full regiments; the Creek force to two regiments and two companies; the Seminole force was doubled; the Chickasaws reorganized five companies and a sixth is being made up. The Indians looked to me alone, and for me to vindicate myself was to vindicate the Government. We lost half the Cherokees solely because their moneys and supplies were intercepted..."—Ibid., 904-905. See also Pike to Holmes, December 30, 1862. Another effect was, the creation of a prejudice self-confessed in General Holmes's mind against Pike.]

of Chief Ross's complaint to Hindman. If so, it was all important that he should vindicate himself. So maligned had he been that his sensitiveness on the score of the discharge of his duties was very natural, very pardonable. After all he had done for the Confederacy and for the Indians, it seemed hardly right that he should be blamed for all that others had failed to do. His motives were pure and could not be honestly impugned by anybody. The address was an error of judgment but it was made with the best of intentions.

And so the authorities at Richmond seem to have regarded it; that is, if the reference in President Davis's letter[449] to Pike of August 9 is to this affair. Pike wrote to the president on the same day that he started his address upon its rounds, but that letter,[450] in which he rehearsed the wrongs he had been forced to endure, also those more recently inflicted upon him, did not reach Richmond until September 20. His address was transmitted by Colonel D.H. Cooper, who had taken great umbrage at it and who now charged the author with having violated an army regulation, which prohibited publications concerning Confederate troops.[451] Davis took the matter under advisement and wrote to Pike a mild reprimand. It was as follows:

Richmond, Va., August 9, 1862.

Brig. Gen. Albert Pike,

Camp McCulloch, Choctaw Nation:

General: Your communication of July 3 is at hand. I regret the necessity of informing you that it is an impropriety for an officer of the Army to address the President through a printed circular.[452] Under the laws for the government of

[Footnote 449: Official Records, vol. liii, supplement, 822.]

[Footnote 450:—Ibid., vol. xiii, 860-869.]

[Footnote 451:—Ibid., vol. liii, supplement, 820-821.]

[Footnote 452: It is possible that the printed circular here referred to was some other one that was directly addressed to the president but none such has been found.]

the Army the publication of this circular was a grave military offense, and if the purpose was to abate an evil, by making an appeal that would be heeded by me, the mode taken was one of the slowest and worst that could have been adopted.

Very respectfully, yours, Jefferson Davis.

The sympathy of Secretary Randolph was conceivably with Pike; for, on the fourteenth of July, he wrote assuring him that certain general orders had been sent out by the Adjutant and Inspector General's Office which were "intended to prevent even the major-general commanding the Trans-Mississippi Department from diverting from their legitimate destination (the Department of Indian Territory) munitions of war and supplies procured by 'him' for that department."[453] That did not prevent Hindman's continuing his pernicious practices, however. On the seventeenth he demanded[454] that Pike deliver to him his best battery and Pike, discouraged and yet thoroughly beside himself with ill-suppressed rage,[455] sent it to him.[456] At the same time he insisted that he be immediately relieved of his command.[457] He could endure the indignities to which he was subjected no longer. The order for his relief arrived in due course and also directions for him to report in person at Hindman's headquarters.[458] He had not then issued his circular; but, as

[Footnote 453: Official Records, vol. xiii, 903; Pike to Holmes, December 30, 1862, Pike Papers, Library of the Supreme Council, 33. Pike did not receive Randolph's letter of July fourteenth until some time in August and not until after he had had an interview with Holmes. See Pike to Holmes, December 30, 1862.]

[Footnote 454: Official Records, vol. xiii, 970.]

[Footnote 455: This is inferred from the very peculiar General Orders that issued from Fort McCulloch that selfsame day. They were sarcastic in the extreme. No general in his right senses would have issued them. They are to be found, Ibid., 970-973.]

[Footnote 456:—Ibid., 973, 974.]

[Footnote 457:—Ib id., 973.]

[Footnote 458: Pike to Hindman, July 31, 1862, Ibid., 973.]

soon as he had, the whole situation changed. He had deliberately put himself in the wrong and into the hands of his enemies. The address was, in some respects, the last act of a desperate[459] man. And there is no doubt that General Pike was desperate. Reports were spreading in Texas that he was a defaulter to the government and, as he himself in great bitterness of spirit said, "The incredible villainy of a slander so monstrous, and so without even any ground for suspicion," was "enough to warn every honest man not to endeavor to serve his country."[460]

Not until August 6 did General Pike's circular address reach Colonel D.H. Cooper, who was then at Cantonment Davis. Cooper wisely suppressed all the copies he could procure and then, believing Pike to be either insane or a traitor, ordered his arrest,[461] sending out an armed force for its accomplishment. Hindman, as soon as notified, "indorsed and approved" his action.[462] This is his own account of what he did:

... I approved his action, and ordered General Pike sent to Little Rock in custody. I also forwarded Colonel Cooper's letter to Richmond, with an indorsement, asking to withdraw my approval of General Pike's resignation, that I might bring him before a court-martial on charges of falsehood, cowardice, and treason. He was also liable to the penalties prescribed by section 29 of the act of Congress regulating intercourse with the Indians and to preserve peace on the frontiers, approved April 8, 1862....

