February 27, 1861. Their report133 of operations and of observations being somewhat difficult of access and its contents not easily summarized, is herewith appended. Its fullness of detail is especially to be commended.
We ... crossed Red River and entered the Chickasaw Nation about thirty miles southwest of Fort Washita; visited and held a private conference with His Excellency Governor C. Harris and other distinguished men of that nation, who fully appreciated our views and the object of our mission. They informed us that a convention of the Chickasaws and Choctaws was in a few days to convene at Boggy Depot, in the Choctaw Nation, to attend to some municipal arrangements. We, in company with Governor Harris and others, made our way to Boggy Depot, conferring privately with the principal men on our route. We arrived at Boggy Depot on the 10th day of March. Their convention or council convened on the 11th. Elected a president of the convention (Ex-Governor Walker, of the Choctaw Nation); adopted rules of decorum. On the 12th we were waited on by a committee of the convention. Introduced as commissioners from Texas, we presented our credentials and were invited to seats. The convention then asked to hear us, when Mr. James E. Harrison addressed them and a crowded auditory upon the subject of our mission, setting forth the grounds of our complaint against the Government of the United States, the wrongs we had suffered until our patience had become exhausted, endurance had ceased to be a virtue, our duty to ourselves and children demanded of us a disruption of the Government that had ceased to protect us or to regard our rights; announced the severance of the old and the organization of a new Government of Confederate Sovereign States of the South, with a common kindred, common hopes, common interest, and a common destiny; discussed the power of the new Government, its influence, and wealth; the interest the civilized red man had in this new organization; tendering them our warmest sympathy and regard, all of which met the cordial approbation of the convention.
The Choctaws and Chickasaws are entirely Southern and are determined to adhere to the fortunes of the South. They were embarrassed in their action by the absence of their agents and commissioners at Washington, the seat of Government of the Northern Confederacy, seeking a final settlement with that Government. They have passed resolutions authorizing the raising of a minute company in each county in the two nations, to be drilled for actual service when necessary. Their convention was highly respectable in numbers and intelligence, and the business of the convention was dispatched with such admirable decorum and promptness as is rarely met with in similar deliberative bodies within the States.
On the morning of the 13th, hearing that the Creeks (or Maskokys) and Cherokees were in council at the Creek agency, on the Arkansas River, 140 miles distant, we immediately set out for that point, hoping to reach them before their adjournment. In this we were disappointed. They had adjourned two days before our arrival. We reached that point on Saturday evening. On Sunday morning, hearing that there was a religious meeting five miles north of the Arkansas River, in the Creek Nation, Mr. James E. Harrison attended, which proved to be of the utmost importance to our mission. The Reverend Mr. H. S. Buckner was present, with Chilly McIntosh, D. N. McIntosh, Judge Marshall, and others, examining a translation of a portion of the Scriptures, hymn book, and Greek grammar by Mr. Buckner into the Creek language. Mr. Buckner showed us great kindness, and did us eminent service, as did also Elder Vandiven, at whose house we spent the night and portion of the next day with these gentlemen of the Creek Nation, and through them succeeded in having a convention of the five nations called by Governor Motey Kinnaird, of the Creeks, to meet at North Fork (Creek Nation) on the 8th of April.
In the intermediate time we visited the Cherokee Nation, calling on their principal men and citizens, conversing with them freely until we reached Tahlequah, the seat of government. Near this place Mr. John Ross resides, the Governor of the nation. We called on him officially. We were not unexpected, and were received with courtesy, but not with cordiality. A long conference was had with him, conducted by Mr. Harrison on the part of the commissioners, without, we fear, any good result. He was very diplomatic and cautious. His position is the same as that held by Mr. Lincoln in his inaugural; declares the Union not dissolved; ignores the Southern Government. The intelligence of the nation is not with him. Four-fifths, at least, are against his views, as we learned from observation and good authorities. He, as we learned, had been urged by his people to call a council of the nation (he having the only constitutional authority to do so), to take into consideration the embarrassed condition of political affairs in the States, and to give some expression of their sentiments and sympathies. This he has persistently refused to do. His position in this is that of Sam. Houston in Texas, and in all probability will share the same fate, if not a worse one. His people are already oppressed by a Northern population letting a portion of territory purchased by them from the United States, to the exclusion of natives, and we are creditably informed that the Governors of some two or more of the Western free-soil States have recommended their people emigrating to settle the Cherokee country. It is due Mr. John Ross, in this connection, to say that during our conference with him he frequently avowed his sympathy for the South, and that, if Virginia and the other Border States seceded from the Government of the United States, his people would declare for the Southern Government that might be formed. The fact is not to be denied or disguised that among the common Indians of the Cherokees there exists a considerable abolition influence, created and sustained by one Jones, a Northern missionary of education and ability, who has been among them for many years, and who is said to exert no small influence with John Ross himself.
From Tahlequah we returned to the Creek Nation, and had great satisfaction in visiting their principal men—the McIntoshes, Stidhams, Smiths, Vanns, Rosses, Marshalls, and others too numerous to mention. Heavy falls of rain occurred about the time the convention was to meet at North Fork, which prevented the Chickasaws and Choctaws from attending the council, the rivers and creeks being all full and impassable. The Creeks, Cherokees, Seminoles, Quapa, and Socks (the three latter dependencies of the Creeks) met on the 8th of April. After they had organized by calling Motey Kinnaird, the Governor of the Creeks, to the chair, a committee was appointed to wait on the commissioners present, James E. Harrison and Capt. C. A. Hamilton, and invite them to appear in the convention, when, by invitation, Mr. Harrison addressed the convention in a speech of two hours. Our views were cordially received by the convention. The Creeks are Southern and sound to a man, and when desired will show their devotion to our cause by acts. They meet in council on the 1st of May, when they will probably send delegates to Montgomery to arrange with the Southern Government.
These nations are in a rapid state of improvement. The chase is no longer resorted to as means of subsistence, only as an occasional recreation. They are pursuing with good success agriculture and stock raising. Their houses are well built and comfortable, some of them costly. Their farms are well planned and some of them extensive and all well cultivated. They are well supplied with schools of learning, extensively patronized. They have many churches and a large membership of moral, pious deportment. They feel themselves to be in an exposed, embarrassed condition. They are occupying a country well suited to them, well watered, and fertile, with extensive fields of the very best mineral coal, fine salt springs and wells, with plenty of good timber, water powers which they are using to an advantage. Pure slate, granite, sandstone, blue limestone, and marble are found in abundance. All this they regard as inviting Northern aggression, and they are without arms, to any extent, or munitions of war. They declare themselves Southerners by geographical position, by a common interest, by their social system, and by blood, for they are rapidly becoming a nation of whites. They have written constitutions, laws, etc., modeled after those of the Southern States. We recommend them to the fostering care of the South, and that treaty arrangements be entered into with them as soon as possible. They can raise 20,000 good fighting men, leaving enough at home to attend to domestic affairs, and under the direction of an officer from the Southern Government would deal destruction to an approaching army from that direction, and in the language of one of their principal men:
“Lincoln may haul his big guns about our prairies in the daytime, but we will swoop down upon him at night from our mountains and forests, dealing death and destruction to his army.”
No delay should be permitted in this direction. They cannot declare themselves until they are placed in a defensible position. The Administration of the North is concentrating his forces at Fort Washita, about twenty-four miles from the Texas line, and within the limits of the Chickasaw Nation. This fort could easily be taken by a force of 200