Confederate Brigadier General Stand Watie, the only American Indian to reach the rank of general in the Civil War on either side.
The Cherokee in the American Civil War were active in the Trans-Mississippi and Western Theaters. In the east, Confederate Cherokees led by William Holland Thomas hindered Union forces trying to use the Appalachian mountain passes of western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. Out west, Confederate Cherokee Stand Watie led primarily Native Confederate forces in the Indian Territory, in what is now the state of Oklahoma.[1] The Cherokee partnered with the Confederacy in order to get funds, as well as ultimately full recognition as a sovereign, independent state.[2]
Before Indian removal, the Cherokee Nation was centered in and around the Blue Ridge Mountains—southwestern North Carolina, southeastern Tennessee, western South Carolina and northeastern Georgia. The Cherokee attempted to address their grievances by taking their problems to the American Federal judicial system. In 1830, a delegation led by Chief John Ross defended Cherokee rights before the U.S. Supreme Court in Cherokee Nation v. Georgia. The Indian cases set a precedent in Indian Country but the United States still enforced removal of most of the Cherokee Nation to west of the Mississippi River, along what became known as the Trail of Tears. After the removals, the Cherokee Nation was based west of the Mississippi River. Some Cherokee remained in the Blue Ridge Mountains.
The Cherokee blamed the federal government and former United States PresidentAndrew Jackson for the Trail of Tears. They had adopted "Southern ways" before their removal from the Southeast. Cherokee society held slavery as a primary institution throughout the pre-war period, instituting laws that explicitly prohibited primarily "black (or negro) slaves" from obtaining citizenship in their nation, and later "persons of color" altogether. Cherokee judiciary and legislative bodies promulgated similar laws regarding race and enslaved status as the Cherokee attempted to legally define themselves as equal to whites or European Americans, at the expense and exclusion of non-white and non-Indian groups, and in particular Blacks.[3] The Cherokee aligned with the Confederacy in part due to their existing cultural, trading, and legal affinities with those states that had seceded. In addition, the Cherokee in Indian Territory opposed William Seward's campaigning in 1860 on behalf of Abraham Lincoln, when he said that Lincoln would open the Indian Territory for white settlement.[4]
Trans-Mississippi Theater
The Cherokee Braves Flag, as flown by Cherokee General Stand Watie.
Chief of the Cherokee John Ross was adamant that the Union was not dissolved. However, another leader of the Cherokee, Stand Watie, joined the Confederate cause, and on June 1, 1861, began recruiting for all-Indian units that became part of the Confederate army. Full-blooded Cherokee tended to support Ross (who was primarily Scottish) while the mixed-blooded Cherokee supported the 3/4 Cherokee Stand Watie.[5] Stand Watie in 1862 was elected Chief of the newly declared Southern Cherokee Nation.
For the duration of the war, a series of small battles and constant guerrilla warfare were waged by Cherokee in the Indian Territory. Stand Watie officially became the last Confederate general to end fighting on June 25, 1865, at Fort Towson, in the southeast portion of the Indian Territory.
Creation of a Bureau of Indian Affairs
In early 1861, the Confederate States of America emerged, prompting a request for the establishment of a Bureau of Indian Affairs, with Albert Pike appointed as Commissioner for tribes west of Arkansas and south of Kansas.[6]
Pike, a proponent of securing Indian Territory for the CSA, facilitated treaties with various tribes by mid-1861. Confederate President Jefferson Davis referred to a now-lost Act for the protection of certain tribes, outlining future policy.[7] Pike's negotiations led to the Treaty with the Creek Nation in July 1861, followed by agreements with eight more tribes, concluding with the Cherokee in October of that year.[8]
Organization
During the Civil War, the Cherokee Nation had approximately 21,000 members with 3,000 of them serving in the Confederacy as soldiers.[9]
Thomas' Legion, led by William H. Thomas, a European-American who was adopted Cherokee, were originally stationed outside Knoxville, Tennessee at Strawberry Plains, Tennessee. Their primary duty was to protect the Alum Cave, and harass Union troops that invaded Tennessee. While briefly working around Chattanooga, Tennessee in June 1862, Thomas personally captured a Union Soldier, after which each of his men vowed to capture at least one "Yankee" before the war was over.[10]
The Legion would become infamous due to their actions on September 15, 1862.[11] While trying to stop a Union advance through Baptist Gap, a popular leader among the Cherokee, Astoogahtogeh, was killed leading a charge. Enraged, the remaining Cherokee were driven to avenge him. In retaliation for Astoogahtogeh's death, the Cherokee scalped the dead Union soldiers after the battle. After the event was reported in newspapers, Union soldiers would fear the Cherokee, but Thomas feared for the reputation of the Cherokee, as he did not want his people to be seen as barbaric. The scalps were sent to be buried with the soldiers they originally came from.[10]
After a number of Thomas' men were captured in February 1864, some were convinced by the Union that they were fighting for slavery, and thereafter fought for the Union. Others convinced their captors they also would defect to the Union side, but instead returned to Thomas and told him Union officials offered $5,000 for Thomas' scalp. After this, many of his men were sent to fight in Virginia, some of whom were present at Appomattox Court House for General Robert E. Lee's surrender.[12] The rest of the Legion continued to fight until surrendering along with the commanding officer of the District of Western North Carolina to the Union commander they had captured on 10 May 1865.