But his resignation had been accepted....[463]

[Footnote 459: And yet, August 1, 1862, Pike wrote to Davis one of the sanest papers he ever prepared. It was full of sage advice as to the policy that ought to be pursued in Indian Territory [Official Records, vol. xiii, 871-874].]

[Footnote 460: Pike to S. Cooper, August 3, 1862, Ibid., 975. See also Pike to Newton, August 3, 1862, Ibid., 976.]

[Footnote 461: D.H. Cooper to Hindman, August 7, 1862, ibid., 977.]

[Footnote 462: Pike to Anderson, October 26, 1862, Ibid., 903.]

[Footnote 463: Hindman's Report, Ibid., 41.]



VII. ORGANIZATION OF THE ARKANSAS AND RED RIVER SUPERINTENDENCY

The mismanagement of southern Indian affairs of which General Pike so vociferously complained was not solely or even to any great degree attributable to indifference to Indian interests on the part of the Confederate government and certainly not at all to any lack of appreciation of the value of the Indian alliance or of the strategic importance of Indian Territory. The perplexities of the government were unavoidably great and its control over men and measures, removed from the seat of its immediate influence, correspondingly small. It was not to be expected that it would or could give the same earnestness of attention to events on the frontier as to those nearer the seaboard, since it was, after all, east of the Mississippi that the great fight for political separation from the North would have to be made.

The Confederate government had started out well. It had dealt with the Indian nations on a basis of dignity and lofty honor, a fact to be accounted for by the circumstance that Indian affairs were at first under the State Department with Toombs at its head;[464] and, in this connection, let it be recalled that it was under authority of the State Department that Pike had

[Footnote 464: Toombs did not long hold the portfolio. Among the Pickett Papers, is a letter from Davis to Toombs, July 24, 1861, accepting with regret his resignation [Package 89].]

entered upon his mission as diplomatic agent to the tribes west of Arkansas.[465] Subsequently, and, indeed, before Pike had nearly completed his work, Indian affairs were transferred[466] to the direction of the Secretary of War and a bureau created in his department for the exclusive consideration of them, Hubbard receiving the post of commissioner.[467]

The Provisional Congress approached the task of dealing with Indian matters as if it already had a big grasp on the subject and intended, at the outset, to give them careful scrutiny and to establish, with regard to them, precedents of extreme good faith. Among the

[Footnote 465: In evidence of this, note, in addition to the material published in Abel, The American Indian as Slaveholder and Secessionist, the following letters, the first from Robert Toombs to L.P. Walker, Secretary of War, dated Richmond, August 7, 1861; and the second from William M. Browne, Acting Secretary of State, to Walker, September 4, 1861:

1. "I have the honor to inform you that under a resolution of Congress, authorizing the President to send a Commissioner to the Indian tribes west of Arkansas and south of Kansas, Mr. Albert Pike of Arkansas was appointed such Commissioner under an autograph letter of the President giving him very large discretion as to the expenses of his mission. Subsequent to the adoption of the resolution, above named, Congress passed a law placing the Indian Affairs under the control of your Department and consequently making the expenses of Mr. Pike and all other Indian Agents, properly payable out of the appropriation at your disposal for the service of the Indian Bureau."—Pickett Papers, Package 106, Domestic Letters, Department of State, vol. i, p.86.

2. "The accompanying letters and reports from Commissioner Albert Pike addressed to your Department are respectfully referred to you, the affairs to which they relate being under your supervision and control."—Ibid., P-93.]

[Footnote 466: A re-transfer to the State Department was proposed as early as the next November [Journal of the Congress of the Confederate States, 489].]

