The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War Part 9

He pleaded lack of funds and the wish that they would wait in Fort Leavenworth and attend Hunter's inter-tribal council so that they might go back to their people carrying definite messages of what was to be done (cont.)]

evident readiness of the government to make answer to that call before it was quite too late pointed auspiciously to a successful outcome for Senator Lane's endeavors; but, unfortunately, Major-general Hunter had not been sufficiently counted with. Hunter had previously shown much sympathy for the Indians in their distress[156] and also a realization of the strategic importance

[Footnote 155: (cont.) [Indian Office _Letter Book_, no. 67, p. 107]. Dole had been forwarned of their intention to appear in Washington by the following letter:

FORT LEAVENWORTH KAN., Nov. 23rd 1861.

HON WM.P. DOLE, Com. Indian Affs.

Sir: On my arrival in St. Louis I found Gen'l Hunter at the Planters House and delivered the message to him that you had placed in my hands for that purpose. He seemed fully satisfied with your letter and has acted on it accordingly. I recd from Gen'l Hunter a letter for Mr.

Cutler, and others of this place, all of which I have delivered.

Having found Cutler here, he having been ordered by Lane to move the council from Leroy to Fort Scott. But from some cause (which I have not learned) he has brought the chiefs all here to the Fort, where they are now quartered awaiting the arrival of Gen'l Hunter. He has with him six of the head chiefs of the Creek, Seminole and Cherokee Nations, and tells me that they are strong for the Union. He also says that John Ross (Cherokee) is all right but dare not let it be known, and that he will be here if he can get away from the tribe.

These chiefs all say they want to fight for the Union, and that they will do so if they can get arms and ammunition. Gen'l Hunter has ordered me to await his arrival here at which time he will council with these men, and report to you the result. I think he will be here on Tuesday or Wednesday. Cutler wants to take the Indians to Washington, but I advised him not to do so until I could hear from you. When I met him here he was on his way there.

You had better write to him here as soon as you get this, or you will see him there pretty soon.

I have nothing more to write now but will write in a day or two.

Yours Truly R.W. DOLE.

P.S. Coffin is at home sick, but will be here soon. Branch is at St.

Joe but would not come over with me, cause, too buissie to attend to business.

[Indian Office Special Files, no 201, _Southern Superintendency_, D 410 of 1861].]

[Footnote 156: In part proof of this take his letter to Adjutant-general Thomas, January 15, 1862.

"On my arrival here in November last I telegraphed for permission to (cont.)]

of Indian Territory. Some other explanation, therefore, must be found for the opposition he advanced to Lane's project as soon as it was brought to his notice. It had been launched without his approval having been explicitly sought and almost under false pretences.[157]

Then, too, Lane's b.u.mptiousness, after he had accomplished his object, was naturally very irritating. But, far above every other reason, personal or professional, that Hunter had for objecting to a command conducted by Lane was the identical one that Halleck,[158] Robinson, and many another shared with him, a wholesome repugnance to such marauding[159] as Lane had permitted his men to indulge in in the autumn. It was to be feared that Indians under Lane would inevitably revert to savagery. There would be no one to put any restraint upon them and their natural instincts would be given free play. Conceivably then, it was not mere supersensitiveness and pettiness of spirit that moved General Hunter to take exception to Lane's appointment but regard for the honor of his profession, perchance, also, a certain feeling of personal dignity that

[Footnote 156: (cont.) muster a Brigade of Kansas Indians into the service of the United States, to a.s.sist the friendly Creek Indians in maintaining their loyalty. Had this permission been promptly granted, I have every reason to believe that the present disastrous state of affairs, in the Indian country west of Arkansas, could have been avoided. I now again respectfully repeat my request."--Indian Office General Files, _Southern Superintendency_, 1859-1862.]

[Footnote 157: To the references given in Abel, _The American Indian as Slaveholder and Secessionist_, add Thomas to Hunter, January 24, 1862, _Official Records_, vol. viii, 525.]

[Footnote 158: The St. Louis _Republican_ credited Halleck with characterizing Hunter's command, indiscriminately, as "marauders, bandits, and outlaws" [_Daily Conservative_, February 7, 1862].

