The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War

By Annie Heloise Abel, Ph.D.

Professor of History, Smith College

1919

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

[Footnote 493: _Official Records_, vol. xiii, 868.]

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."]