Organization
In May 1861, William H. Thomas began recruiting Cherokees from the Quallatown, North Carolina area.[13] The first two companies were composed mostly of Indian soldiers. They were called the Junaluska Zouaves.[13] Thomas' Confederates were sometimes referred to as Thomas' Legion or Thomas' Legion of Cherokee Indians and Highlanders. They were later designated as the 69th North Carolina Regiment.
Field & Staff: Colonel William H. Thomas, Lieutenant Colonel James R. Love, Major William W. Stringfield, Luther C. May (Adjutant), James W. Terrell (A.Q.M.), John W. Lawing (Surgeon), and Hezekiah West (Chaplain)[14]
Companies: Company A (Captain James W. Terrell), Company B (Captain G. M. Hanks), Company C (Captain Elisha G. Johnson), Company D (Captain William B. Love), Company E (Captain Julius M. Welch), Company F (Captain J. M. McConnell), Company G (Captain Daniel G. Fisher), Company H (Captain Thomas J. Cooper, Captain James W. Cooper), Company I (Captain Willis Parker, Captain Joseph A. Kinsey), Company K (Captain Thomas A. Butler)[14]
Cherokee Confederates reunion in New Orleans, 1903.
The eastern Cherokee faced a severe smallpox outbreak following the war. Thomas and many of his followers were deeply in debt, to the point that the federal government recognized the eastern tribe as separate from the western tribe, and filed a lawsuit against the Cherokee's creditors, in effect leaving the protection of the Cherokee to the federal government.[12]
In comparison to the other signatories, the Cherokee were especially keen in remaining neutral, but this opposition gradually collapsed with Confederate battlefield success: the ninth and final "treaty of friendship and alliance" was signed on October 7, 1861, in Tahlequah. Financial concerns were crucial for many of these tribes, as abrogating federal treaties would result in the loss of an income stream, much alone the forfeiture of principal amounts obtained via past talks.[16]
In the west, at the end of the war, with the Union victorious, the Union Cherokee established policies that confiscated land from the Confederate Cherokee.[citation needed] The Federal government promised the Confederate Cherokee that the laws promoting the confiscation would be annulled. This was due to Indian Commissioner D.N. Cooley, who saw opportunities in splitting the factions of the Cherokee, as represented by Ross and Watie. Cooley even went as far as to portray Ross as a traitor, when Ross had always been a Union advocate.[17] The Cherokee were forced to adopt their slaves into the tribe, and to allow settlement of their lands by whites. In effect, due to the Cherokee split and the maneuverings of Cooley, the Cherokee suffered the worst of Reconstruction.[18]
Monuments
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Monuments were dedicated for the Cherokee's wartime participation in the early 20th century.[19]
↑ Ferguson, Robert. "Southeastern Indians During The Civil War". The Backwoodsman. Vol.39, no.2 (Mar/Apr 2018ed.). Bandera, Texas: Charlie Richie Sr. pp.63–65. Retrieved February 19, 2018.
1 2 3 Moore, John W. (1882). "Sixty-Ninth Regiment--Infantry". Roster of North Carolina Troops in the War Between the States, Vol. 4. Ashe & Gatling, State Printers and Binders. p.151.
↑ Clark, Walter (1901). "Sixty-Ninth Regiment". Histories of the Several Regiments and Battalions from North Carolina in the Great War 1861-'65, Vol. III. Nash Brothers, Book and Job Printers. p.731.
Confer, Clarissa (2007), The Cherokee Nation in the Civil War, University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN978-0-8061-3803-9
Dale, Edward Everett (1947). "The Cherokees in the Confederacy". The Journal of Southern History. 13 (2): 159–185. doi:10.2307/2197976. JSTOR2197976.
Fisher, Paul Thomas. "Confederate empire and the Indian treaties: Pike, McCulloch, and the Five Civilized Tribes, 1861–1862" (MA thesis Baylor U. 2011). online; bibliography pp 107–19.
