History of Oklahoma and Indian Territory and homeseekeker's [!] guide

Chapter I. Some Early Cherokee History

The first treaty that ever was made between the United States and the Cherokee Indians was conclnded at Hopewell, on the Kiowee, November 22, 1785.

There came a division among the Cherokees, and a chief by the name of Diitcher became dissatisfied and decided to go towards the sunset about the year 1808. A number of French traders came up the Tennessee river from New Orleans. They had a large stock of goods and undertook to establish a trading post. They had a quantity of whisky among their stores, and the Indians all got drunk. It is said by the old Indians that Dutcher took advantage of this opportunity to complete his plans, and that he murdered those Frenchmen and took their boats and goods. He loaded the women and children on the boats, with men enough to operate them, while the balance of the warriors, numbering, about 200 men, proceeded overland on ponies, keeping in touch with the boats as they went. They went to the mouth of the Tennessee, and then down to the mouth of the White river. Here the horses were ferried across on the boats, and the band proceeded to the mouth of the Arkansas, up which they went to the place where Dardanelles^ Ark., now stands, arriving there about the fall of 1809. They remained there until the spring of 1810, when they got in need of salt. Discovering that the water of the Arkansas was salty, they decided to lead an expedition up the river to the fountain of salt which they conceived must exist somewhere up the river. Somewhere near the mouth of Grand river they came in contact with the Osages, and after some difficulty they took some of the Osages prisoners.

Dutcher then informed the prisoners that if they would take him to where they obtained their salt he would spare their hves. So they lead him up the river about 60 miles to the salt springs near what is now known as the Cherokee Orphan Asylum. The entire country and those Springs were claimed by the Osages at that time, and the Osages were accustomed to taking pay in ponies from the other tribes that were permitted to secure salt there. But Dutcher wasn't built that way. He didn't believe in giving up ponies for salt or anything else. He believed in getting all he could, and 'in keeping all he could get. So there was trouble over the salt springs, but the Cherokees secured all the salt they wanted, and then went on back to their home.

But every year they had trouble with the Osages in securing their supply of salt. This state of affairs continued until the summer of 1817, when Dutcher decided to take possession of the Salt Springs himself. He picked his army in this way: He built seven fires in a row. When they had burned down to a bed of coals his warriors were ordered to run and turn summersaults through the air over and in those fires. Those that were burnt had to stay at home, and those who were unscathed were permitted to go to war. Out of his whole tribe he had about three hundred warriors, all being good, strong, active men. He proceeded to the Springs over the usual route, arriving there on about the fourth of July of that same year. 1817. He found the Osages already at the Springs, under the command of their chief, Claremore. The Cherokees had guns, and while the}' were outnumbered by the Osages, the latter were armed only with bows and arrows. After several days of hard fighting the Osages fell back to a range of timbered hills about twenty miles west, near the site of Pry or Creek. Here they made another stand, only to be again routed. Falling back once more, they went west to the Claremore mound, from which the prosperous little city of Claremore takes its name. This hill was high, with a little timber on top. . It was surrounded on the east by prairie for several miles.

Dutcher believed the Osages were on Dog Creek at a little Indian village named Black

Dog, about a mile east of where Claremore is now. However, after investigation he was disappointed, as Black Dog camp had been abandoned. After the second day, however^ one of the best known scouts the Cherokees ever produced. Hominy Jack, brought in word that the Osages were camped on a high mound about seven miles to the northward. Dutcher went thither by night, and his men crept up to the top of the hill. The Osages, believingthat they were out of all danger, had no pickets out at all. The Cherokees laid low until the l^reak of day, when, with a single warwhoop, they sprang upon the sleeping Osages. They first emptied their guns, and then completed the work of slaughter with their tomahaAvks and butcher knives.

"Run for your life," was the cry of the terrified Osages. 80 down the hill they went,^ with the Cherokees right at their heels, cutting and slashing and screaming like demons. Tumbling over one another at the foot of the hill, the Osages began to realize their condition. They whirled on the Cherokees, and a hand to hand battle took place. The Osages, being so much bigger than the Cherokees, were about to turn the game on them. But Dutcher, discovering his mistake, drew his men off and ordered them to load and fire their g\ms. The Osages soon got under cover in the timber along the bank of the Verdigri. river, which was about a mile west of the hill-

The dead were strewn from the top to the foot of the hill, and as late as 1882 many bones and other relics of the old battle could be found. The chief was killed after whom the mound took its name.