In a letter to Lincoln, January 6, 1862, Halleck said some pretty plain truths about Lane [_Official Records_, vol. vii, 532-533].

He would probably have had the same objection to the use of Indians that he had to the use of negroes in warfare [_Daily Conservative_, May 23, 1862, quoting from the Chicago _Tribune_].]

[Footnote 159: On marauding by Lane's brigade, see McClellan to Stanton, February 11, 1862 [_Official Records_, vol. viii, 552-553].]

legitimately resented executive interference with his rights. His protest had its effect and he was informed that it was entirely within his prerogative to lead the expedition southward himself. He resolved to do it. Lane was, for once, outwitted.

The end, however, was not yet. About the middle of January, Stanton became Secretary of War and soon let it be known that he, too, had views on the subject of Indian enlistment. As a matter of fact, he refused to countenance it.[160] The disappointment was the most keen for Commissioner Dole. Since long before the day when Secretary Smith had announced[161] to him that the Department of War was contemplating the employment of four thousand Indians in its service, he had hoped for some means of rescuing the southern tribes from the Confederate alliance and now all plans had come to naught. And yet the need for strenuous action of some sort had never been so great.[162]

Opoeth-le-yo-ho-la and his defeated followers were refugees on the Verdigris, imploring help to relieve their present

[Footnote 160: Note this series of telegrams [Indian Office Special Files, no. 201, _Southern Superintendency_, D 576 of 1862]:

"Secretary of War is unwilling to put Indians in the army. Is to consult with President and settle it today."--SMITH to Dole, February 6, 1862.

"President cant attend to business now. Sickness in the family. No arrangements can be made now. Make necessary arrangements for relief of Indians. I will send communication to Congress today."--Same to Same, February 11, 1862.

"Go on and supply the dest.i.tute Indians. Congress will supply the means. War Department will not organize them."--Same to Same, February 14, 1862.]

[Footnote 161: Smith to Dole, January 3, 1862 [Indian Office Special Files, no. 201, _Central Superintendency_, I 531 of 1862; Commissioner of Indian Affairs, _Report_, 1862, p. 150].]

[Footnote 162: On the second of January, Agent Cutler wired from Leavenworth to Dole, "Heopothleyohola with four thousand warriors is in the field and needs help badly. Secession Creeks are deserting him.

Hurry up Lane."--Indian Office Special Files, no. 201, _Southern Superintendency_, C 1443 of 1862.]

necessities and to enable them to return betimes to their own country.[163] Moreover, Indians of northern antecedents and sympathies were exhibiting unwonted enthusiasm for the cause[164] and it seemed hard to have to repel them. Dole was, nevertheless, compelled to do it. On the eleventh of February, he countermanded the orders he had issued to Superintendent Coffin and thus a temporary quietus was put upon the whole affair of the Indian Expedition.

[Footnote 163: Their plea was expressed most strongly in the course of an interview which Dole had with representatives of the Loyal Creeks and Seminoles, Iowas and Delawares, February 1, 1862. Robert Burbank, the Iowa agent, was there. White Cloud acted as interpreter [_Daily Conservative_, February 2, 1862].]

[Footnote 164: Some of these had been provoked to a desire for war by the inroads of Missourians. Weas, Piankeshaws, Peorias, and Miamies, awaiting the return of Dole from the interior of Kansas, said, "they were for peace but the Missourians had not left them alone"

[Ibid., February 9, 1862].]

III. THE INDIAN REFUGEES IN SOUTHERN KANSAS

The thing that would most have justified the military employment of Indians by the United States government, in the winter of 1862, was the fact that hundreds and thousands of their southern brethren were then refugees because of their courageous and unswerving devotion to the American Union. The tale of those refugees, of their wanderings, their deprivations, their sufferings, and their wrongs, comparable only to that of the Belgians in the Great European War of 1914, is one of the saddest to relate, and one of the most disgraceful, in the history of the War of Secession, in its border phase.