Gibson, Arrell (1981), Oklahoma, a History of Five Centuries, University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN0-8061-1758-3
Moore, Jessie Randolph. "The Five Great Indian Nations: Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Seminole, and Creek: The Part They Played in Behalf of the Confederacy in the War Between the States." Chronicles of Oklahoma 29 (1951): 324–336.
Rozema, Vicki (2007), Footsteps of the Cherokees, John F. Blair, ISBN978-0-89587-346-0
John Ross was the Principal Chief of the Cherokee Nation from 1828 to 1866; he served longer in that position than any other person. Described as the Moses of his people, Ross influenced the nation through such tumultuous events as the relocation to Indian Territory and the American Civil War.
Elias Cornelius Boudinot was an American politician, lawyer, newspaper editor, and co-founder of the Arkansan who served as the delegate to the Confederate States House of Representatives representing the Cherokee Nation. Prior to this he served as an officer of the Confederate States Army in the Trans-Mississippi Theater of the American Civil War. He was the first Native American lawyer permitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Brigadier-General Stand Watie, also known as Standhope Uwatie and Isaac S. Watie, was a Cherokee politician who served as the second principal chief of the Cherokee Nation from 1862 to 1866. The Cherokee Nation allied with the Confederate States during the American Civil War and he was the only Native American Confederate general officer of the war. Watie commanded Indian forces in the Trans-Mississippi Theater, made up mostly of Cherokee, Muskogee, and Seminole. He was the last Confederate States Army general to surrender.
Lewis Downing, also known by his Cherokee name ᎷᏫ ᏌᏩᎾᏍᎩ ("Lewie-za-wau-na-skie") served as Chief of the Cherokee Nation from 1867 to 1872. After the death of John Ross, he was a compromise candidate who was elected to a full term as Principal Chief. Downing worked to heal divisions in the tribe following removal to the Indian Territory and the American Civil War. He was elected to a second term in 1871, but died in 1872, after a two-week battle with pneumonia. The Cherokee Council chose William P. Ross as his successor.
The trans-Mississippi theater of the American Civil War was the scene of the major military operations west of the Mississippi River. The area is often thought of as excluding the states and territories bordering the Pacific Ocean, which formed the Pacific coast theater of the American Civil War (1861–1865).
The Colorado Territory was formally created in 1861 shortly before the bombardment of Fort Sumter sparked the American Civil War. Although sentiments were somewhat divided in the early days of the war, Colorado was only marginally a pro-Union territory. Colorado was strategically important to both the Union and Confederacy because of the gold and silver mines there as both sides wanted to use the mineral wealth to help finance the war. The New Mexico Campaign was a military operation conducted by Confederate Brigadier General Henry Sibley to gain control of the Southwest, including the gold fields of Colorado, the mineral-rich territory of Nevada and the ports of California. The campaign was intended as a prelude to an invasion of the Colorado Territory and an attempt to cut the supply lines between California and the rest of the Union. However, the Confederates were defeated at the Battle of Glorieta Pass in New Mexico and were forced to retreat back to Texas, effectively ending the New Mexico Campaign.
The 1st Cherokee Mounted Rifles was a Confederate States Army regiment which fought in the Indian Territory during the American Civil War. It was formed from the merger of two predecessor units the First Regiment of Cherokee Mounted Rifles, and the Second Regiment of Cherokee Mounted Rifles. The first commander was Col. John Drew, while the second was Stand Watie.
Confederate Units of Indian Territory consisted of Native Americans from the Five Civilized Tribes — the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole nations. The 1st Cherokee Mounted Rifles were commanded by the highest ranking Native American of the war: Brig. Gen. Stand Watie, who also became the last Confederate General to surrender on June 23, 1865. There was also a series of Union units of Indian Territory.
During the American Civil War, most of what is now the U.S. state of Oklahoma was designated as the Indian Territory. It served as an unorganized region that had been set aside specifically for Native American tribes and was occupied mostly by tribes which had been removed from their ancestral lands in the Southeastern United States following the Indian Removal Act of 1830. As part of the Trans-Mississippi Theater, the Indian Territory was the scene of numerous skirmishes and seven officially recognized battles involving both Native American units allied with the Confederate States of America and Native Americans loyal to the United States government, as well as other Union and Confederate troops.
Fort McCulloch was a Confederate military fort built by CSA Brigadier General Albert Pike in the Indian Territory during the American Civil War after the Battle of Pea Ridge.
The Choctaw in the American Civil War participated in two major arenas—the Trans-Mississippi and Western Theaters. The Trans-Mississippi had the Choctaw Nation. The Western had the Mississippi Choctaw. The Choctaw Nation had been mostly removed west prior to the War, but the Mississippi Choctaw had remained in the east. Both the Choctaw Nation and the Mississippi Choctaw would ultimately side with the Confederate States of America.