[Footnote 467: President Davis recommended the creation of the bureau, March 12, 1861 [Richardson, Messages and Papers of the Confederacy, vol. i, p. 58: Journal of the Congress of the Confederate States, vol. i, p. 142]. On the sixteenth, he nominated David Hubbard of Alabama for commissioner [Pickett Papers, Package 88]. The bill for the creation of the bureau of Indian Affairs was signed the selfsame day [Journal, vol. i, 151]. S.S. Scott became Acting Commissioner of Indian Affairs before the year was out.]

things[468] it considered and in some cases favorably disposed of were, the treaties of amity and alliance negotiated by Albert Pike, the transfer of Indian trust

[Footnote 468: The preliminaries of the negotiations with the Indians have not been enumerated here, although they might well have been. On the twentieth of February, 1861, W.P. Chilton of Alabama offered a resolution to inquire into the expediency of opening negotiations [Journal, vol. i, 70]. March 4, Toombs urged that a special agent be sent and offered a resolution to that effect [Ibid., 105]. The day following, Congress passed the resolution [Ibid., 107]: but left the powers and duties of the special agent, or commissioner, undefined. Davis appointed Pike to the position and, after Congress had expressed its wishes regarding the mission in the act of May 21, 1861, had a copy of the act transmitted to him as his instructions [Richardson, vol. i, 149].

The act of May 21, 1861, carried a blanket appropriation of $100,000, which was undoubtedly used freely by Pike for purposes connected with the successful prosecution of his mission. In December, the Provisional Congress appropriated money for carrying into effect the Pike treaties. The following letter is of interest in connection therewith:

Richmond, Va., 9" December 1861.

Sir: On the 1st or 2nd of August 1861, after I had made Treaties with the Creeks and Seminoles, I authorized James M.C. Smith, a resident citizen of the Creek Nation, to raise and command a company of Creek Volunteers, to be stationed at the North Fork Village, in the Creek country, on the North Fork of the Canadian, where the great road from Missouri to Texas crosses that river, to act as a police force, watch and apprehend disaffected persons, intercept improper communications, and prevent the driving of cattle to Kansas.

The Company was soon after raised, and has remained in the service ever since. At my appointment George W. Stidham acted as Quartermaster and Commissary for it, and without funds from the Government, has supplied it.

By the Treaty with the Seminoles, made on the 1st of August, they agreed to furnish, and I agreed to receive, five companies of mounted volunteers of that Nation. Two companies, and perhaps more, were raised, and have since been received, I understand, by Col. Cooper, and with Captain Smith's company employed in putting down the disaffected party among the Creeks. Under my appointment, Hugh McDonald has acted as Quartermaster and Commissary for the Seminole companies, and made purchases without funds from the Government. After I had made the Treaties with the Reserve Indians and Comanches, in August 1861, Fort Cobb being about to be abandoned by the Texan Volunteers who had held it, I authorized M. Leeper, the Wichita agent, to enlist a small force, of twenty or twenty-five men, under a Lieutenant, for the security of the Agency. He enlisted, (cont.)]

funds from the United to the Confederate States government,[469] the payment of Indian troops and their pensioning.[470] Its disposition to be grateful and generous came out in the honor which it conferred upon John Jumper, the Seminole chief.[471]

A piece of very fundamental work the Provisional Congress did not have time or opportunity to complete.

[Footnote 468: (cont.) I learn, only some fifteen, and he has had them for some time in the service.

I also appointed a person named McKuska, formerly a soldier, to take charge of what further property remained at Fort Cobb, and employed another person to assist him, agreeing that the former should be paid as Ordnance Sergeant, and the latter as private; and directing the Contractor for the Indians to issue to the former two rations, and to the latter one.

In consequence of the collection of some force of disaffected Creeks and others, and an apprehended attack by them, Col. Douglas H. Cooper called for troops from all the Nations, and I understand that several companies were organized and marched to join his regiment. I think they are still in the service.

I am now empowered to receive all the Indians who offer to enter the service. To induce them to enlist, what is already owing them must be paid; and I earnestly hope that Congress will pass the bill introduced for that purpose. Respectfully your obedient servant

Albert Pike, Brig. Genl Commd Dept of Ind. Terr'y. Hon. W. Miles, Chairman Com. on Mil. Affs.

[War Department, Office of the Adjutant-General, Archives Division, Confederate Records.]]

[Footnote 469: Journal, vol. i, 650, 743, 761. The Confederate government took, in the main, a just, reasonable, and even charitable view on the subject of the assumption of United States obligations. Pike had exceeded his instructions in promising the Indians that monetary obligations would be so assumed. See his letter to Randolph, June 30, 1862.]

[Footnote 470: This matter went over into the regular Congress, which began its work, February 18, 1862. For details of the bill for pensions see Journal, vol. i, 43, 79.]

[Footnote 471: "The Congress of the Confederate States of America do enact, That the President of the Confederate States be authorized to present to Hemha Micco, or John Jumper, a commission, conferring upon him the honorary title of Lieutenant Colonel of the army of the Confederate States, but without creating or imposing the duties of actual service or command, or pay, as a complimentary mark of honor, and a token of good will and confidence in his friendship, good faith, and loyalty to this government...."—Statutes at Large of the Provisional Government, 284.]

