Choctaw

“ BOUNDARY BETWEEN CHEROKEES, CREEKS, CHOCTAWS, AND CHICKASAWS.
The lines of demarkation between the respective possessions of the Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw, and Chickasaw Nations had long been a subject of dispute between them. People living in a state of barbarism and principally dependent upon the chase for a livelihood, necessarily roam over a vast amount of territory within which no permanent habitations have been established by themselves. ”

“ Now, even if we consent to detach the Iroquois tradition, there is still in both the Mandan and Choctaw tradition, a common idea of their having come from “under the ground,” which seems to me the tradition that they were created out of the ground at one remove. To this it would seem the Choctaws have super-added their recollection of some incident of their tribe, possibly that they were an offshoot of the Esquimaux, or were at one period in their latitude and lived their life, which would be in accordance with the theory of their migrations from Asia by Behring’s Straits. ”

“ Following the 1902 agreement allotments were made from the common lands to the citizens and the freedmen of the two tribes. The Chickasaws received no compensation for their one-fourth interest in the common lands allotted to the Choctaw freedmen either by reduction of the allotments to the Choctaw citizens or of that tribe's proportionate share, or by any other settlement or adjustment. ”

“ Enclosed please find letter of G. B. Hester (a Choctaw who was made quarter-master and commissary in the First Choctaw Regiment and, in 1865, “cotton agent for the Creek Indians who were at that time squatting in the Chickasaw Nation.” See O’Beirne’s Leaders and Leading Men of the Indian Territory) at Boggy Depot, C. N. You will see they are without mails in that country. For three weeks the mails for the Indian country have been accumulating in this office. I sent forward all the mail that could be packed on a single horse.... I cannot get men to carry the mail. ”

“ In the midst of the unnumbered wrongs which the Southern Indians have received at our hands, it gives us pleasure to record an act of justice toward an interesting Choctaw girl; while, at the same time, the incident which led to it is pertinent to our present purpose, which is, to show the amiable qualities which belong to the savages even in the untutored state. ”

“ These men living in their midst had opportunity to witness their extreme poverty, utter ignorance and general degradation. They also heard their personal appeals for the light of knowledge and Bible truth. Their sympathetic interest was awakened and began to manifest itself towards them.
They were occasionally accorded the privilege of attending religious services, and at Doaksville, during the ministry of Rev. Cyrus Kingsbury, were permitted to hold occasional Sabbath afternoon meetings in the Choctaw church. ”

“ At the moment some of the tribes, notably the Choctaw and Chickasaw, [21] were having domestic troubles that threatened a neighborhood war and the new fear of the white man’s further aggrandizement threw them into despair. The southern Indians, generally, were much more exercised and much more alarmed than were the northern. [22] Being more highly civilized, they were better able to comprehend the drift of events. ”

“ By the third article of that treaty the Choctaw Nation of Indians ceded to the United States the entire country they owned and possessed east of the Mississippi river, and agreed to remove beyond the Mississippi river as early as practicable, so that as many as possible of their people, not exceeding one-half of the whole number, should depart during the falls of 1831 and 1832, and the residue follow during the succeeding fall of 1833. ”

“ Their influence appears to have been used in stirring up the Indians to hostile acts, just as in New York the Iroquois were incited to attack the Canadians. The Choctaws, a powerful tribe, were on the whole friendly to the French. The wars in Louisiana were not so disastrous to the French as the raids of the Five Nations had proved in the Valley of the St. Lawrence. The vengeance of the Chickasaws was easily sated with a few Choctaw scalps, and perhaps with the capture of a few Indian women and children whom they could sell to the English settlers in Carolina as slaves. ”

“ In order simply to avoid future dispute, the United States desired the relinquishment by the Choctaw Nation of all claim to any territory west of the 100th degree of west longitude, and, in addition, it obtained a lease of the territory between the 98th and 100th degrees of west longitude for the permanent settlement of the Wichita and certain other tribes or bands of Indians, the right being reserved to the Choctaws and Chickasaws to settle on the leased territory as theretofore. ”

