The legislative work of the Cherokee Council, partisan body that it was, with Lewis Downing as its presiding officer and Thomas Pegg as acting Principal Chief, was reactionary, yet epochal. It comprised several measures and three of transcendent importance, passed between the eighteenth [February, 1863] and the twenty-first:

1. An act revoking an allegiance with the Confederate States and re-asserting allegiance to the United States.

2. An act deposing all officers of any rank or character whatsoever, inclusive of legislative, executive, judicial, who were serving in capacities disloyal to the United States and to the Cherokee Nation.

3. An act emancipating slaves throughout the Cherokee country. [1]

To Major General Hunter, Commanding Kansas Department:

It is the intention of the Government to order me to report to you for an active winter's campaign. They have ordered General Denver to another department. They have ordered to report to you eight regiments cavalry, three of infantry, and three batteries, in addition to your present force. They have also ordered you, in conjunction with the Indian Department, to organize 4,000 Indians. Mr. Doles, Commissioner, will set out with me.

J.H. Lane [2]

General Hunter sent Captain J. W. Turner, Chief Commissary of Subsistence, and Brigade-Surgeon A. B. Campbell to the refugee Indian encampment to provide assistance to the destitute. However, the plight of the refugees overwhelmed the meager resources of Hunter's men; what few cheap blankets and condemned army tents that were furnished did little to meet the dire needs of those who had endured the exodus to the “promised land.” [5] According the Campbell, the supplies provided by the army consisted of thirty-five blankets, forty pairs of socks, and a few underclothes; Campbell woefully admitted that he “selected the nakedest of the naked” and gave them of what few items there were.

Campbell then explained to the hundreds who stood about that there was to be nothing left for them. From among those who stood before him, there were “seven, varying in age from three to fifteen years [without] one thread upon their body.” [6] On the fifteenth of February with supplies having given out, the army stopped giving assistance altogether; the horror was such that is was “beyond the power of any pen to portray.” [7] As Annie Abel described the situation in her work The American Indian in the Civil War, 1862-1865, “The inadequacy of the Indian Service and the inefficiency of the Federal never showed up more plainly, to the utter discredit of the nation, than at this period and in this connection.” [8] Yet, from the midst of this chasm of despair was to come the hope for a new day.
 
 

When Evan Jones arrived in the new Nation in January 1862, it was no longer the Cherokee Nation. It was Keetoowah, it was a nation of the “beloved community.” According to reports from the camps, there were more than three thousand Creek, a thousand Seminole, a hundred Quapaws, and less than fifty Cherokee and Chickasaw. Less than a hundred African Americans survived the flight to Kansas; [9] one can assume that the Southern troops would be much more willing to kill a fleeing African American than Native American. William McLoughlin believes that by the end of January, there were as many as ten thousand people living in the squalid refugee camps near Leroy, Kansas; [10] Annie Abel described the camps as “concentration camps” in 1919 work entitled The Indian as Participant in the Civil War, 1862-1865. [11]

Evan Jones immediately began working with the local religious and charitable organizations in order to organize assistance for the refugees, but this was difficult because the refugees, of necessity, had been situated on uninhabited lands along the Verdigris River. Though Jones could offer yet little to the emaciated refugees, his mere presence provided great hope and inspiration to those who had been his flock for so many years. He wrote home to his missionary board requesting assistance for his congregation, “In daily visiting the camps of the Indians, I witness a vast amount of destitution and suffering, and it is painful to think how little I can do towards its alleviation. I am glad to hear such good news about Missionary contributions coming in.” [12]

When Jones traveled among the able-bodied Keetoowah, he found a resilient and inspired people who were anxious to return to the homeland and reestablish their position in the political and social affairs of their respective Nations. If this meant joining the Federal Army and returning to Indian Territory to engage the rebel brigades of Watie, McIntosh, and Jumper, the loyal Keetoowahs were eager to do so. Remembering how Stand Watie and his Knights of the Golden Circle had ruthlessly pursued them to the Kansas border, there was strong resentment towards the Confederate Cherokee on the part of the loyal Keetoowahs. [13]

