Colonel R. W. Furnas Assumes Command
(Page 80) The withdrawal of the Federal white troops from the Indian country for operations against the enemy in the western border counties of Missouri and Arkansas left the Indian regiments in possession of all that part of their country west of Grand River with the east side debatable ground which they could hold when the regular Federal forces were within supporting distance, and which they would be obliged to evacuate when they could not have such support. It was becoming more and more evident to the Federal military authorities that the Indian country could be best defended by the Federal occupation of western Missouri and western Arkansas, and that the Indians who had espoused the Confederate cause would become aggressive only when sup ported by white troops, who, up to this time had been thrown into the Indian country from Texas.
In a short time after the retrograde movement of the Indian Expedition commenced at Flat Rock towards the northern part of the Territory, Colonel Cooper commanding the Southern forces at and in the vicinity of Fort Davis, consisting of the Choctaw and Chickasaw regiment, the Creek regiment and Colonel Watie’s regiment of Cherokees and a contingent of Texas troops, was ordered by General Hindman to cross to the north side of the Arkansas River and to move north and east until he came in touch with the Missouri Southern forces under Shelby, Rains and Cockrell, who had recently been pursued by the Federal forces from Lone Jack. General Pike, who had been in command of the Indian Department before and after the battle of Pea Ridge up to July, and, in fact, until he resigned in November, had been making his headquarters at Fort Ben McCulloch near Red River in the southern part of the Indian Territory, nearly two hundred miles from the scene of active operations, and the administration of the affairs of his (Page 81) department was causing much complaint among his subordinates, and finally General Hindman ordered him arrested and brought to his headquarters if he undertook to do certain things he had proposed in his correspondence.
In compliance with instructions from General Hindman, General Pike turned over to Colonel Cooper the troops and supplies he had requested, and about that time Pike sent in his resignation, but President Davis did not accept it and he returned to the service, to the command of his department, and remained until November, when he resigned again and had nothing further to do with Indian operations. He was accused of treason to the Confederacy and of being connected with a secret society of Unionists of Grayson and Cook counties, Texas, of whom forty-six, after a form of trial, were hung. However, he was never tried on a charge of treason.
When General Salomon assumed command of the Indian Expedition and commenced the retirement of the army no immediate orders or instructions were sent to the commanders of the three Indian regiments for their guidance in future operations, and Colonel R. W. Furnas, the senior officer among them, called a council to outline a policy for their immediate future. After some discussion in the council it was decided to consolidate the three regiments into one command and call it the First Indian Brigade, and Colonel Furnas was designated as the commander; the opinion was also expressed in the council that under the conditions then existing the Indian Brigade could hold the country north of the Arkansas River if General Salomon would leave with it a battery of artillery and honor their requisitions for subsistence and ammunition.
Colonel Furnas at once called on General Salomon and laid before him the action of the council, and he agreed to leave with the Indians one section of the First Kansas Battery and to honor their requisitions for supplies as far as practicable, and the General further stated that it was not (Page 82) the design of the Department Commander, General Blunt, to withdraw all the white troops from the Indian country; that those then being withdrawn were being used in an emergency for operations in the western border counties of Missouri against secessionists who were entering the state in large numbers from the South.
On assuming command of the Indian Brigade Colonel Furnas made disposition of his forces so as to afford protection to the loyal Indians as fully as possible; he sent a force of two or three hundred men to occupy Fort Gibson, which it did for a short time, a day or two, and then evacuated the place, the enemy under Colonel Cooper at Fort Davis, a few miles distant, threatening to cut it off. He also sent out a larger detachment of three or four hundred men under the command of Colonel W. A. Phillips of the Third Indian regiment, to scout the country between Tahlequah, Parkhill and Fort Gibson, which he did, and came into collision with a hostile force of Indians equal to his own, under Lieutenant Colonel Thomas F. Taylor of Colonel Watie’s regiment of Cherokees at Bayou Manard near Fort Gibson, and after a sharp engagement, routed the enemy, killing Colonel Taylor, Captain Hicks and two Choctaw captains, and thirty-two found on the field, besides wounding, as he estimated, upwards of fifty men of the hostile force, who were carried away in the retreat.
This vigorous action of Colonel Phillips alarmed Colonel Cooper and he ordered all his detachments scouting on the north side of the Arkansas River to return immediately to the south side; but in the meantime Colonel Furnas had re tired with the balance of his brigade to Baxter Springs on the northern line of the Territory, and Colonel Phillips was directed to join him there, which left the greater part of the Indian country north of the Arkansas River to be over -run by the Indian forces of Cooper in a short time. Large numbers of Cherokee and Creek families who had declared them selves in favor of the Union during the brief occupation of (Page 83) the country by the Federal forces, followed closely in the rear of the retiring troops, for they knew they would soon be the victims of revenge on the return of the Indians who had espoused the cause of the Confederacy, if they at tempted to remain at home.
The families of the Indian soldiers who had belonged to Colonel Drew’s Cherokee regiment until Captain Greeno visited Tahlequah and Parkhill and then left it and almost immediately en masse joined Colonel Phillips Third Regiment Indian Home Guards, would be the especial victims of persecution of the re-occupation of the country by the white and Indian Southern forces, which was certain to follow the Federal evacuation.
These loyal Indian families who had commenced preparing to raise patches of corn and garden vegetables would now have to leave everything of that nature to fall into the hands of the enemy, and would be obliged, when they reached the northern line of the Territory to be fed and provided for by the Government until the next year; but they would not be subjected to the sufferings and hardships that fell upon the loyal Indians who were driven from their homes the previous winter under the leadership of Hopoeithleyohola.
When the Indian Expedition entered the Indian country the Federal troops were scarcely ever out of sight of good sized herds of a hundred or so head of cattle grazing on the prairies, and as the spring had been seasonable, they were in good condition and made good beef and if prudence had been exercised by the commander of the expedition and his chief commissary the army meat bill should not have cost the Government one cent, for probably most of the herds the troops saw belonged to the disloyal Cherokees who had espoused the Confederate cause and had shared in the spoils of lost property sustained by the loyal Cherokees in their disastrous retreat to Southern Kansas the past winter. (Page 84)
It was common talk among the soldiers that the beef contractor for the Expedition furnished it every day with full rations of beef without making any new purchases for slaughter and without decreasing the size of his herd; but Colonel Phillips on returning from his expedition to the vicinity of Fort Gibson, brought out a large herd of cattle with his command and estimated that this stock would sup ply the refugee Indian families and the troops of the Expedition with beef for a long time, and recommended that it be held for that purpose instead of being sold to speculators for a nominal price. The Indian country was fairly well watered and was considered the best grazing region in the west, and the live stock the Indians raised up to the war was their main source of wealth, but they would certainly shortly be deprived of this if the hostile forces of both sides alternately occupied and marched over the country, taking such supplies as they could find.
Tags: Cherokee, General Furnas, General Pike, Indian Expedition, R. W. Furnas
Source: The Union Indian Brigade in the Civil War, By Wiley Britton, published 1922, Franklin Hudson Publishing Co., Kansas City, Missouri.