“ There were some friendly Indians, mostly from southern tribes, who fought under Wayne and Scott during the season of 1794; and among the rest about sixty Choctaws, commanded by a brave chief commonly called General Hummingbird, who more recently distinguished himself in the last war against the Creeks, (as the allies of the British.) He died December 23d, 1828, aged seventy-five, at his residence near the Choctaw agency, where he was buried with the honors of war. ”

“ These incidents relating to the special education of the first young people among the Choctaw Freedmen are quite suggestive and interesting.
These young people may be said to represent buds of promise found in the wilderness, where the wild flowers bloom that are cared for only by a Heavenly Father's eye. They are transplanted for a time, where they may receive Bible instruction, industrial training and a foretaste of the privileges of an enlightened christian civilization. ”

“ The Choctaw mission embraces eleven families and three large boarding schools. Five slaves, hired at their own desire, are in the employment of the missionaries. A less number are employed in the Cherokee mission. Gladly would the missionaries dispense with these, could the necessary amount of free labor for domestic service be obtained. Those who employ this slave labor, allege that it is to them a matter of painful necessity. They are known to resort to it unwillingly, and are not regarded as thereby giving their sanction to slavery. ”

“ Thus, in some tribes the paternal grandson and his grandfather call one another 'elder brother' and 'younger brother' respectively. These persons are of the same totem." [16] "Many other designations" in Mr. Morgan's Tables of Terms of Relationship "admit of a similar solution." [17] The terms do not denote degrees of blood relationship, but of brotherhood in the totem (or phratry, or matrimonial class) . It is so, too, with the Choctaw term for Mother. Every one knows who his mother, in our sense, is: the Choctaw term denotes a tribal status. ”

“ The Atakapas had their hunting grounds about Vermilion river and the adjacent Gulf coast. Their name in Choctaw means “man-eaters,” both they and their neighbors along the Texan coast having an ugly reputation as cannibals, differing in this from the Muskokis and their neighbors east of the Mississippi, among whom we have no record of anthropophagy, even of a ritual character. The later generations of Atakapas have been peaceful and industrious. ”

“ It would appear that some difficulty arose with the Choctaw and Delaware warriors, who had expected to receive higher wages than the law allowed for serving in the army. Such had been done with the Creeks, and undoubtedly had been promised the Choctaws and Delawares. To quiet these discontents, General Jessup wrote Colonel Davenport, on the seventh of November, saying, “I regret the circumstance to which you refer. The importance of fulfilling all our engagements with the Indians with the most scrupulous good faith, is unquestionable. ”

“ Permanent allotments of forty acres were to be made to each Chickasaw and Choctaw freedman, the remaining unallotted land was to be sold and the proceeds were to be used to equalize allotments as far as necessary, the balance being paid into the Treasury of the United States to the credit of the two tribes and distributed per capita as their other funds. ”

“ The latter, who, together with the Cherokees and Choctaws, fill up the southern portion of the Union, quite to the banks of the Mississippi, exist in juxtaposition to, and not as intruders within, the Algic circle. The Chickasaws are a scion of the Choctaws, as the Seminoles are of the Muscogees. The Choctaw and Muscogee are, radically, the same language. ”

“ Within this area many of the tribes were commonly known under Choctaw names, even though of widely differing linguistic stocks, and if such a name existed for the Cherokee it must undoubtedly have been communicated to the first Spanish explorers by De Soto’s interpreters. This theory is borne out by their Iroquois (Mohawk) name, Oyataʼgeʻronoñʼ, as given by Hewitt, signifying “inhabitants of the cave country,” the Allegheny region being peculiarly a cave country, in which “rock shelters,” containing numerous traces of Indian occupancy, are of frequent occurrence. ”