There was also strong support within the state of Kansas for organizing a force of “colored” troops in order to protect Kansas from its enemies to the South. [14] It was believed that “hordes of whites and half breeds in the Indian country are in arms driving out and killing Union men. They threaten to overrun Kansas and exterminate both whites and Indians.” [15] As early as August 1861, Senator James Lane of Kansas had sought among the Native Americans of Kansas a brigade of Indians to use as “Jayhawkers” against the states of Missouri, Arkansas, and Indian Territory. [16] Lane had written the Indian Agents of Kansas stating his requests:

For the defence of Kansas I have determined to use the loyal Indians of the Tribes above named... If you have means within your control I would like to have you supply them when they march with a sufficient quantity of powder, lead & subsistence for their march to this place, where they will be fed by the government... I enjoin each of you to be prompt and energetic that an early assembling of the said Indians can be accomplished. [17]

Senator Lane, however, was not to have his plan slowed by either Commissioner Dole or General David Hunter, Commander of the Western Department, who had military responsibility for the western frontier. [21] By late 1861, Lane had used his power and influence in Washington and his friends and supporters in Kansas to organize the “Kansas Brigade.” The brigade swept across the border into Missouri burning, looting, and distributing proclamations announcing the abolition of slavery on the frontier. Wherever Lane's Kansas Jayhawkers swept, they “liberated” hundreds of black slaves and allowed them to accompany the expedition as teamsters, cooks and even soldiers. [22]

Lane was not averse to using the black soldiers for whatever purposes he saw fit. At Fort Leavenworth, Kansas in early 1862, the wily Lane stated, “I do say that it would not pain me to see a Negro handling a gun and I believe the Negro may just as well become food for powder as my son.” [23] In late November of 1861, Lane's Jayhawkers had “liberated” six hundred ex-slaves and sent them back to the “Happy Land of Canaan” in a “Black Brigade” led by two Methodist chaplains. When they arrived in Kansas, the freed blacks cheered for “James Lane, the liberator;” the chaplains then distributed the “ex-slaves” as laborers among the farms and villages of southern Kansas. [24]

Because of Kansas's reputation as an abolitionist enclave, especially in the areas around Lawrence, Leavenworth, Wyandotte, and Fort Scott, large numbers of African American refugees began to flee Missouri, Arkansas, and Indian Territory for the state. [25] In addition, the fear of Lane's Jayhawkers led many slaveholders in states surrounding Kansas to free their slaves as opposed to facing the scorched earth policy of the Jayhawkers; some Missouri slaveholders took their slaves to Texas, as did many Cherokee, to safeguard them until the war was over. Many of the African-Americans in Kansas were among the Native American refugees who had fled Indian Territory and were now living in camps in the Southern part of the state. [26] By 1863, there were nearly 8,000 former slaves in Kansas; by the end of the war the state's African- American population had grown from 816 in 1860 to nearly 13,000. [27]

Just as there was support in Kansas for the use of Indian troops to “protect” the state from the “hordes of whites and half breeds” lurking on their southern border, there began a movement among the abolitionist forces to enlist African Americans in the army. The Leavenworth Conservative echoed Lane's refrain by stressing the need for colored troops to protect Kansas's long border from Southern Indians and guerrillas. The Emporia News argued that if the South used colored troops “to shoot down our brave boys, ought we not retaliate by using them to subdue the enemies of the government?” [28] If the image of black soldiers was thought to strike fear into the hearts of Southerners, what might this image have upon those Southerners who were Cherokee?

As the Kansas citizens, military and political officials contemplated the use of colored soldiers, the refugees themselves contemplated a return home and the restoration of their once powerful Nation. If an army was needed, then this army was willing. A pervasive image in Cherokee society, that of the phoenix, was to be reborn in the midst of the new nation; out of the “nakedest of the naked,” a new army was to rise.