That work was, the establishment of a superintendency of Indian Affairs in the west that should be a counterpart, in all essentials, of the old southern superintendency, of which Elias Rector had been the incumbent. Elias Rector and the agents[472] under him, all of whom, with scarcely a single exception, had gone over to the Confederacy, had been retained, not under authority of law, but provisionally. The intention was to organize the superintendency as soon as convenient and give all employees their proper official status. Necessarily, a time came when it was most expedient for army men to exercise the ordinary functions of Indian agents;[473] but even that arrangement was to be only temporary. Without doubt, the enactment of a law for the establishment of a superintendency of Indian affairs was unduly delayed by the prolonged character of Pike's diplomatic mission. The Confederate government evidently did not anticipate that the tribes with which it sought alliance would be so slow[474] or so wary in accepting the protectorate it offered. Not until January 8, 1862, did the Provisional Congress have before it the proposition for superintendency organization. The measure was introduced by Robert W. Johnson of Arkansas and it

[Footnote 472: Quite early a resolution was submitted that had in view "the appointment of agents to the different tribes of Indians occupying territory adjoining this Confederacy..." [Journal, vol. i, 81.]]

[Footnote 473: Journal, vol. i, 245.]

[Footnote 474: Pike was not prepared beforehand for so extended a mission. In November, he wrote to Benjamin, notifying him that he was enclosing "an account in blank for my services as commissioner to the Indian nations west of Arkansas.

"It was not my intention to accept any remuneration, but the great length of time during which I found it necessary to remain in the Indian Country caused me such losses and so interfered with my business that I am constrained unwillingly to present this account. I leave it to the President or to Congress to fix the sum that shall be paid me...."—Pike to Benjamin, November 25, 1861, Pickett Papers, Package 118.]

went in succession to the Judiciary and Indian Affairs committees; but never managed to get beyond the committee stage.[475]

February 18, 1862, saw the beginning of the first session of the first congress that met under the Confederate constitution. Six days thereafter, Johnson, now senator from Arkansas, again took the initiative in proposing the regular establishment of an Indian superintendency.[476] As Senate Bill No. 3, his measure was referred to the Committee[477] on Indian Affairs and, on March 11, reported back with amendments.[478] Meanwhile, the House was considering a bill of similar import, introduced on the third by Thomas B. Hanly, likewise from Arkansas.[479] On the eighteenth, it received Senate Bill No. 3 and substituted it for its own, passing the same on April Fool's day. The bill was signed by the president on April 8.[480]

The information conveyed by the journal entries is unusually meagre; nevertheless, from the little that is given, the course of debate on the measure can be inferred to a certain extent. The proposition as a whole carried, of course, its own recommendation, since the Confederacy was most anxious to retain the Indian friendship and it certainly could not be retained were not some system introduced into the service. In matters of detail, local interests, as always in American legislation, had full play. They asserted themselves most prominently, for example, in the endeavor made

[Footnote 475: Journal, vol. i, 640, 672, 743.]

[Footnote 476:—Ibid., vol. ii, 19.]

[Footnote 477: The Committee on Indian Affairs, at the time, consisted of Johnson, chairman, Clement C. Clay of Alabama, Williamson S. Oldham of Texas, R.L.Y. Payton of Missouri, and W.E. Simms of Kentucky.]

[Footnote 478: Journal, vol. ii, 51-52.]

[Footnote 479: Journal, vol. v, 47.]

[Footnote 480:—Ibid., 210.]

to make Fort Smith, although quite a distance from all parts of the Indian Territory except the Cherokee and Choctaw countries, the permanent headquarters, also in that to compel disbursing agents to make payments in no other funds than specie or treasury notes. The amendment of greatest importance among those that passed muster was the one attaching the superintendency temporarily to the western district of Arkansas for judicial purposes. It was a measure that could not fail to be exceedingly obnoxious to the Indians; for they had had a long and disagreeable experience, judicially, with Arkansas. They had their own opinion of the white man's justice, particularly as that justice was doled out to the red man on the white man's ground.[481] Taken in connection with regulations[482] made by the War Department for the conduct of Indian affairs, the Act of April 8 most certainly exhibited an honest intention on the part of the Confederate government to carry out the provisions of the Pike treaties. The following constituted its principal features: With headquarters at either Fort Smith or Van Buren, as the president might see fit to direct, the superintendency was to embrace "all the Indian country annexed to the Confederate States, that lies west of Arkansas and Missouri, north of Texas, and east of Texas and New Mexico." A superintendent and six agents were immediately provided for, individually bonded and obligated to continue resident during the term of office, to engage in no mercantile pursuit or gainful occupation

[Footnote 481: The Confederacy, as a matter of fact, never did keep its promise regarding the establishment of a judiciary in Indian Territory. Note Commissioner Scott's remarks in criticism, December i, 1864 [Official Records, vol. xli, part iv, 1088-1089].]