The first in the long procession of refugees were those of the army of Opoeth-le-yo-ho-la who, after their final defeat by Colonel James McIntosh in the Battle of Chustenahlah, December 26, 1861, had fled up the valley of the Verdigris River and had entered Kansas near Walnut Creek. In scattered lines, with hosts of stragglers, the enfeebled, the aged, the weary, and the sick, they had crossed the Cherokee Strip and the Osage Reservation and, heading steadily towards the northeast, had finally encamped on the outermost edge of the New York Indian Lands, on Fall River, some sixty odd miles west of Humboldt. Those lands, never having been accepted as an equivalent for their Wisconsin holdings by the Iroquois, were not occupied throughout their entire extent by Indians and only here and there

encroached upon by white intruders, consequently the impoverished and greatly fatigued travellers encountered no obstacles in settling themselves down to rest and to wait for a much needed replenishment of their resources.

Their coming was expected. On their way northward, they had fallen in, at some stage of the journey, with some buffalo hunters, Sacs and Foxes of the Mississippi, returning to their reservation, which lay some distance north of Burlington and chiefly in present Osage County, Kansas. To them the refugees reported their recent tragic experience.

The Sacs and Foxes were most sympathetic and, after relieving the necessities of the refugees as best they could, hurried on ahead, imparting the news, in their turn, to various white people whom they met. In due course it reached General Denver, still supervising affairs in Kansas, and William G. Coffin, the southern superintendent.[165] It was the first time, since his appointment the spring before, that Coffin had had any prospect of getting in touch with any considerable number of his charges and he must have welcomed the chance of now really earning his salary. He ordered all of the agents under him--and some[166] of them had not previously entered officially upon their duties--to a.s.semble at Fort Roe, on the Verdigris, and be prepared to take charge of their

[Footnote 165: These facts were obtained chiefly from a letter, not strictly accurate as to some of its details, written by Superintendent Coffin to Dole, January 15, 1862 [Indian Office Special Files, no.

201, _Southern Superintendency_, C 1474 of 1862].]

[Footnote 166: For instance, William P. Davis, who had been appointed Seminole Agent, despairing of ever reaching his post, had gone into the army [Dole to John S. Davis of New Albany, Indiana, April 5, 1862, Indian Office _Letter Book_, no. 68, p. 39]. George C. Snow of Parke County, Indiana, was appointed in his stead [Dole to Snow, January 13, 1862, Ibid., no. 67, p. 243].]

several contingents; for the refugees, although chiefly Creeks, were representative of nearly every one of the non-indigenous tribes of Indian Territory.

It is not an easy matter to say, with any show of approach to exact figures, how many the refugees numbered.[167] For weeks and weeks, they were almost continually coming in and even the very first reports bear suspicious signs of the exaggeration that became really notorious as graft and peculation entered more and more into the reckoning.

Apparently, all those who, in ever so slight a degree, handled the relief funds, except, perhaps, the army men, were interested in making the numbers appear as large as possible. The larger the need represented, the larger the sum that might, with propriety, be demanded and the larger the opportunity for graft. Settlers, traders, and some government agents were, in this respect, all culpable together.

There was no possibility of mistake, however, intentional or otherwise, about the dest.i.tution of the refugees. It was inconceivably horrible. The winter weather of late December and early January had been most inclement and the Indians had trudged through it, over snow-covered, rocky, trailless places and desolate prairie, nigh three hundred miles. When they started out, they were not any too well provided with clothing; for they had departed in a hurry, and, before they got to Fall River, not a few of them were absolutely naked. They had practically no tents, no bed-coverings, and no provisions. Dr.

A.B. Campbell, a surgeon sent out by General Hunter,[168] had reached them

[Footnote 167: Compare the statistics given in the following: Commissioner of Indian Affairs, _Report_, 1861, p. 151; 1862, pp. 137, 157; Indian Office Special Files, no. 201, _Southern Superintendency_, C 1525 of 1862; General Files, _Southern Superintendency_, C 1602 of 1862.]

[Footnote 168: The army furnished the first relief that reached them.

In its issue (cont.)]