Chapter 9

[Footnote 937: John M. Thayer to Charles A. Dana, March 15, 1864, Ibid., 617.]

western counties of Arkansas[938] so as to round out the Department of Kansas. To them it was absurd that Fort Smith should be within their jurisdiction and its environs within Steele and Thayer's. The upshot of the quarrel was, the reorganization of the frontier departments on the seventeenth of April which gave Fort Smith and Indian Territory to the Department of Arkansas[939] and sent Blunt back to Leavenworth. His removal from Fort Smith, especially as Curtis had intended, had no change in department limits been made, to transfer Blunt's headquarters to Fort Gibson,[940] was an immense relief to Phillips. Blunt and Phillips had long since ceased to have harmonious views with respect to Indian Territory. During his short term of power, Blunt had managed so to deplete Phillips's forces that two of the three Indian regiments were practically all that now remained to him since one, the Second Indian Home Guards, had been permanently stationed at Mackey's Salt Works on the plea that its colonel, John Ritchie, was Phillips's ranking officer and it was not expedient that he and Phillips "should operate together."[941] Blunt had detached also a part of the Third Indian and had placed it at Scullyville as an outpost to Fort Smith. There were to be no more advances southward for Phillips.[942] Instead of making them he was to occupy himself with the completion of the fortifications at Fort Gibson.[943]

[Footnote 938: Thayer to Grant, March 11, 1864, _Official Records_, vol. xxxiv, part ii, 566.]

[Footnote 939:--Ibid., part iii, 192, 196.]

[Footnote 940:--Ibid., part ii, 651. Blunt would have preferred Scullyville [Ibid., part iii, 13].]

[Footnote 941: Blunt to Curtis, March 30, 1864, Ibid., part ii, 791.]

[Footnote 942: Blunt to Phillips, April 3, 1864, Ibid., part iii, 32; Phillips to Curtis, April 5, 1864, Ibid., 52-53.]

[Footnote 943: Curtis had ordered the completion of the fortifications which might be taken to imply that he too was not favoring a forward policy.]

Among the southern Indians, Maxey's reconstruction policy was all this time having its effect. It was revitalizing the Indian alliance with the Confederacy, but army conditions were yet a long way from being satisfactory. In March Price relieved Holmes in command of the District of Arkansas.[944] A vigorous campaign was in prospect and Price asked for all the help the department commander could afford him. The District of Indian Territory had forces and of all the disposable Price asked the loan. Maxey, unlike his predecessors, was more than willing to coöperate but one difficulty, which he would fain have ignored himself--for he was not an Albert Pike--he was compelled to report. The Indians had to be free, absolutely free, to go or to stay.[945] The choice of coöperating was theirs but theirs also the power to refuse to coöperate, if they so desired, and no questions asked. The day had passed when Arkansans or Texans could decide the matter arbitrarily. Watie was expected to prefer to continue the irregular warfare that he and Adair, his colonel of scouts, had so successfully been waging for a goodly time now. Formerly, they had waged it to Steele's great annoyance;[946] but Maxey felt no repugnance to the services of Quantrill, so, of course, had nothing to say in disparagement of the work of Watie. It was the kind of work, he frankly admitted he thought the Indians best adapted to. The Choctaws under Tandy Walker were found quite willing to cross the line and they did excellent service in the Camden campaign, which, both in the cannonade near Prairie d'Ane on the thirteenth of April and in the Battle of Poison Spring on the

[Footnote 944: _Official Records_, vol. xxxiv, part ii, 1034, 1036.]

[Footnote 945: Maxey to Smith, April 3, 1864, Ibid., part iii, 728-729.]

[Footnote 946: For Steele's opposition to Adair's predatory movements, see _Confederate Records_, chap. 2, nos. 267, 268.]

eighteenth of April, offered a thorough test of what Indians could do when well disciplined, well officered, and well considered. The Indian reinforcement of Marmaduke was ungrudgingly given and ungrudgingly commended.[947] The Camden campaign was short and, when about over, Maxey was released from duty with Price's army. His own district demanded attention[948] and the Indians recrossed the line.

Price's call for help had come before Maxey had taken more than the most preliminary of steps towards the reorganization of his forces and not much was he able to do until near the end of June. Two brigades had been formed without difficulty and Cooper had secured his division; but after that had come protracted delay. The nature of the delay made it a not altogether bad thing since the days that passed were days of stirring events. In the case of Stand Watie's First Brigade no less than of Tandy Walker's Second were the events distinguished by measurable success. The Indians were generally in high good humor; for even small successes, when coupled with appreciation of effort expended, will produce that. One adventure of Watie's, most timely and a little out of the ordinary, had been very exhilarating. It was the seizure of a supply boat on the Arkansas at Pheasant Bluff, not far from the mouth of the Canadian up which the boat was towed until its commissary stores had been extracted. The boat was the Williams, bound for Fort Gibson.[949]

[Footnote 947: Williamson to Maxey, April 28, 1864, _Official Records_, vol. xxxiv, part i, 845.]

[Footnote 948: It had not been Smith's intention that he should go out of his own district, where his services were indispensable, until Price's need should be found to be really urgent [Boggs to Maxey, April 12, 1864, Ibid., part iii, 760-761].]

[Footnote 949: --Ibid., part i, 1011-1013; part iv, 686-687.]

It was under the inspiration of such recent victories that the southern Indians took up for consideration the matter of reënlistment, the expiration "of the present term of service" being near at hand. Parts of the Second Brigade took action first and, on the twenty-third of June, the First Choctaw Regiment unanimously reenlisted for the war. Cooper was present at the meeting "by previous request."[950] Resolutions[951] were drawn up and adopted that reflected the new enthusiasm. Other Choctaw regiments were to be prevailed upon to follow suit and the leading men of the tribe, inclusive of Chief Garland who was not present, were to be informed that the First Choctaw demanded of them, in their legislative and administrative capacities "such co-operation as will force all able-bodied free citizens of the Choctaw Nation, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five years, and fitted for military service, to at once join the army and aid in the common defense of the Choctaw Nation, and give such other coöperation to the Confederate military authorities as will effectually relieve our country from Federal rule and ruin."

The First Brigade was not behindhand except in point of time by a few days. All Cherokee military units were summoned to Watie's camp on Limestone Prairie.[952] The assemblage began its work on the twenty-seventh of June, made it short and decisive and indicated it in a single resolution:

Whereas, the final issue of the present struggle between the North and South involves the destiny of the Indian Territory alike with that of the Confederate States: Therefore,

_Resolved_, That we, the Cherokee Troops, C.S. Army, do

[Footnote 950: _Official Records_, vol. xxxiv, part iv, 694.]

[Footnote 951: --Ibid., 695.]

[Footnote 952: Stand Watie to Cooper, June 27, 1864, Ibid.,