[Footnote 482: The regulations referred to can be found in Confederate Records, chap. 7, no. 48.]

whatsoever, and to prosecute no Indian claims against the government. In the choice of interpreters, preference was to be given to applicants of Indian descent. Indian trade privileges were to be greatly circumscribed and, in the case of the larger nations, the complete control of the trade was to rest with the tribal authorities. In the case, also, of those same larger nations, the restrictions formerly placed upon land alienations were to be removed. Intruders and spirituous liquors were to be rigidly excluded and all payments to Indians were to be carefully safeguarded against fraud and graft. Indian customs of citizenship and adoption were to be respected. No foreign interference was to be permitted. Foreign emissaries were to be dealt with as spies and as such severely punished. The Confederate right of eminent domain over agency sites and buildings, forts, and arsenals was to be recognized, as also the operation of laws against counterfeiting and of the fugitive slave law. In default of regular troops, the Confederacy was to support an armed police for protection and the maintenance of order. The judicial rights of the Indians were to be very greatly extended but the Confederacy reserved to itself the right to apprehend criminals other than Indian.

The intentions of the Confederate government were one thing, its accomplishments another. The act of April 8 was not put into immediate execution, and might have been allowed to become obsolete had it not been for the controversy between Pike and Hindman. On the first of August, while the subject-matter of the address, which he had so imprudently issued to the Indians, was yet fresh in his mind, General Pike wrote a letter of advice, eminently sound advice, to President Davis.[483] Avoiding all captiousness, he set forth a

[Footnote 483: Official Records, vol. xiii, 871-874.]

programme of what ought to be done for Indian Territory and for the Indians, in order that their friendly alliance might be maintained. He urged many things and one thing very particularly. It was the crux of them all and it was that Indian Territory should be absolutely separated from Arkansas, in a military way, and that no troops from either Arkansas or Texas should be stationed within it. Other suggestions of Pike's were equally sound. Indeed, the entire letter of the first of August was sound and in no part of it more sound than in that which recommended the immediate appointment of a superintendent of Indian affairs for the Arkansas and Red River Superintendency, also the appointment of Indian agents for all places that had none.[484] It was high time that positions in connection with the conduct of Indian affairs should be something more than sinecures.

Aspirants for the office of superintendent had already made their wants known. Foremost among them was Douglas H. Cooper. It was not in his mind, however, to separate the military command from the civil and he therefore asked that he be made brigadier-general and ex officio superintendent of Indian affairs in the place of Pike removed.[485] His own representations of Pike's grievous offence had fully prepared him for the circumstance of Pike's removal and he anticipated it in making his own application for office. Subsequent knowledge of Pike's activities and of his standing at Richmond must have come to Cooper as a rude awakening.

Nevertheless, Cooper did get his appointment. It

[Footnote 484: In his message of August 18, 1862 [Richardson, vol. i, 238], President Davis remarked upon the vacancies in these offices and said that, in consequence of them, delays had occurred in the payment of annuities and allowances to which the Indians were entitled.]

[Footnote 485: Official Records, vol. liii, supplement, 821.]

came the twenty-ninth of September in the form of special orders from the adjutant-general's office.[486] Pike was still on the ground, as will be presently shown, and Cooper's moral unfitness for a position of so much responsibility was yet to be revealed. The moment was one when the Confederacy was taking active steps to keep its most significant promise to the Indian nations, give them a representation in Congress. The Cherokees had lost no time in availing themselves of the privilege of electing a delegate, neither had the Choctaws and Chickasaws. Elias C. Boudinot had proved to be the successful candidate of the former and Robert M. Jones[487] of the latter. Over the credentials of Boudinot, the House of Representatives made some demur; but, as there was no denying his constitutional right, under treaty guarantee, to be present, they were accepted and he was given his seat.[488] Provisions had, however, yet to be determined for regulating Indian elections and fixing the pay and mileage, likewise also, the duties and privileges of Indian delegates.[489] Perhaps it is unfair to intimate that the provisions would have been determined earlier, had congress not preferred to go upon the assumption that they would never be needed, since it was scarcely likely that the Indians would realize the importance of their rights and act upon them.[490]

[Footnote 486: War Department, Confederate Records, Special Orders of the Adjutant and Inspector General's Office, C.S.A., 1862, p. 438; Official Records, vol. xiii, 885.]

[Footnote 487: See document of date, October 7, 1861, signed by Douglas H. Cooper, certifying that Robert M. Jones had received the "greatest number of votes cast" as delegate in Congress for the Choctaws and Chickasaws [Pickett Papers, Package 118].]

