Talk:Stand Watie/source
Stand Watie (1806-1871) was a member of the Cherokee nation, who had the distinction of being the only Native American on either side to rise to a brigadier general's rank during the American Civil War.
Stand Watie was born on the 12 December 1806, near Rome, Georgia. His father was David Watie (or Oowatie), who became a wealthy slave-owning planter in 1827. Stand learned to read and write English at a mission school in Georgia, and occasionally helped write for the Cherokee Phoenix newspaper, which led him into the dispute over the Georgia state repressive anti-Indian laws. Later, when gold was discovered on Cherokee lands in northern Georgia, and thousands of white settlers poached on Indian lands, only the federal treaties gave Indians any protection from the states. Nevertheless, in 1832, Georgia confiscated most of the Cherokee land, and the Georgia militia destroyed the Cherokee Phoenix.
In 1835, the Watie family agreed with the New Echota Treaty which required Cherokees to leave Georgia in return for 800,000 acres (3,237 km²) in the Indian Territory and a cash settlement. Other Cherokee factions disagreed and an internal civil war ensued, until a truce was established in 1846. Many murders were committed, including Stand Ridge’s uncle. After the truce was signed, Stand Watie joined the Tribal Council from then until 1861, eventually presiding over a Cherokee population of 21,000 in the Indian Territory in 1861.
The Confederacy[edit]
The Union abandoned all Indian Territory military posts in the spring of 1861, violating treaty pledges and making the area vulnerable to attack. As a slave-owning planter, Watie joined the Confederacy in 1861 because he feared the consequences of Lincoln's election and the Republican Party's free soil promises to open the west and the Indian Territory to white settlement.
Watie agreed to form a Cherokee cavalry unit after native American soldiers began to be recruited. At the Battle of Pea Ridge March 6-8, 1862, Stand Watie and his Cherokee Mounted Rifles captured Union artillery batteries in a dramatic charge and held their position to allow an orderly withdrawal of Earl Van Dorn's Confederate army. Pea Ridge began the Union invasion of the Indian Territory.
Although other Indian tribes began to desert, Stand Watie continued to fight. He took part in the Indian Expedition of 1862:
- June 28: the advance from Fort Leavenworth led by Col. William Weer, who sought to take over the Indian Territory lands for his personal gain. The capture of John Ross occurred at this time
- July 3: defeat at Locust Grove against the 6th Kansas Cavalry and the black First Kansas Colored Infantry. After Weer's officers had mutinied and retreated back to Kansas Watie was left in control of the Cherokee lands. His forces conducted a brutal campaign of revenge against pro-Union Cherokees and white missionaries. In
- September 30: Watie joined a Confederate raid into southwest Missouri led by Col. Cooper and Jo Shelby, defeating Frederick Salomon at Newtonia
Stand Watie conducted raids in 1863 and 1864, focusing on military targets and distributing captured supplies to his people:
- In November, 1863, he attacked the Union Cherokees at Tahlequah, Oklahoma, destroyed the town and burned the Rose Cottage of John Ross.
- In December, Gen. Samuel Maxey began to rebuild Confederate Indian forces in the Territory and Watie was ordered to increase his raids to force a Union withdrawal from Fort Gibson. From his bases south of the Canadian River in 1864, he captured hundreds of horses from Fort Gibson and deprived the Union cavalry of fresh mounts.
On May 6, 1864, Watie was promoted to Brigadier General.
Two of his greatest successes were probably:
- June 15 1864 at Pleasant Bluff, near the mouth of the Canadian River, he captured the steamer J. R. Williams carrying supplies to Fort Gibson.
- September 19 1864 he captured 300 supply wagons carrying $1.5 million worth of supplies in a federal wagon supply train in the second battle of Cabin Creek on September 19, 1864
Watie surrendered on June 23, 1865, the last Confederate general to lay down his arms. After the war, he served as a member of the Southern Cherokee delegation during the negotiation of the Cherokee Reconstruction Treaty of 1866. He then retired from public life.
Stand Watie died on Sept. 9, 1871, at his home on Honey Creek in Delaware County, Oklahoma.