The Cherokee people of the southeastern United States, and later Oklahoma and surrounding areas, have a long military history. Since European contact, Cherokee military activity has been documented in European records. Cherokee tribes and bands had a number of conflicts during the 18th century with Europeans, primarily British colonists from the Southern Colonies. The Eastern Band and Cherokees from the Indian Territory fought in the American Civil War, with bands allying with the Union or the Confederacy. Because many Cherokees allied with the Confederacy, the United States government required a new treaty with the nation after the war. Cherokees have also served in the United States military during the 20th and 21st centuries.
The Cherokee Nation was a legal, autonomous, tribal government in North America recognized from 1794 to 1907. It was often referred to simply as "The Nation" by its inhabitants. The government was effectively disbanded in 1907, after its land rights had been extinguished, prior to the admission of Oklahoma as a state. During the late 20th century, the Cherokee people reorganized, instituting a government with sovereign jurisdiction known as the Cherokee Nation. On July 9, 2020, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Muscogee (Creek) Nation had never been disestablished in the years before allotment and Oklahoma Statehood.
Thomas' Legion, also known as Thomas' Legion of Cherokee Indians and Highlanders, Thomas' Legion of Indians and Highlanders, and the 69th North Carolina Regiment, was a unit of the Confederate Army in the American Civil War. The formation was organized in 1862 by William Holland Thomas and fought in the last skirmish of the war in North Carolina before surrendering in May 1865.
On the eve of the American Civil War in 1861, a significant number of Indigenous peoples of the Americas had been relocated from the Southeastern United States to Indian Territory, west of the Mississippi. The inhabitants of the eastern part of the Indian Territory, the Five Civilized Tribes, were suzerain nations with established tribal governments, well established cultures, and legal systems that allowed for slavery. Before European Contact these tribes were generally matriarchial societies, with agriculture being the primary economic pursuit. The bulk of the tribes lived in towns with planned streets, residential and public areas. The people were ruled by complex hereditary chiefdoms of varying size and complexity with high levels of military organization.
The ambush of the steamboat J.R. Williams was a military engagement during the American Civil War. It took place on June 15, 1864, on the Arkansas River in the Choctaw Nation which became encompassed by the State of Oklahoma. It is popularly termed the "only naval battle" in that landlocked state. It was a successful Confederate attack on the Union Army's lines of supply. The Confederate forces were Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw and Creek Indians led by General Stand Watie, who was a Cherokee.
The Seminole in the American Civil War were found in both the Trans-Mississippi and Western Theaters. The Seminole Nation in the Trans-Mississippi Theater had split alliances. However, the majority of the tribe in the Western territories joined the Union Army under the leadership of Billy Bowlegs. Others, such as John Jumper, supported the Confederacy. The Florida Seminole participated in some skirmishing in central Florida. They were likely at the Battle of Olustee in February 1864.
The Second Battle of Cabin Creek was part of a plan conceived by Confederate Brigadier General Stand Watie, who had been promoted from colonel after the First Battle of Cabin Creek. The plan was to have a Confederate force attack central Kansas from Indian Territory, raiding Union Army facilities and encouraging Indian tribes in Western Kansas to join in an attack on the eastern part of the state. Watie presented the plan to his superior, General S. B. Maxey on February 5, 1864. Maxey approved the plan on the condition that the attack would start by October 1, to coincide with an attack on Missouri already planned by General Sterling Price.
The Osage Battalion was a Native American unit of the Confederate States Army. Recruited from among the Osage tribe, whose loyalties were split between the Union and Confederacy, it did not meet its 500-man establishment. From early 1863 a four-company battalion of 200 men served under Brigadier General Douglas H. Cooper in the Trans-Mississippi Department. In 1864 the unit was transferred to the First Indian Brigade under Native American Brigadier General Stand Watie and fought under his command at the Second Battle of Cabin Creek on September 19, 1864. The battalion surrendered to Union forces on June 23, 1865, one of the last Confederate units to lay down its arms.
The history of slavery in Oklahoma began in the 1830s with the five Native American nations in the area: Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, and Seminole. Slavery within these Native American nations began simply by placing a lower status on them than their master. The slavery in these tribes varied in style, being specifically different from American slavery. Slavery in the area continued to grow for many years, even throughout the entirety of the Civil War. The growth was significant, slaves making up a portion of the population in the new Indian territory. Slavery ended in the Oklahoma area with the completion of the Civil War. Treaties were made with the nations regarding citizenship and slavery for African Americans. The repercussions of slavery that followed greatly affected the state, with prominent racial issues.
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