[Footnote 488: Journal, vol. v, 513, 514.]

[Footnote 489:—Ibid., vol. ii, 452, 457, 480; vol. v, 514, 523, 561.]

[Footnote 490: Davis had thrown the responsibility of the whole matter upon Congress, when he insisted that the "delegate" clauses in the treaties should (cont.)]

While Congress was debating the question of Indian delegate credentials and their acceptance, a tragedy took place in Indian Territory that more than confirmed General Pike's worst prognostications and proved his main contention that Indian affairs should be considered primarily upon their own merits, as an end in themselves, and dealt with accordingly. Had the Arkansas and Red River Superintendency been regularly established, the tragedy referred to might never have occurred; but it was not yet established and for many reasons, one of them being that, although Douglas H. Cooper's appointment had been resolved upon, he had not yet been invested with the office of superintendent.[491] His commission was being withheld because charges of incapacity and drunkenness had been preferred against him.[492]

General Pike's disclosures had aroused suspicion and grave apprehension in Richmond, so much so, indeed, that the War Department, convinced that conditions in Indian Territory were very far from being what they should be, decided to undertake an investigation of its own through its Indian bureau. Promptly, therefore, S.S. Scott, acting commissioner, departed for the West. General Pike was in Texas.

Now one of the contingencies that Pike had most constantly dreaded was tribal disorder on the Leased

[Footnote 490: (cont.) be so modified as to make the admission of the Indians dependent, not upon the treaty-making power, but upon the legislative. See his message of December 12, 1861, Richardson, vol. i, 149-151.]

[Footnote 491: Elias Rector, who had been retained as superintendent under the Confederate government, seems never to have exercised the functions of the office subsequent to the assumption by Pike of his duties as commander of the Department of Indian Territory. He was probably envious of Pike and resigned rather than serve in a subordinate capacity. He seems to have made some troube for Pike [Official Records, vol. xiii, 964, 976].]

[Footnote 492:—Ibid., 906, 908, 910-911, 927-928.]

District,[493] a disorder that might at any moment extend itself to Texas and to other parts of the Indian Territory, imperiling the whole Confederate alliance. So long as there was a strong force at Fort McCulloch and at the frontier posts of longer establishment, particularly at Fort Cobb, the Reserve Indians could be held in check with comparative ease. Hindman, ignorant of or indifferent to the situation, no matter how serious it might be for others, had ordered the force to be scattered and most of it withdrawn from the Red River Valley.

The so-called Wichita, or Reserve, Indians, to call them by a collective term only very recently bestowed, had ever constituted a serious problem for the neighboring states as well as for the central government. It was with the Confederacy as with the old Union. The Reserve Indians were a motley horde, fragments of many tribes that had seen better days. They were all more or less related, either geographically or linguistically. Some of them, it is difficult to venture upon what proportion, had been induced to enter into negotiations with Pike and through him had formed an alliance with the Confederacy. Apparently, those who had done this were chiefly Tonkawas. Other Reserve Indians continued true to the North. As time went on hostile feelings, engendered by living in opposite camps, gained in intensity, the more especially because white men, both north and south, encouraged them to go upon the war-path, either against their own associates or others. Reprisals, frequently bloody, were regularly instituted. With Pike's departure from Fort McCulloch an opportunity for greater vindictiveness offered, notwithstanding the fact that the Choctaw and Chickasaw

[Footnote 493: Official Records, vol. xiii, 868.]

troops had been left behind and were guarding the near-by country, their own.

Sometime in the latter part of August or the early part of September, Matthew Leeper, the Wichita agent under the Confederate government, a left-over from Buchanan's days, went from the Leased District,[494] frightened away, some people thought, perhaps afraid of the inevitable results of the mischief his own hands had so largely wrought, and sojourned in Texas, his old home. The sutler left also and a man named Jones was then in sole charge of the agency. The northern sympathizers among the Indians thereupon aroused themselves. They had gained greatly of late in strength and influence and their numbers had been augmented by renegade Seminoles from Jumper's battalion and by outlawed Cherokees. They warned Jones that Leeper would be wise not to return. If he should return, it would be the worse for him; for they were determined to wreak revenge upon him for all the misery his machinations in favor of the Confederacy and for his own gain had cost them. Presumably, Jones scorned to transmit the warning and, in course of time, Leeper returned.

The twenty-third of October witnessed one of the bloodiest scenes ever enacted on the western plains. The northern Indians of the Reserve together with a lot of wandering Shawnees, Delawares, and Kickapoos, many of them good-for-nothing or vicious, some Seminoles and Cherokees attacked Leeper unawares, killed him,[495] as also three white male employees of the agency.