Dutcher took some prisoners and lots of ponies. I once had the privilege of knowing an old lady who was taken prisoner there when she was a girl. She said that her father had her on his back and was running down the hill, when a Cherokee; striking at him with his knife, cut her instead, on the face and arm. Her father then put her down and ran to save his own life. He tried many times to get her back from the Cherokees by offering herds of ponies. She was raised and educated at a mission near Fort Gibson, and married a Cherokee man by the name of Petite, who was a prominent man. She never returned to her tribe until 1883, when she w^as recognized by the scar on her face. She died from old age in 1888, leaving two daughters, and one son, the son being named Wooster Petite, who lives at the present time at Pawhuska, and has served as district judge among the Osages for several years.

The fight at Claremore Mound was the last trouble the Cherokees and Osages ever had. After the fight Dutcher sent a delegation to the principal chief of the Cherokee Nation in the east advising him to exchange the old nation for the new territorv which he had just taken charge of. His suggestion was carried out in the treat}^ of April 12, 1834, and all the Cherokees began to collect in the new territory. John Ross remained chief for 40 years, and died in Washington City in 1864. His nephew, Hill Ross, was appointed to fill the unexpired term, but was defeated for the office of principal ^chief in the fall of the same year by Lewis Downing, and as W. T. Sherman had been appointed to the command of the whole United States army, he decided to make some changes in Indian affairs. As the original treaty with the Cherokees had been broken, it became necessary to make a new treaty in 1866. A delegation of Cherokees consisting of Houston Benge, Smith Christie and others met the United States authorities at Washington and an agreement was made that all freedmen and slaves that had been owned by the Cherokee people who were then living in the territory should return within six months from the date of the treaty and should have equal rights with the native Cherokees; and also at the same time the Cherokees contracted to sell all the land west of the 96th meridian line at 473^ cents per acre for the purpose of settling friendly Indians and freedmen on. They also sold Cherokee and Labette counties, in Kansas, and a strip four miles wide the length of the Cherokee outlet. This was for years called the neutral strip, and extended along the Kansas state line. The Cherokees also sold the northeast corner of the Indian Territory, beginning at the Missouri line, then running west to the Neosho river, then running down the Neosho to the mouth of Spring river, then down Grand river, which is formed by the Neosho and Spring, to the mouth of Cowskin river, then up Cowskin river to the Missouri line. This body of land was settled by the Senecas, Wyandottes, Ottawas, Miamis and Modocs, while on the Cherokee outlet the government settled the Osages, Otoes, Pawnees and Poncas.

The Cherokees, however, claimed the remainder of the Cherokee Strip, as it was not all taken up by the - government in settling friendly Indians. The government assented to the justice of this claim, and in November, 1892, the United States made a treaty for the remainder of the Cherokee Strip for $1.25 an acre, and agreed to put all intruders out of the Cherokee Nation. There were at that time several thousand white people living on the public domain in the Cherokee Nation, contrary to law, claiming to be Cherokees. The Cherokee Strip was opened for settlement on September 16, 1893.

Things wore along in this way in the Cherokee Nation until the final treaty was made and the rolls closed on the 31st day of October, 1902, and the land office was opened in Vinita January 1st., 1903.

Chapter II. Creeks And Seminoles

As far back as the Creeks know themselves, they were hving in Alabama and there came trouble among them, and one part of them went to Florida. These were called Seminoles. They made a treaty for the country in which they now live about the same time the Cherokees moved west. Possibly as late as 1836 they, by agreement, divided their territory among themselves, the Seminoles taking the west part. They made a treat}' in 1866, and sold their surplus land in Oklahoma, as the' Cherokees had done, at 473^ cents per acre, to be used to settle friendly Indians upon, as well as freedmen. On their land the government settled the Cheyennes and Arapahoes, Sac and Fox, lowas, Pottawatomies, and Kickapoos.

A part of this country was not settled by any Indians, and was the original Oklahoma. The Creeks claimed that the title reverted to them, arid, they let it out for grass pasture land to various cattlemen, among others Wagoner, Auho & Burnet, Pitckguel Brothers and the Miller Brothers, who established the famous 101 ranch. In the fall of 1880 Captain Payne led a colony of settlers into that country.

The Creek government contended that the land had not been sold to white settlers, but Captain Payne and his "so'oners" settled on Deep Fork -at the stage line between Welch and the stage station on Deer creek, and began to build houses and to dig wells. The government notified them to get off, but they paid no heed to the warnings. Finally soldiers were sent to enforce the command. They had to tie Captain Payne to get him out of the country.