Back home, Chief John Ross struggled to maintain control over a Cherokee Nation that was spinning ruthlessly out of control. Confronted with the fact that the very troops he had commissioned into military service to protect his interests had deserted to Kansas, Ross found his leadership and loyalty to the Confederate States of America seriously called into question. Watie and the Knight of the Golden Circle had not only gained a strategic advantage by the Keetoowah's desertion, they were using the desertion to increase their own political and social standing within the Nation. In addition to accusing the Keetoowah of spoiling the good name of the Cherokee before their Confederate allies, the Knights even charged Ross with having protected some of the deserters in his home. [29]

Some of the deserters were indeed returning to the Cherokee Nation and attempting to reintegrate themselves into Cherokee society; others were returning home to gather up what materials they had and to return to Kansas. Ross, upon learning that Colonel Cooper intended to court-martial the deserters, begged Cooper to be allowed to handle this situation himself. He explained to Cooper that he was responsible for the confusion within the fullbloods because his efforts at reconciliation with Opothle Yahola. He also stressed the terms of the treaty with the Confederacy that the Cherokee soldiers would be required to fight only in defense of their homeland; asking the Cherokee to assault the fleeing renegades went against this policy he believed. Through deft and diplomacy, Ross was able to convince Cooper to allow him to handle the affair as he best saw fit. [30]

Ross reassembled Drew's regiment on December 19, 1861 and addressed the troops as Colonel Cooper and Major Thomas Pegg stood by his side. He began by chastising those among Drew's regiment who had deserted the Confederacy, but promised a pardon to those who agreed to return to the regiment. He then asserted that the treaty that the Cherokee people had secured with the Confederate States of America was the best treaty ever secured by the Cherokee Nation, and perhaps the best that could be expected under the circumstances. The desertion was all a misunderstanding:

According to the stipulations of our treaty [with the Confederacy] we must meet enemies of our allies whenever the South requires it, as they are our enemies as well as the enemies of the south; and I feel sure that no such occurrence as the one we deplore would have taken place if all things were understood as I have endeavored to explain them. [31]

In late December, as Watie's troops were pursuing the fleeing Opothle Yahola north to Kansas, the Civil War was brought home to the Pins who had remained in the Nation. Chunestotie, a beloved man and one of the leaders of the Keetoowah, was murdered and scalped by Charles Webber, the nephew of Colonel Stand Watie. Chunestotie had deserted Drew's regiment before the battle of Bird's Creek, had fought with Opothle Yahola against the Confederate troops, and had returned to the Nation under Ross's amnesty. Chunestotie, a well-known Pin, had also been part of a struggle which stopped the Confederate flag from being raised over the Cherokee Council House in August Mrs. John Ross had protested. [33] For clinging to the “old ways,” Chunestotie was killed.

Colonel Drew called the murder of Chunestotie a “barbarous crime” and called for the arrest and trial of Webber; the Keetoowahs held Watie and the Knights of the Golden Circle responsible for the murder. Watie called the murder regrettable, but said that his nephew was “beside himself with liquor” at the time and the Ross party was just trying to make political hay of an unfortunate but entirely understandable incident. Around the same time Arch Snail, another of the Keetoowah deserters from Drew's troops who had returned home, was killed by his own pistol.Watie's followers claimed the Arch Snail had tried to ambush them and they were forced to kill him. [34] Ross wrote to Colonel Cooper urging him to investigate “certain complaints made against the reckless proceedings of Colonel Watie and some of his men towards Cherokee citizens” and demanded Cooper's immediate “attention to the Subjects therein embraced.” [35]

Watie, in responding to Cooper's inquiry regarding the murders, was incredulous. The murder of Chunestotie, Watie sardonically replied, “is called a barbarous crime and shocks the sensitive nerves of Colonel Drew, Mr. Ross, and others, who of course never participated in the shedding of innocent blood.” [36] He further went on to lay out his contempt for the Chunestotie, the Keetoowahs, as well as John Ross:

Chunestotie has been for years hostile to Southern people and their institutions; he was active last summer in repressing Southern movements with a strong hand, with the advice and assistance of Capt. John Ross `who accompanied you in your recent expedition.' He went at the head of many others of like opinion to Tahlequah last summer for the avowed purpose of butchering any and all who should attempt to raise a southern flag -- the flag was not raised as you remember...” [37]

Drew's regiment was the only thing that stood between Ross and his enemies; Ross began to refer to them as “my regiment” and the Keetoowah who remained in the Nation were tied closely to Ross. Not only did they protect Ross, but they worked against Watie and his Knights of the Golden Circle in their efforts to move the Cherokee Nation closer to the Confederate States of America. On January 11, 1862, Colonel Drew's troops left Fort Gibson to go to Park Hill, the home of Chief John Ross in order to “protect Chief Ross, that it was thought that he was not safe.” [39] The troops were called to Park Hill because Ross had been threatened by “a drunk boy [who]goes there, calls him a Pin and an abolitionist.” [40]

Ross's problems with this “drunk boy” were not only just the fear the he might become another victim of someone “beside himself with liquor,” there were deeper issues here. The boy was Return Foreman, the nephew of Reverend Stephen Foreman, Pastor of Park Hill Presbyterian Church, Ross's neighbor, and an follower of Stand Watie. The Foreman family ran down both sides of the conflict: James Foreman, responsible for killing treaty party members, was killed by Stand Watie in 1842. David Foreman, ordained by Evan Jones at Flint Church in 1849, left Jones's church over the issue of slaveholding ministry to pursue a ministry with the Southern Baptists in 1861. Several of the Foreman family members were also brethren at Cherokee Lodge #21. Members of the Foreman family also fought on both sides in the Civil War: Stephen Foreman's sons fought with Watie's troops; John Foreman fled North to Kansas with Opothle Yahola's forces.

Stephen Foreman shared his nephew's opinion about Ross. He never believed Ross to have been committed to the Southern cause and that the whole purpose of Drew's regiment was not to fight for the Confederacy, but to protect Ross and the Keetoowahs from the Knights of the Golden Circle. Foreman, a mixed blood slaveholder, distrusted Ross and Drew's regiment of Keetoowah:

His regiment showed their hand and his hand too at the Bird Creek fight when they fought against our own men. Mr. Ross showed his hand also in pardoning all those men without even a trial. Mr. Ross also showed his hand harboring the leaders of those traitors of the country. It is said that two or three of those traitors were in his house.” [41]

Cooper's investigation into the Chunestotie murder being a charade, Ross felt further alienated and endangered; the Knights of the Golden Circle kept up the intensity by consistently provoking incidents. Ross, with great consternation, wrote a letter seeking assistance to brother Albert Pike:

I had intended going up to see the Troops of our Regiment; also to visit the Head Qrs. of the Army at Cane Hill in view of affording any aid in any manner within the reach of my power to repel the enemy. But I am sorry to say I have been dissuaded from going at present in consequence of some unwarrantable conduct in the part of many base, reckless, and unprincipled persons belonging to Watie's regiment who are under no restraint or subordination of their leaders in domineering over and trampling upon the rights of peaceable and unoffending citizens. I have at all times in the most unequivocable manner assured the People that you will not only promptly discountenance, but will take steps to put a stop to such proceedings for the protection of their persons & property and to redress their wrongs. This is not the time for crimination and recrimination; at a proper time I have certain complaints to report for your investigation. [42]

...dey was a lot of dem Pin Indians all up on de Illinois River and dey was wid de North and dey taken it out on de slave owners a lot before de War and during it too. Dey would come in de night and hamstring de horses and maybe set fire to de barn, and two of `em named Joab Scarrel and Tom Starr killed my pappy one night just before de War broke out.... [43]

Them pins was after Master all de time for a while at de first of de War, and he was afraid to ride into Fort Smith. Dey come to de house one time when he was gone to Fort Smith and us children told dem he was at Honey Springs, but dey knowed better and when he got home he said somebody shot at him and bushwhacked him all the way from Wilson's Rock to dem Wildhorse Mountains, but he run his horse like de devil was setting on his tail and dey never did hit him. He never sen them neither. We told him `bout de Pins coming for him and he just laughed.