[Footnote 494: Official Records, vol. liii, supplement, 828.]

[Footnote 495: On the murder of Agent Leeper, see Scott to Holmes, November 2, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 919-921; Holmes to Secretary of War, November 15, 1862, Ibid., 919: F. Johnson to Dole, January 20, 1863, Abel, American Indian as Slaveholder and Secessionist, 329-330, footnote; (cont.)]

They then put "the bodies into the agency building and fired it." The next morning they made an equally brutal attack upon the Tonkawas and with most telling effect. More than half of them were butchered. The survivors, about one hundred fifty, fled to Fort Arbuckle.[496] Their condition was pitiable. The murderers, for they were nothing less than that, fled northward, they and their families, to swell the number of Indian refugees already living upon government bounty in Kansas.

Commissioner Scott then at Fort Washita hurried to the Leased District to examine into the affair. He had made many observations since leaving Richmond, had talked with Pike, now returned from Texas, and had come around pretty much to his way of thinking. His recommendations to the department commander that were intended to reach the Secretary of War as well were in every sense a corroboration of Pike's complaints in so far as the woeful neglect of the Indians was concerned. Better proof that Hindman's conduct had been highly reprehensible could scarcely be asked for.

[Footnote 495: (cont.) Moore, Rebellion Record, vol. vi, 6; W.F. Cady to Cox, February 16, 1870, Indian Office Report Book, no. 19, 186-188; Coffin to Dole, September 24, 1863, Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Report, 1863, 177.]

[Footnote 496: S.S. Scott asked permission of Governor Winchester Colbert, November 10, 1862, to place the fugitive Tonkawas "temporarily on Rocky or Clear Creek, near the road leading from Fort Washita to Arbuckle." Colbert granted the permission, "provided they are subject to the laws of the Chickasaw Nation, and will furnish guides to the Home Guards and the Chickasaw Battalion, when called upon to do so."]



VIII. THE RETIREMENT OF GENERAL PIKE

The tragedy at the Wichita agency brought General Pike again to the fore. His resignation had not been accepted at Richmond as Hindman supposed was the case at the time he released him from custody. In fact, as events turned out, it looked as though Hindman were decidedly more in disrepute there than was Pike. His arbitrary procedure in the Trans-Mississippi District had been complained of by many persons besides the one person whom he had so unmercifully badgered. Furthermore, the circumstances of his assignment to command were being inquired into and everything divulged was telling tremendously against him.

The irregularity of Hindman's assignment to command has been already commented upon in this narrative. Additional details may now be given. Van Dorn had hopes, on the occasion of his own summons to work farther east, that Sterling Price would be the one chosen eventually to succeed him or, at all events, the one to take the chief command of the Confederate forces in the West. He greatly wished that upon him and upon him alone his mantle should fall.[497] The filling of the position by Hindman was to be but tentative, to last only until Price,[498] perhaps also Van Dorn,

[Footnote 497: Van Dorn to President Davis, June 9, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 831-832.]

[Footnote 498: Price was preferred to H.M. Rector; because Van Dorn felt that Rector's influence with the people of Arkansas had greatly declined. The truth was, Governor Rector had become incensed at the disregard shown for Arkansas by Confederate commanders. In a recent proclamation, he had announced that the state would henceforth look out for herself.]

could discuss matters personally with the president and remove the prejudice believed to be existing in his mind against Price; but the War Department had quite other plans developed, a rumor of which soon reached the ears of Van Dorn. It was then he telegraphed, begging Davis to make no appointment for the present to the command of the Trans-Mississippi District and informing him that Hindman had been sent there temporarily.[499] The request came to Richmond too late. An appointment had already been resolved upon and made. The man chosen was John Bankhead Magruder, a major-general in the Army of Northern Virginia. However, as he was not yet ready to take up his new duties, Hindman was suffered to assume the command in the West; but Magruder's rights held over. They were held in abeyance, so to speak, temporarily waived.[500]

The controversy between Pike and Hindman would seem to have impelled Secretary Randolph to wish to terminate early Magruder's delay; but Magruder was loath to depart. His lack of enthusiasm ought to have been enough to convince those sending him that he

[Footnote 499: The orders for Hindman to repair west, issuing from Beauregard's headquarters, were explicit, not upon the point of the temporary character of his appointment, but upon that of its having been made "at the earnest solicitation of the people of Arkansas." [Official Records, vol. x, part ii, 547].]