After this boomers continued to cross the hne continuously, and the soldiers had a busy time putting them out. After the death of Captain Payne Captain Couch took his place, guided by one of the most determined ■cowboys of the west, Phil Johnson, who had spent many years in the country after cattle and knew it to be a good country. He knew also all the good camping places, and being, as well as Couch, a determined man, they defied the government until finally, in the fall of 1888, President Harrison bought the land from the Creeks for white settlement, and old Oklahoma was opened for settlement on April 22, 1889.

The opening of Oklahoma might be called the opening wedge. Too miich credit for it cannot be given Captain Payne, Captain Couch and Phil Johnson. There should be a monument of Oklahoma stone built for those three men.

The opening of Oklahoma threw the surrounding tribes of Indians into closer touch with the white men, and introduced them to civilization. The Pottawatomie, Sac and Fox, Iowa and Ponca country was opened for settlement on September 22, 1891. The next reservation to be opened was that of the Cheyennes and Arapahoes, whose country was opened for white settlement on November 19, 1892. The next was the Kickapoo country, opened for settlement on May 23, 1895.

It will be remembered that all these openings up to this time had been "on the run." The prospective settlers had been lined up outside the new country, and at a given signal they rushed into the new land, to secure what farms or lots they could. The man with the fastest horse and the biggest gun and the most friends would get the best place.

The Creek Indians were the first to nia);^'' a final treaty with the United States for the closing of their tribal government, and were also the first to open a land office. The allotment of their land was about completed by January 1, 1903.

There is a tradition that these two tribes once inhabited the same country where they now live, and that a great tribe of Indians from the northwest made war on them so long and so fiercelv that thev decided to leave the country. They started east, guided by a dog and a magic pole. At night they would plant the pole in the ground, and in the morning the way the pole would be leaning would be the way they would go. They traveled east until they came to the Mississippi river. The dog was drowned crossing the river, leaving them nothing but the pole for a guide. They then traveled south for some distance along the Mississippi. They remained in the new country until they first saw the white man. The Chickasaws reheld they are only Choctaws, but the word Chickasaw "means "reheld." They have never shed the blood of the white man, and brag of it. They have adopted the white man's ways and his religion.

The Choctaws and Chickasaws, like the other tribes, made a treaty in 1866 and parted with those lands of theirs lying in what is ..ow Oklahoma, on which the government settled the Comanches, Kiowas, Apaches. Caddos and Wichitas, whose covmtry was opened fo.r settlement on August 5, 1901. A more sensible method of opening was adopted this time, by drawing, so that each man had an equal chance, and the lucky man won. The lands of the Choctaws and Chickasaws were allotted about the sam.e as the lands of the other five civilized tribes.

This closes the history of the five civilized tribes and. Oklahoma with the exception of the big pasture that will be open on the 3rd day of December, 1906. A Cherokee allotment is $325 worth of land, and the land is graded from 50 cents an acre to $6.50. The Creeks have 160 acres each, and have a surplus that is to be sold to the highest bidder. The Choctaws and Chickasaws have 320 acres each. Every one of them who can write his own name is allowed to sell all his land but his homestead by applying to the Secretary of the Interior through the Indian agent. A great part of Oklahoma was long counted part of Texas, but it was finally decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that not the North Fork of the Red river, but the Red river itself was the dividing line between Oklahoma and Texas as far as the east line of the Panhandle country. Beaver county was a tract of land which none of the tribes claimed, and was for many years called "No Man's Land." Fort Supply was established in '67, it was the first fort to be established in Oklahoma. It was located on Beaver creek in what is now Woodward county, Oklahoma, which was the first step to be taken to rid that part of the plains of buffalo.

QUANAH PARKER WITH THE TREATY ROLL. CHIEF OF THE COMANCHES.

Chapter III. Quanah Parker

This ct^gter on the hfe of Quanah Parker will be begun with the following poem taken in substance from Indianology by Herman .Lehmann. The old chieftain, Parker, was a great lover of music, and the following poem fairly illustrates the figure of a dance of which the noted chief was especially fond:

Get yo' little sage hens ready,

Trot 'em out upon the floor; Line up there, you cusses, steady;

Lively now, one couple more.

Shorty, shed that ol' sombrero;

For the ladies now, all set.

S'lute your ladies, all together;

Ladies opposite, the same; Hit the lumber with your leather;

Balance all, and swing your dame.

Bunch the heifers in the middle.

Circle, stags, and do-se-do; Pay attention to the fiddle;

Swing her till the trotters crack.

22 HISTORl; OF OKLAHOMA.

Gents, all right, a heel and toe;

Swing 'em, kiss 'em, if you kin; Go to next, and keep a-goin,'

Till yo hit your pards agin.

Gents to center, places round,

And form a basket balance; All whirl yo gals to where yo found 'em,

Promenade around the hall.