“ It had not been the choice of the travellers themselves, but of their Indian guide, who, as already stated, had presented himself to them at Bent’s Fort, and been engaged to conduct them through Bridger’s Pass. Speaking the white man’s tongue, though but indifferently, and being a Choctaw, as he declared himself, they had no suspicion of his honesty, until that very day, when a band of free trappers, who chanced to pass them on the route, and who knew something of the Indian’s character, had warned them to beware of him. ”

“ It has not escaped notice, that there may be reasons for such a classification, on philological grounds. No one can have given attention to the subject without perceiving marked resemblances and affiliations, in the southern groupe of languages, such as exist between the Choctaw and the Chickesaw, and with more remoteness between the latter and the great Muscogee, or Creek family. Points of harmony in the principles of utterance, exist between all these tribes, even where coincidences in their vocabularies are reduced to but a few instances. ”

“ If the river bed passed to the tribe, it was to be held by the Nation as property common to all. Moreover, the Cherokee patent expressly provided 'that the lands hereby granted shall revert to the United States, if the said Cherokee Nation becomes extinct, or abandons the same.' The Choctaw patent and treaties contained a similar condition. ”

“ In 1860 there were a few Louisiana Caddoes in the northwestern part of the Chickasaw country, most likely the same that, in 1866, were reported to have been driven out of Texas in 1839 by bushwhackers and then out of the Washita country at the opening of the Civil War. They continued throughout the war loyal to the United States. In 1853 the Choctaw General Council passed an act admitting to the rights of citizenship several Catawba Indians; and from that circumstance, the Office of Indian Affairs surmised that the Choctaws would be willing to incorporate Catawbas yet in the Carolinas. ”

“ But the more enlightened are married by preachers, or authorized civil officers.
With the united nation of Choctaws and Chickasaws, the executive power is vested in four chiefs, called in Choctaw mingoes, who are selected one from each of the districts into which the country is divided, {267} and of which the Chickasaw tribe constitutes one. [199] These chiefs are vested with the usual veto and pardoning powers, and are elected [p311] for four years. Most of their other constitutional provisions resemble those of the Cherokees. ”

“ There French garrisons held Mobile and Fort Alabama. The Creeks at this time numbered over four thousand warriors. The lands of the Choctaws, a tribe of even larger fighting strength, began two hundred miles north of New Orleans and extended along the Mississippi. A hundred and sixty miles northeast of the Choctaw towns were the Chickasaws, the bravest and most successful warriors of all the tribes south of the Iroquois. The Cherokees, in part seated within the Carolinas, on the upper courses of the Savannah River, mustered over six thousand men at arms. ”

“ Gov. James Glen. As corroborative of Adair: “We have advices from some of our traders that the Choctaw Indians (for many years past in the French interest) have invited them into their towns to trade, promising them a guard of 400 men; and as a testimony of their good intentions they brought with them the scalps of three Frenchmen.” S. C. Gazette, Nov. 4, 1746.
174. The celebrated and double-faced Red Shoes, leader of a faction of the Choctaws. He took part with the French in the war of 1736; but proving insolent after the war, Vaudreuil stopped the supply of arms and ammunition to his party. ”

“ Perhaps the Choctaw is afraid to let out so vital a secret. The less reticent Australian blurts it forth. Suppose the hypothesis correct. Men and women keep their lives in their naguals, private sacred beasts. But why, on this score, should a man be afraid to make love to a woman of the same nagual? Have Red Indian women any naguals? I never heard of them.
Since writing this I have read Miss Kingsley’s Travels in West Africa. There the ‘bush-souls’ which she mentions (p. 459) bear analogies to totems, being inherited sacred animals, connected with the life of members of families. ”

“ An obnoxious member of the legislature was sought, but fled and did not return.
One of the utterances of Tyler at the negro meeting recalled a remarkable incident in the history of Meridian. In a drunken brawl an Indian belonging to the Mississippi Choctaw tribe was killed there. A band of his tribesmen, in a spirit of retaliation, visited Meridian and killed the slayer. Tyler referred to this action of the Choctaws as an example worthy of emulation by his people. ”