[Footnote 500: Price, nothing daunted, continued to seek the position and submitted plans for operations in the West. His importunities finally forced the inquiry from Davis as to whether Magruder's appointment had ever been rescinded and whether, since he seemed in no hurry to avail himself of it, he really wanted the place. Randolph reported that Magruder had no objection to the service to which he had been ordered but desired to remain near Richmond until the expected battle in the neighborhood should have occurred. Randolph then suggested that Price be tendered the position of second in command [Randolph to Davis, June 23, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 837], an arrangement that met with Magruder's hearty approval [Magruder to R.E. Lee, June 26, 1862, Ibid., 845].]

was hardly the man for the place. His acquaintance with Trans-Mississippi conditions was very superficial, yet even he found out that they were of a nature to admonish those concerned of their urgency, especially in the matter of lack of arms.[501] By the fourteenth of July his indecision was apparently overcome. At any rate, on that day Randolph wrote Pike that Magruder, the real commander of the Trans-Mississippi District, would soon arrive at Little Rock and that the offences of which Pike had had reason to complain would not be repeated.

Letters travelled slowly in those days and Randolph's comforting intelligence did not reach Pike in time to avert the catastrophe of his proclamation and consequent arrest. And it was just as well, all things considered, for Magruder never reached Little Rock. He was a man of intemperate habits and, while en route, was ordered back to Richmond to answer "charges of drunkenness and disobedience of orders."[502] His appointment was thereupon rescinded. The man selected in his place, to the total ignoring of Price's prior claims, was Theophilus H. Holmes, a native of North Carolina.[503] President Davis was still possessed of the notion that frontier affairs could be best conducted by men who had no local attachments there. Late events had all too surely lent weight to his theory. Nevertheless, in holding it, Davis was strictly inconsistent and illogical; for loyalty to the particular home state constituted the strongest asset that the Confederacy had. It was the lode-star that had drawn Lee and

[Footnote 501: Magruder to Randolph, July 5, 1862, Official Records, vol. xiii, 851-852.]

[Footnote 502: Clark to Price, July 17, 1862, Official Records, vol. liii, supplement, 816-817.]

[Footnote 503: Wright, General Officers of C.S.A., 15-16.]

many another, who cared not a whit for political principles in and for themselves, from their allegiance to the Union. It was the great bulwark of the South.

Holmes was ordered west July 16;[504] but, as he had the necessary preparations to make and various private matters to attend to, August had almost begun before it proved possible for him to reach Little Rock.[505] The interval had given Hindman a new lease of official life and a further extension of opportunity for oppression, which he had used to good advantage. The new department commander, while yet in Richmond, had discussed the Pike-Hindman controversy with his superior officers and had arrived at a conclusion distinctly favorable to Pike. He frankly confessed as much weeks afterwards. Once in Little Rock, however, he learned from the Hindman coterie of Pike's Indian proclamation and immediately veered to Hindman's side.[506] Pike talked with him, recounted his grievances in a fashion that none could surpass, but made absolutely no impression upon him. So small a thing and so short a time had it taken to develop a hostile prejudice in Holmes's mind, previously unbiased, so deep-seated that it never, in all the months that followed, knew the slightest diminution. Conversely and most fortuitously, a friendliness grew up between Holmes and the man whom he had supplanted that made the former, either forget the orders given him in Richmond or put so new a construction upon them that they were rendered nugatory. It was a situation, exceedingly fortunate for

[Footnote 504: Official Records, vol. xiii, 855.]

[Footnote 505: He had reached Vicksburg by the thirtieth of July and from that point he issued his orders assuming the command [ibid., 860].]

[Footnote 506: Pike to Holmes, December 30, 1862 (Appendix); Confederate Military History, vol. x, 121-122.]

the service as a whole, no doubt, but most unhappy for Indian Territory.

It finally dawned upon Pike that it was useless to argue any longer upon the matters in dispute between him and Hindman, for Holmes had pre-judged the case. Moreover, Holmes was beginning to appreciate the advantage of being in a position where he could, by ignoring Pike's authority and asserting his own, be much the gainer in a material way. How he could have reconciled such an attitude with the instructions he had received from Randolph it is impossible to surmise. The instructions, whether verbal or written, must have been in full accord with the secretary's letter to Pike of the fourteenth of July, which, although Pike was as yet ignorant of it, had explicitly said that no supplies for Indian Territory should be diverted from their course and that there should be no interference whatever with Pike's somewhat peculiar command.[507] All along the authorities in Richmond, their conflicting departmental regulations to the contrary notwithstanding, had insisted that the main object of the Indian alliance had been amply attained when the Indians were found posing as a Home Guard. Indians were not wanted for any service outside the limits of their own country. Service outside was to be deprecated, first, last, and always. Indeed, it was in response to a suggestion from Pike, made in the autumn of 1861, that the Indian Territory ought to be regarded as a thing apart, to be held for the Confederacy most certainly but not to be involved in the warfare outside, that Pike's department had been created and no subsequent