...Pretty soon all de young Cherokee menfolks all gone off to de War, and Pins was riding `round all de time, and it ain't safe to be in dat part around Webber's falls, so old Master take us all to Fort Smith where they was a lot of Confederate soldiers. [44]

...Mammy said the patrollers and “Pin” Indians caused a lot of trouble after the war started. The master went to war and left my misterss to look after the place. The “Pins” came to the farm one day and broke down the doors, cut feather beds open and sent the feathers flying in the wind, stole the horses, killed the sheep and done lots of mean things. The mistress took her slaves and went somewhere in Texas until after the war. [45]

Not just in the Cherokee Nation did the terror reign; it spread like a wildfire among the Nations of Indian Territory. In the Creek Nation, the crops which had been ready to gather were left in the field. The ceremonies to celebrate the harvest and the beginning of a new season were not held; the temples and churches saw little activity. There was only desolation: “We would see some lone cow that had been left. The roosters would continually crow at some deserted home. The dogs would bark or howl. Those days were lonesome to me, as young as I was, for I knew that most of our old acquaintances were gone.” [47]

Terror reigned. Men of the North and men of the South killed each other on sight. Parties of armed factions rode the land looking for the spoils of “war.” They stole everything they could not only from the homes of the “enemy,” but also anyone thought to be their “supporters.” Homes were burned, supplies were stolen and that which could not be used to support the struggle was destroyed. The women and children hid in the woods by day and at night returned to “what was left of our homes.” [48] No one was left untouched by the pain and horror which swept the Indian Territory.

In March of 1862, the Confederate forces, including many of reinstated Keetoowah of Drew's regiment as well as Watie's troops, fought a decisive battle against Union forces at the Battle of Pea Ridge in northwestern Arkansas. [49] For the first time, the Confederate Indians were not only allowed to fight amongst the white soldiers in a traditional Napoleonic confrontation, they were encouraged to fight in “their own fashion” with traditional weapons. A member of Sterling Price's Missouri brigade described the Confederate warriors:

They came trotting gaily into camp yelling forth a wild war whoop that startled the army out of all of its propriety. Their faces were painted for they were `on the warpath,' their long black hair qued in clubs hung down their backs, buckskin shirts, leggins, and moccasins adorned with little bells and rattles, together with bright colored turkey feathers fastened on their heads completed unique uniforms uniforms not strictly cut according to military regulations. Armed only with tomahawk, and war clubs, and presented an image somewhat savage, but they were mostly Cherokees, cool and cautious in danger, active and sinewy on persons, fine specimens of the `noble red man.' [50]

A Northern pamphlet charged that General Albert Pike had “maddened them [the Confederate Indians] with liquor to fire their savage natures, and, with gaudy dress and a large plume on his head, disregarding all the usages of civilized warfare, led them in a carnage of savagery, scalping wounded and helpless soldiers, and committing other atrocities too horrible to mention.” [51] Nothing could be further than the truth, but General Pike, upon examining the reports of Confederate surgeons, found that, indeed, one of the Federal dead was found scalped.

Pike immediately denounced the scalpings and immediately asserted that they were done by soldiers in another command; Union officers even reported that the “atrocities” were committed by white Texans. [52] However, the scalpings, paired with the Confederate Cherokee's wholesale desertion in December, caught brother Albert Pike in a whirlwind which he was not to escape unscathed. He was soon to resign his commission. [53]

Farther north in Kansas, a new storm was rising. Those who had fled and had suffered greatly in the winter of discontent were gathering their will and preparing to return home to rescue the land which had once been theirs. An ill-wind blew across the prairie and the struggle to come would be monumantal. At home, knowing of the impending cataclysm, the Confederate forces gathered their strength for the coming days. In the forthcoming battles, there would be no winners.
 
 

...the Indians of all tribes held a grand council last Thursday at Fort Roe in regard to the war, at which they determined with great unanimity to gathe