Balance all yo pards and trot 'em

Round the circle double quick; Grab and kiss 'em while you've got 'em.

Hold it to 'em if they kick.

Ladies, left hand to your sonnies;

Here we go, grand right and left;

Balance all and swing your honies;

Pick 'em up and feel their heft.

Promenade like skeery cattle;

Balance all and swing your sweets; Shake your hocks and make 'em rattle;

Keno, — promenade to seats.

— Denver Post.

Quanah Parker is Chief of the Comanches, one of the most powerful tribes of the North American Indians. The Comanches are now located on a reservation in Oklahoma Territory near Fort Sill, the tribe being reduced to only a few hundred. They were partially brought into submission in 1783 by the Spaniards under General Auza, but were soon again on the war path, and were ever afterwards known as the fiercest and most cruel in all the western country. They continually harassed the frontier of Texas until they were finally placed on their reservation in the Territory by the United States authorities in 1870.

"Quanah Parker succeeded to the office of Chief in 1867 or 1868 on the death of Chief Teppakenaki. Quanah is a man of much force of character, and has been the actual leader of the tribe for many years. He not only inherited his strong and prominent traits of character from his illustrious sire, old Chief Quanah, but there is also a reinforcement of Anglo-Saxon blood in his veins, coming from the Parker family, which contributes much to the robust strength of his manhood. When entering civilization, as he frequently does on trips to Washington and other eastern cities, he dresses in fashionable costume. When with the tribe, however he dons their primitive garb." — Mrs. M. in Ennis' Review.

Quanah Parker is now about 54 years old (1906). He is the son of Quanah, one of the most renowned chiefs of the Comanches, and Cynthia Ann Parker, the captive white girl who with her brother, John, was captured at Parker's Fort in 1836. The capture and captivity of the Parker children is one of the most pathetic occurrences in Indian annals, and forms a prominent page in Texas history. The Parker family were early emigrants to Texas from Illinois. They settled in what is now Limestone county, near where the town of Groesbeck now stands, and in conjunction with others in that vicinity erected a fort which was designated as Parker's Fort many years after. The settlers in the new country were unmolested. They had commenced farming and stock-raising with considerable success. They had established a neighborhood school, which Cynthia Ann and John Parker had entered. They had organized a Primitive Baptist church, of which Elder John Parker, an uncle of Cynthia Ann, was pastor.

One summer morning in 1836 the gate of the fort had been left open, and several of the men had gone out to their farms to labor. While the little settlement was in this helpless condition three hundred Comanche Indians suddenly dashed into the fort, killing the three or four men who had been left to guard the fort, including Elder John Parker, Benjamin and Silas Parker and Samuel and Robert Frost. All the women and children were made captives. Among the captives were John and Cynthia Ann Parker, aged nine and eleven years respectively. John and Cynthia were kept among the Indians many years. John, upon reaching manhood, became an important personage among the Comanches on account of his bravery and good judgment in battle. In an expedition into Mexico, while attacking a town, the Indians were so closely pressed that defeat seemed imminent. The chief in command was killed, upon which John Parker assumed command and led a charge that turned the fortvmes of the day, so that the Comanches achieved a signal victory. On his return to the Comanche country he was at once made a sub-chief, and became conspicuous in the councils of the tribe.

Cynthia Ann was taken as a wife by Quanah, and became the mother of three children, the young Quanah and a brother and sister. In the early part of 1860 Colonel G. S. Ross, since governor of the state, in command of a battalion of Texas Rangers, engage'd a large body of hostile Comanches in battle in what is now Knox county, and near where stands the town of Benjamin. Colonel Ross led a charge which routed the superior force of the Indians, killing Quanah. The Indians fled to the brakes of the ^Yichita river, and in the pursuit one of the Rangers overtook a woman riding a pony and carrying a small child. He presented his revolver to her, when she threw" back her robe, held her child in front of her, and exclaimed in broken Spanish, "Americano, Americano." The Ranger took her prisoner, and after returning to the fort she proved to be the long-lost Cynthia Ann Parker. Her uncle, Hon. Isaac Parker, who was then a pioneer legislator, repaired to the fort with a few friends, and through an interpreter engaged her in conversation, when she at once related the heart rending scenes enacted at the fort in 1836. After having endured the hardships of savage Hfe for a ciuarter of a century she soon passed away under the influence of civihzed luxury. Her death occurred in Anderson count}' , Texas, in 1865. Her Httle daughter is said to have been an extremely bright child, and took readily to the ways of civilization. She was placed in school by her white relatives^ and gave unusual promise of success, but died' soon after her mother.

It is said that Quanah still longed for brighter fields and freer hunting. He, after the manner of his father, thought it best to drive the Avhite man from his hunting ground, so he headed a party of picked warriors and started out on the range. He went into Beaver county and tackled a camping party of hunters who were making headquarters in an old adobe made after the fashion of a block house with port-holes. Parker's men rushed up on those hunters a little ways from their encampment, shot, speared, lanced, tomahawked and otherwise put to death several in a running fight. The Indians were too close for the hunters to do effective work with their long ranged guns, and so Quanah 's men overtook them near the house and had a hand to hand conflict. Some of the hunters, however, gained entrance into the fort as the door of the cabin swung open. Just as one hunter was entering an arrow pierced his heart, and his soul went to that land from whose bourne no traveler returns. His body blocked the door. The pale faces tried to pull the body in so the door could be closed, and Quanah's men made a desperate attempt to enter over the corpse. The white men were sending volleys of explosive balls at the Indians from the portholes. When one of those balls struck anything, even the finger, it was like an electric shock. To the effect of these balls the hunters owed it that they were able at last to pull in the body and close the door. The Indians attempted to batter it down, and they even seized the portholes and were firing into the adobe hut. The hunters, driven to desperation, opened new holes and kept up the battle, until Quanah's men, seeing they were not gaining anything, scattered and stole away, meeting again away ovit on the prairie, out of gun-shot range from the fort. They were riding along trying to devise some means for rescuing their dead, who were left on the battlefield. Suddenly and without warning or apparent cause one of the warriors tumbled from his horse dead. He was examined, and it was found that a ball had gone through his skull. The wind was l)lowing and the buffalo hunter's gun was of such, long range that the report was never heard, but the effect was c[uite visible. That decided Quanah's men. Tliey left their dead, and thenceforth steered clear of such adversaries. I don't know how many were killed on either side, but there must have been scores. This was called the battle of the adobe wall. To the credit of the frontier women, it may be said that there were seven white women inside of those walls, who ran bullets and reloaded shells while their men emptied them at the portholes. Without the assistance rendered by the women, the whole party probably would have perished.

Quanah had found many hunters of buffalo on this trip. He saw the hunters, the white men, had come to stay, and experience had convinced him that where one was killed, seven came in place of the dead man. He .decided therefore that if he did not wish to see the white men as thick as the stars of the sky or the grass of the plains, he and his men had better quit killing them. His father had died in battle, his mother, sister and brothers had been carried away never again to be seen by him. Now he must go on to death like a mad man or must take a more sensible view and let the dead bury their dead and try to secure \some benefits for his people.

He decided that it was the height of folly to fight for a hunting ground with no game on it. If the buffalo were not all killed already, he knew that they would soon disappear. Consequently, in the year 1869 he let General McKenzie at Fort Sill know his whereabouts, and also asked concerning terms, of surrender. McKenzie sent one of his scouts to the Coman- •ches, and a Mexican who had been raised by the Comanches, to make a treaty with them.

They met away out on the plains and made a treaty. Let iis stop and think of that treaty, — one white man and a Mexican who had been raised by the Comanehes on one side; on the other hundreds of warriors who, with white men's scalps dangling at their belts, had been dancing their war dance until they were tired,, under the leadership of a young man. But this young man, Quanah Parker, must somehow have inspired respect and honor, which these Indians recognized, and which was plain to General McKenzie also. For the general, though a brave man, and had no fear whatever, would not send a lone man into a place where he thought there was great danger, and this man whom he sent was one of his favorite scouts. Though I have tried to get the name of this scout I have so far failed, and know only his Indian name, which means nothing in this case. So away out there on the plains they made their treaty, Now there were some older chiefs,. jealous of Parker, who wanted to secure control, so they slipped across into Texas, and murdered and stole and committed depredations innumerable, among their other crimes being^ the burning of a government train. The leaders of these unruly Comanehes were White Wolf and Sutaner. They were finally arrested and taken to Texas, where they were sentenced to the penitentiary for life. After having been kept in the penitentiary for three months, however,, they were released and permitted to return tothe reservation, in order that they might tell Iheir people what would become of them if they did not obey the law. After having visited their people White Wolf and Sutaner had to go back to the penitentiary for the balance of their lives. White Wolf escaped by killing himself before it was time to go back, while Sutaner committed suicide in the penitentiary after his return.

Quanah moved his band to the reservation and then went to work, riding night and day, trying to gather up the small bands and persuade them to move on to the reservation. This was a hard task many times, for while they were small bands they had taken a solemn oath to •stick together and to fight the white man. Always, however, when Quanah would get to them he would out-talk them and bring them in.